Towards an Effective Use of Computer Related Technologies in Reading Literary Texts: a Pilot Study

Abstract

Technology can have a reciprocal relationship with teaching. The emergence of new technologies pushes teachers to understand and accommodate these technologies for classroom use; at the same time, the on-the-ground implementation of these technologies in the classroom can directly impact how these technologies continue to take shape. One method of accommodation to education is through the use of technology in literature circle. The literature circle is a cooperative activity involving higher level thinking that is being used to support the process of learning. Technology can be used to accommodate students with different levels in a literature circle by providing accommodations to student interactions, reading material and role activities and assignments. Today, every teacher is a reading teacher, because every teacher is responsible for promoting literacy in his/her content area. Teachers are also expected to teach their students to use higher level and critical thinking skills and are required to make accommodations for all students in their classes, an occurrence that has become more common in today’s schools. It is a fact that the use of computers becomes a revolution in the history of human life in all aspects and the process of language learning and teaching could not be exempted from this. Many institutions around the world have integrated computer-assisted language learning (CALL) into their curricula. The main aims of this paper is to shed the light on the impacts of ICT on the process of language learning and literature teaching and to explore the attitudes of students in the department of English in the university of Chlef- Algeria towards using technology in literature class besides demonstrating the significance of ICT in maximizing students’ autonomy. The findings show that students have very positive attitudes towards utilizing ICT in literature classes on one hand, on the other hand, because of the challenges that might hamper the use of ICT in class there should be more actions that will be taken to promote the use of ICT in Literature lessons in the future.