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LTPSS Spanish teacher in Board of Directors of SinoELE Journal and Research Group
2010-02-08 15:44:02
LTPSS Spanish teacher in Board of Directors of SinoELE Journal and Research Group
Mr. Nicolás Arriaga Agrelo, LTPSS Spanish panel head presents us SinoELE, a journal and a research group specialized in the teaching of Spanish as a Foreign Language to Native Speakers of Chinese. He is one of the directors and founding members.
www.sinoele.org ISSN: 2076 5533
SinoELE is an international research group and a biannual publication created by José Miguel Blanco Pena, Alberto Sánchez Griñán and Nicolás Arriaga Agrelo (LTPSS). Its main goal is to promote the studies about the teaching (and learning) of Spanish as a Foreign Language to Chinese native speakers.
The work of SinoELE is to advance in the following directions:
a) research projects proposed, and carried out by SinoELE group members;
b) a thorough collection of original, adapted or already published papers, dissertations and didactic materials meant to address the needs of the teachers and learners of Spanish as a foreign language in the Chinese-speaking contexts; and
c) through an academic journal, published online and open to collaborations from all the teaching professionals in the community in the form of articles, book reviews, and other materials related to the teaching and learning of Spanish in the already mentioned cases.
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Presentation of the Issue one of SinoELE Journal.
The teachers of Spanish as a foreign language (ELE) working with Chinese speaking students often perceive the need of a common space to share experiences, solve doubts and find solutions to difficulties that are specific to students and teachers with our particular backgrounds. As experience tells us, the teaching and the learning Spanish in the context where we work actually share many common features with other contexts, but they also present some special characteristics that require special treatment.
Fortunately, and considering the huge distance we aim to cover when we refer to the native speaker of Chinese, there have been virtual spaces for communication among specialists where issues related to the teaching of Spanish as a foreign language to Chinese speaking learners are occasionally debated. Forums such as “ELE-Asia-Pacifico” (coordinated also by LTPSS teacher Nicolas Arriaga Agrelo, at Red-Iris Spanish Academic & Research Network) or “E/LE Oriental” at “Todoele” are good examples of the most successful ones.
Most of the existing research publications of Spanish as a Foreign Language are of a more general character. This, no question of its value, also poses a double disadvantage to us: On the one hand, not all that is published appears useful, applicable or attractive; and, on the other hand, what it can actually work for us gets unmapped a little island in the middle of the increasingly widening ocean of language methodology literature. On the other hand, there are a striking number of publications by our colleagues in the field of English for Chinese learners, since long time ago. As far as we are aware of, there is no equivalent for Spanish neither on print or online.
These are some of the reasons why we have created a publication that can link theoretical reflections and teaching practices of professionals in the field, that are directly related with the Chinese speaking learner. Not less importantly, we believe that the appearance of such a vehicle will eventually stimulate new research in the area.
SinoELE becomes then the first publication of Spanish Applied Linguistics and teaching methodology accounting for the specificities of the Chinese learner and the Chinese contexts.
SinoELE, thus, is born with the support of a competent team of teachers and researchers to fill in a gap in the area of Spanish as a Foreign Language, and in this first issue we would like to present it with the hope but also the certainty that we are offering a serious, interesting, useful and necessary reference in our field.
