The language department at Langara College has two language labs: a teaching lab with 36 stations and a language study student lab with 7 stations. Language classes have weekly or bi-weekly sessions to focus on listening and speaking skills. Most speaking and listening exams and practice sessions are held in the lab and recorded for grading and personalized feedback on pronunciation. The study lab is open from morning to evening to allow students to practice listening and speaking skills. Workstations are equipped with high-quality headsets for recording audio.
Langara's language department uses Sanako Study 1200, a language lab platform designed to allow students to actively participate in language learning exercises and practice more during classes than is possible in a traditional classroom environment.
During regular language lab sessions, instructors may assign students to pairs and groups and allow them to practice different exercises that focus on interactive and oral language skills, therefore improving even the most difficult parts of language learning, like pronunciation and intonation, with a wide array of activities including listening comprehension, model imitation, reading practice, and paired or group discussion.
Using a simple method of dual track recording and allowing individual students to insert their recordings alongside a master track/file along with recapping, inserting their own voice and comparing the results in audio graph mode gives the students the tools they need to reinforce learning and stay motivated with visual and auditory feedback. These recordings can be saved by students for self-evaluation and progress monitoring and collected by instructors for review and feedback.
The language lab enables instructors and students to move from passive to active learning and prepare students for real life scenarios when speaking and using foreign languages.
