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Department of Applied Linguistics Spring 2017 The Pennsylvania State University D EAR M EMBERS AND F RIENDS OF A PPLIED L INGUISTICS rom my perspective, this STEM grad students (ITAs) who are L2 speak- tion! Who are the teachers in the time of year is marked by ers of English. videos? You guessed it. Our own F annual reviews, which gives grad students, members of the me the unique privilege of a 360 de- Now, if you have all those acronyms down, IECP faculty, and members of the gree view of the department, start- here’s the crisscrossing synergy. Over this ESL faculty. ing with each individual’s personal past summer, Stephen Looney worked with So from one point of view, the accomplishments, but ultimately faculty and grad students in the ITA program CEAPP project has triggered inno- encompassing the various criss- to develop video clips out of the database to vative pedagogical applications crossing synergies that make use in courses (ESL 115, ESL 117, and ESL 118) and cutting-edge research with APLNG sizzle all year. with the International Teaching Assistants video data. But from another per- here at Penn State. Then, along with two of spective (mine), it has also brought Let me talk about just one of these our graduate students, he used data from the together people in a collaborative that you might not know about. CEAPP database to publish an article in the community in ways that optimize Stephen Looney (Director of the Journal of Pragmatics about ITA instruction. their expertise, incites their creativ- International Teaching Assistant Finally, Stephen’s group is working with a col- ity, and foments their scholarship Program; ITA) and Joan Kelly Hall league at Cornell to revise and refine these and teaching. (Director of the Center for Research materials over the coming year. on English Language Learning and And this is just one example of the Teaching; CRELLT) have been work- From another angle, Daisuke Kimura (4th year many, many collaborations that ing on a pedagogical- and research- PhD student), Joan Kelly Hall, and Taiane Mal- mark the community and culture of focused videocorpus database called abarba (a former Visiting Scholar with us from APLNG. So from my perspective, the Corpus of English for Academic the Universidad do Vale do Rio do Sinos, Bra- spring is a time when I see how and Professional Purposes (or CE- zil) used the experience of building the CEAPP APLNG blooms, and I get quite a APP). The full-length videos include, database to give a presentation on video tech- view of the whole enchanted land- on the one hand, classroom instruc- nologies in teacher education at the American scape. I hope our Spring 2017 tion in English from courses con- Association of Applied Linguistics in Portland newsletter gives you the same ex- ducted by faculty in the Intensive this past March. In the same session at AAAL, perience! English Communication Program (or Michael Amory (3rd year PhD student) drew on IECP) and, on the other hand, class- the CEAPP data to give a presentation on mul- room, lab, and office hours in STEM timodality, and the whole session was orga- fields conducted by international nized by our applied linguist colleague, Mari Haneda, in the Penn State College of Educa- Bob Schrauf APLNG Newsletter │ Page 2 M EET O UR N EW C OLLEAGUES Jason Litzenberg, Ph.D., was ap- troduction of an entirely new curriculum, pointed as Director of the Intensive Eng- which incorporated insights gained from a lish Communication Program (IECP) and needs analysis that he conducted with a col- is a Senior Lecturer in Applied Linguis- league. tics. He joined the department in fall 2016. He comes to University Park from Dr. Litzenberg has over 20 years experience in Universidad de Investigación de the field of ELT. He has worked at a range of Tecnología Experimental (Yachay Tech) institution types in various regions of the in Imbabura Province, Ecuador. He world, including Germany, the UAE, Ecuador, spent two years developing the English and the United States. He is interested in Language Program for this new English teacher development, curriculum design, pro- medium-of-instruction university, during gram development, language ideology and which time he oversaw the rapid growth attitudes, and linguistic landscapes – areas of the program and a doubling of full- which have influenced some of his recent pro- time faculty to over 25 instructors. fessional endeavors. Last year he presented at AAAL on a linguistics landscapes project, at At Yachay Tech, he also managed the IA-TEFL on teacher training, and in March of smooth transfer of the language pro- this year he lead a panel on institutional col- gram from an overseas administrative laboration in English program development at unit to a local one, and oversaw the in- the International TESOL conference in Seat- tle. Kevin McManus, Ph.D., was ap- guage Acquisition. Dr. McManus also exam- pointed as the Associate Director of the ines language learning