About

Interactive Italian is based on the following language learning principles:

• comprehensible input (Krashen 1982)
• Pareto principle (Davies 2005)
• situated meaning (Gee 2004)
• gamification (Gee 2003)
• going slow (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• circling (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• staying in bounds (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• spaced repetition (Reynolds 1964, Hintzman 1974, Dempster 1989)
• active recall (Glenn 2009)
• concept and comprehension checking (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• fast feedback (Chen et al 2010)
• teaching to the eyes (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• pop-up grammar (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)
• personalization (Ray & Seely 1998, Waltz 2015)

The use of technology is designed to supplement presentations of the material in a classroom by a human teacher and to enable teachers to spend more time giving students individual attention and less time engaging in presentation and practice activities that can be automated. The technology also enables the automation of marking and the detailed tracking of progress in achieving educational outcomes. On the basis of detailed data, teachers can focus on areas where students are having difficulties.

References

Krashen, Stephen D., (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Oxford, New York: Pergamon Press.

Gee, James Paul. (2003). What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy. New York: Palgrave/Macmillan.

Gee, James Paul. (2004). Situated language and learning: A critique of traditional schooling. London: Routledge.

Ray, Blaine & Seely, Contee (1998). Fluency Through TPR Storytelling: Achieving Real Language Acquisition in School. Berkeley, CA: Command Performance Language Institute.

Waltz, T. (2015). TPRS with Chinese Characteristics. Albany, NY: Squid for Brains.

Davies, M. (2005). "Vocabulary range and text coverage: Insights from the forthcoming Routledge frequency dictionary of Spanish." Selected proceedings of the 7th Hispanic linguistics symposium, Citeseer.

Hintzman, D. L. (1974). "Theoretical implications of the spacing effect." In Theories in cognitive psychology: The Loyola Symposium. Editor: R. L. Solso. Oxford, England, Lawrence Erlbaum.

Reynolds, J. H. and R. J. Glaser (1964). "Effects of repetition and spaced review upon retention of a complex learning task." Journal of Educational Psychology 55(5): 297.

Dempster, F. N. (1989). "Spacing effects and their implications for theory and practice." Journal of Educational Psychology Review 1(4): 309-330.

Glenn, D. (2009). "Close the book. Recall. Write it down." The Chronicle of Higher Education 55(34): A1.

Chen, J. C., et al. (2010). "Classes that click: Fast, rich feedback to enhance student learning and satisfaction." Journal of Engineering Education 99(2): 159-168.