CALL and Web training with teacher self-empowerment: A departmental and long-term approach

This paper examines the benefits of self-empowering, group in-service training (INSET). It incorporates evidence from several case studies. The training involves the teaching and practising of relevant skills, as a departmental group, in the evaluation, selection and use of various computer-assisted language learning (CALL) and Web materials. Prior assessment of the needs of individual teachers and those of the department as a whole inform subsequent targeting of the training content. These needs range from a self-confessed paucity of awareness of CALL materials among modern foreign language teachers to the effective use of multi-media authoring materials across the whole ability range. There is a description of a typical training session which reveals that there must be at least two facilitators offering expertise on the CALL materials being presented and practical teacher-training experience of the challenges teachers face within the classroom. The benefits of a model which supports team work and an educative process, and which holds a balance between theoretical issues and practical hands-on experience, is shown to be effective. The paper concludes with an evaluation of this form of INSET and proposes recommendations for further development and dissemination.