Abstract:

This paper aims to present an insight into non-formal education practices that can be used in teaching foreign language, with emphasis on digital tools that have become increasingly popular given the pandemic context. The article will present the methods and strategies used in online teaching of Romanian as a foreign languages, exploring the best ways to combine formal and non-formal approaches in order to reach the best results.

Online teaching presents serious challenges, as it paradoxically creates a feeling of disconnection and detachment in students. Lack of face to face interaction can hinder learning and diminish performance, especially since the switch to such a paradigm happened suddenly and without proper preparation of the teaching staff. However, to fight lack of interest in students, a set of non-formal tools should be used to create sound bonds between educational actors, and to make classes dynamic and engaging.

The article presents a set of educational strategies used in online teaching of Romanian as a foreign language in the period April – May 2021, which used authentic contexts to support learning. Traditional language teaching approaches were combined with storytelling and activities performed on renowned online platforms (kahoot, fakebook, wordwall, socrative, etc.), meanwhile visual support for learning (pictures, videos etc.) was provided. Moreover, the teacher generated genuine communication contexts that would help students develop their communicational skills. The study presents the results obtained following a consistent approach that employed, in a balanced manner, non-formal education tools applied in the virtual environment, as well challenges and possible solutions.

Keywords:

Non-formal education, online education, storytelling.