Christine Pleines

Profile

As a Lecturer within the German section at the Department of Languages , I write distance language learning materials and have been contributing to all Open University German courses. My background is in Applied Linguistics and my research interests are in the field of Second Language Acquisition. I am currently working on a corpus of spoken learner language as well as quantitative data gathered from distance language learners (beginners and improvers) regarding the development of their spoken competence in the target language.

Teaching Interests

I enjoy developing print-based and multimedia language learning materials, and am particularly interested in developing students' spoken linguistic competence in a distance learning environment and in raising cultural awareness.

I've contributed to teaching at the OU in the following roles:
• joint course team chair (production) for L203r Motive (from July 2006)
• member of L130r Auftakt course team, Dvd-Rom development
• member of Spanish course team (Oct 2004 – Aug 2005)
• staff tutor overseeing Open University language provision in London (Nov 2003-Feb 2004)
• joint course team chair (production) for German beginner’s course Rundblick (2001-2002, 2004)
• tutor and course director at second and third level residential schools and on the ‘Alternative Learning Experience’ (Lyceum/telephone tuition) (from 1998)
• award board chair of L130 Auftakt (1998)
• course team chair of L130 Auftakt (May 1997 - June 1999)
• book co-ordinator for second level courses L203 Motive and L213 Variationen (1996-1999)
• author and co-ordinator of preparatory study pack Café Einklang and first level German course L130 Auftakt (1995-1997)

Research Interests

interests in the area of foreign language acquisition and language teaching methodology the acquisition of speaking skills at a distance

Publications