Digital video conferencing in Algerian English curricula to enhance learners’ intercultural communicative competence : the case of doctoral students at Batna-2 University-Algeria

Abstract EN

This paper is an empirical research that attempts to make contributions to the English Language Pedagogy.

It aims at introducing Digital Video Conferencing (DVC) in teaching Algerian students.

The teaching/learning process has long been undergoing traditional teaching in the sense that classrooms tend to be teacher-centered.

Teachers play the role of the ‘sage on the stage’, for they entirely depend on lecturing and monopolizing talk which drive learners to get bored, daydream, or even do something else such as texting friends (personal observation).

Therefore, embedding DVC in the teaching/learning process is of paramount importance in order to swing the balance to a more learner-centered extreme; this would prioritize learners’ benefits and put their learning above all, and would restrict the role of the teacher to that of a ‘guide on the side’ since learners favour being involved in what they are exposed to.

Albeit beneficial in getting learners engaged and in enhancing their Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC), it is overlooked or granted to the elite of students.

Nevertheless, many researchers opined and proved its usefulness in authenticating learning, in generating a sense of problem-solving urgency, in social engagement, in making learners blissfully productive, and in creating future teachers with a global profile.

1 In this investigation we adhere to the experimental research where a control group is taught through traditional teaching while an experimental one is part of the DVC programme at Batna-2 University.

The results revealed the development of the components of ICC (Intercultural sensitivity, intercultural awareness, and intercultural adroitness) in the experimental group in comparison to the control group whose results did not improve.