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Article published In: Filling the Void: Young language learners and the intercultural domain
Edited by Sandie Mourão and Raphaelle Beecroft
[Language Teaching for Young Learners 6:2] 2024
► pp. 220–242

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Asynchronous virtual exchange and young English learners’ intercultural communicative competence

An exploratory study

 | Chemnitz University of TechnologyChemnitz, Germany
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 19 September 2024
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ltyl.00054.rea
Abstract
Virtual Exchange, by definition, connects groups of students in different countries for online intercultural communication (Lewis, T., & O’Dowd, R. (2016). Introduction to online intercultural exchange and this volume. In R. O’Dowd & T. Lewis (Eds.), Online Intercultural Exchange: Policy, Pedagogy, Practice (pp. 3–20). Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). This exploratory study presents and analyses an asynchronous video exchange between sixth grade students in two countries with the goal of exploring which of Byram’s objectives for intercultural communicative competence (Byram, M. (2021). Teaching and assessing intercultural communicative competence: Revisited (2nd ed.). Multilingual Matters. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) can be addressed with young learners. The asynchronous video exchange project presented in this article was carried out between young English learners in Germany and English L1 speakers in the United States. Transcripts and observation notes from project meetings in Germany and transcripts of two videoconferences held with the two groups at the beginning and end of the exchange were analyzed qualitatively using Byram’s objectives for intercultural communicative competence (Byram, M. (2021). Teaching and assessing intercultural communicative competence: Revisited (2nd ed.). Multilingual Matters. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) as deductive codes in order to reveal which objectives were addressed during the exchange project. Eighteen of Byram’s 30 objectives were addressed to some degree in the current project. Those objectives will be discussed and considerations for future exchanges will be presented in view of these initial results.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Virtual exchange
    • 2.1Forms of virtual exchange
    • 2.2Tasks in virtual exchange projects
  • 3.Intercultural communicative competence
  • 4.VE projects for promoting ICC in young learners
  • 5.Research question
  • 6.Methodology of the study
    • 6.1The asynchronous virtual exchange project
    • 6.2The participating schools
    • 6.3Structure of the VE
  • 7.Research design
  • 8.Initial results
    • 8.1Intercultural communicative competence
      • 8.1.1Attitudes
      • 8.1.2Knowledge
      • 8.1.3Skills of interpreting and relating
      • 8.1.4Skills of discovery and interaction
      • 8.1.5Critical cultural awareness
  • 9.Discussion
  • 10.Conclusion
  • References
References (24)
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Funk, Alexandra, Lukas Eibensteiner & Laurenz Volkmann
2025. Virtual Exchanges in Teacher Education: Gleanings from a Digital Internationalization Project. In The Palgrave Handbook of Internationalization of Language Education, ► pp. 235 ff. DOI logo

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