during study abroad Center for Language Acquisition. He and the impact of learners’ social networks holds the Gil Watz Early Career Profes- and language engagement on development. sorship in Language and Linguistics and is The findings from this large-scale, longitudi- assistant professor in Applied Linguistics. nal project will be published by Routledge as He came to Penn State in fall 2016 after Anglophone Students Abroad: Identity, Social completing a three-year British Academy Relationships, and Language Learning; co- Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University authored with Rosamond Mitchell and Ni- of York, UK. Prior to that he was a re- cole Tracy-Ventura). A major additional out- search associate at the University of put of this project was the creation of a Southampton. His doctoral degree is in freely accessible learner corpus of L2 French second language acquisition and French and Spanish (http://langsnap.soton.ac.uk) from Newcastle University. At Penn State, a large part of his responsibili- Dr. McManus’ research and teaching fo- ties is in the Center for Language Acquisi- cus is in second language acquisition, tion, where , in collaboration with others, he especially classroom learning and study is expanding connections with the college’s abroad. He is particularly interested in language departments and developing new language awareness, a core focus of his initiatives through intensive workshops, a British Academy project that investigated Language Teaching Forum, and a new fel- the learning benefits of raising learners’ lowship program for lecturer faculty. awareness about first and second lan- guage properties. Initial findings have been published in Studies in Second Lan- APLNG Newsletter │ Page 3 Jialing Wang, M.Ed., joined the immersion programs, and universities. Department of Applied Linguistics in Prior to Jialing Wang’s move to October 2016 as a research technologist University Park, she was the regional for both the Center for Language manager for Africa and South Asia of a Acquisition (CLA) and the Center for large automobile corporation. Advanced Language Proficiency Education and Research (CALPER). Jialing Wang’s current responsibilities in our department include managing In 2012, Jialing Wang graduated from the day-to-day research and outreach University of Georgia with a Master’s activities of the CLA and CALPER, degree in TESOL and World Language coordinating ongoing initiatives and Education. She has several years of professional development activities for experience teaching both in the U.S. and language teachers, monitoring in China in a variety of institutional budgets, and supporting grant contexts — public schools, language development of the Department. T HE MA TESL P ROGRAM he MA TESL program continues Department Open House. To help our off campus. Students attend to attract talented students from MAs prepare for the poster session, we across the globe. Currently, workshops offered by the Schreyer T provide a special workshop on poster Institute for Teaching Excellence, there are 35 students in our program, design. This workshop is one of several and fifteen of those students graduated and many give back to our academic workshops offered community by volunteering to this spring. As part of the graduation throughout the year, and each is requirements, each student completes teach and tutor at Mid-State provided to help our MAs navigate the Literacy Council, State College’s two capstone projects—the MA paper demands of the MA program. and an electronic portfolio. local literacy council. In addition to supporting their academic We are proud of the achievements This spring marked the third year that development, we also encourage our our MAs had the opportunity to of our MA TESL students and students to participate in professional pleased with their commitment to showcase their papers in a poster development opportunities both on and session held at our spring APLNG the profession. Sharon Childs APLNG Newsletter │ Page 4 T HE IECP P ROGRAM he IECP has experienced some exciting changes dur- are experiencing dramatic decreases in student enrollment, ing the past year. In July, the IECP welcomed its new a situation being exacerbated by the national political cli- T Director, Dr. Jason Litzenberg, who holds a PhD in mate. The IECP is currently seeking accreditation by UCIEP, Applied Linguistics from Georgia State University and an organization of university and college-administered In- comes to Penn State from Universidad de Investigación de tensive English Programs, in order to increase its visibility as Tecnología Experimental (Yachay Tech) in Ecuador, where a program of excellence in the crowded market. he spent almost two years leading the establishment of the English Language Program at this recently founded institu- Indeed, student recruitment is an imperative of the IECP for tion. This past year also saw the complete implementation 2017.

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