Integrating Second Life Into a Chinese Language Teacher Training Program: A Pilot Study

Second Life (SL), a 3-D Multi-User Virtual Environment, has been found beneficial to foreign language education because of its immersive and interactive environments. This cross-continental study explored feasibilities of using Second Life to provide field experiences to pre-service Mandarin teachers in a program of Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language in Taiwan. This study also investigated pre-service teachers‘ insights of teaching Chinese in such a virtual environment, as well as the difficulties these teachers encountered when integrating Second Life in teaching Chinese. The study found that the more teaching experience the pre-service teachers gained in teaching Chinese in Second Life, the more positive an attitude they would develop toward adopting Second Life in teaching Chinese virtually, and in contrast, the less frustrations they would have for technical challenges when teaching in Second Life.