Computer-Mediated Communication and the Italian News: an Integrated Approach to Foreign Language Learning

This paper describes a project which integrated email communication between native speakers (NS) and non-native speakers (NNS) and the Italian daily broadcast telegiornale (tg) in the context of foreign language learning. For one semester students of Italian at the University of Wollongong regularly watched the Italian telegiornale and met once a week to discuss it with the instructor and the rest of the class. As part of the project learners participated in one-to-one email interactions with selected NS of Italian and discussed a range of topics presented in the news. This paper discusses some of the key characteristics of the project and the implications of this integrated approach in terms of learners' motivation and participation.