Videoconferencing has been proposed as a technology which has an immediate and beneficial application to language learning, because it enables face-to-face communication at a distance. The costs remain high, however, and course providers need to be sure what additional ‘pedagogical overheads’ are involved, i.e. in the rethinking of teaching approaches and the preparation of material. This paper reports on a study of a videoconference tutorial carried out as part of the distance learning component of a course in Professional English. The study shows that the interaction between teacher, subject expert and students was characterised by the absence, as well as the presence, of important features of face-to-face communication, and that certain kinds of tutorial activity, such as individual correction, and the management of group discussion, were not especially well supported by the technology used. We discuss the implications of this for the pedagogy of language teaching by videoconference, and draw some lessons for the incorporation of the technology into the mainstream of distance language learning.

It is not bold to predict that in many countries it will soon be no morepossible for education systems to be computer-free than it already is for transport systems to be motor-vehicle-free. The technology simply has too much to offer in too many areas for people to ignore it or to be content todo without it. It is therefore in the interest of any community of learnersand teachers that very careful thought be given to the integration of computers into the education process if they are to avoid situations in the classroom that are informatic equivalents of traffic jams, exhaust pollution, lunatic drivers, and road fatalities. On the road, mayhem and casualties are minimised by such things as road rules, town planning, speed limits, vehicle inspection, sign-posting, traffic lights, speed cameras and random breath testing.

Formes Cachées is a visuo-spatial puzzle in the form of a computer game. Users participate in the game by means of a natural language interface through which they ask questions and give instructions. Solving the puzzle therefore involves using language in a purposeful way as a tool rather than as subject matter. This article describes a French version of the game. In its current form the game would be mainly of novelty value in foreign language teaching, but its techniques could be used in creating software to cover a more extensive range of language.

The software, which runs under Microsoft Windows in 800 x 600 SVGA, may be downloaded from the CT1 Modern Languages World Wide Web server, http://www.hull.ac.uk/cti/software.htm

Mindful of how much time is needed to produce satisfactory texts for standard CALL authoring packages, it is surprising that an abundant source of free, first-class, totally authentic and up-to-date raw material still remains largely untapped for supplementing course material and for self-access language learning.