The myriad of possibilities brought about by the advent of Web 2.0 in terms of communication and interaction have revolutionised educational practices over the past few years. One of the most promising educational approaches resulting from this revolution is online intercultural exchange or telecollaboration, which has been reported to contribute towards the development of 21st century competences. Many of the benefits of online intercultural exchange have been extensively explored in the literature and numerous studies have been carried out. However, very few studies have looked into the differences between an L1 or mother tongue exchange and an L2 or lingua franca exchange as far as the development of 21st century competences is concerned. This paper aims at filling this gap by exploring and comparing the results of two configurations of Online Intercultural Exchange carried out over a period of 4 months with 125 participants. The results indicate that the L1 exchange was perceived as more beneficial than the L2 exchange for most of the competences studied (linguistic and communicative competences, Language for Specific Purposes learning, learner autonomy and teamwork). Meanwhile, the L2 exchange was considered as more beneficial for the development of intercultural competence. Furthermore, no significant differences were observed regarding digital literacy.

<p>Digital Storytelling is a powerful pedagogical tool for both students and educators, which started to be used for teaching and learning purposes a few years ago, becoming more and more popular over time. The use of digital storytelling in non-specific language learning contexts has been widely explored, as shown in the literature. However, its use in technical-scientific contexts of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) has not been so widely studied. This paper explores a project of digital storytelling for ESP carried out at the Universitat Politècnica de València, in Spain. The methodology was divided into several stages: completing a pre- and a post-survey, learning about digital storytelling by doing a WebQuest, making decisions about their digital stories (topic, plot, software and media), sharing their stories with their classmates through the PoliformaT LMS, watching their classmates' digital stories, using the forum to write their comments about their digital stories and their classmates', keeping a log and preparing and presenting their “making of” in front of the class, and assessing both their peers’ digital stories and their oral presentations. The overall results were very positive, as students were highly satisfied with their progress in learning and developing different skills, these being mainly linguistic, research, writing, organisation, digital, presentation, interpersonal, problem-solving and critical-thinking skills.</p>

The aim of this research study around the co-construction and sharing of authentic and meaningful artefacts within the 'Youth Entrepreneurship for Society' virtual exchange was to find out how the implementation of artefact-based telecollaborative tasks fosters 21st competences and social entrepreneurship in English for Specific Purposes settings. The project tasks were informed by constructionism and supported virtual collaboration an effort to promote social justice. They revolved around social entrepreneurship in English for Specific Purposes contexts, aiming to connect the classroom with the outside world through the involvement of local organisations, while fostering students' twenty-first century competences: intercultural, linguistic, digital and teamwork as well as social entrepreneurial mindset. The two research questions which guided the study were: (1) How does the implementation of artefactbased tasks in English for Specific Purposes contexts contribute to students' perceived development of twenty-first century competences? (2) In what ways can the implementation of artefact-based telecollaborative tasks foster social entrepreneurship in English for Specific Purposes contexts?The results of the study conducted with 42 participants indicate that the virtual exchange was perceived as having positively contributed to connecting the classroom with the outside world through the involvement of mentor civil organisations, while fostering students' twenty-first century competences.

RESUMENEste artículo versa sobre la integración de la telecolaboración, o intercambio intercultural en línea, en contextos de educación superior, para el desarrollo de la competencia intercultural en el aula inglés como lengua extranjera. Se analiza, desde la perspectiva de los estudiantes, un intercambio de telecolaboración en que participantes de España y de Estados Unidos colaboraron en grupos interculturales y plurinacionales para llevar a cabo una serie de tareas cuya complejidad cognitiva iba progresivamente en aumento: creación de un perfil digital, grabación de un vídeo de presentación, interacción multimodal (texto, audio, videoconferencia) para discutir y debatir los diferentes temas propuestos, creación de relatos digitales y realización de una presentación oral. Los datos cualitativos y cuantitativos analizados fueron obtenidos mediante un pre-y un post-cuestionario. La complejidad de llevar a cabo este tipo de proyectos apunta la necesidad de una revisión curricular que permita la "normalización" (Bax, 2000(Bax, , 2003; Chambers y Bax, 2006) de las Tecnologías de la Información y de la Comunicación en el aula para un uso efectivo e integrado de las mismas en las prácticas docentes del siglo XXI. Asimismo, el apoyo institucional en forma de reconocimiento, provisión de recursos e inclusión de este tipo de proyectos como parte integral de las diferentes asignaturas se perfila como el elemento clave para que este tipo de iniciativas alcancen los objetivos propuestos. Palabras clave: telecolaboración, competencia intercultural, educación superior, normalización "You realize that the world can be so different and similar at the same time": Telecollaboration and the development of the intercultural competence in higher education ABSTRACT This paper revolves around the integration of telecollaboration, or online intercultural exchange, in higher education settings for the development of the intercultural competence in the English as a Foreign Language classroom. The perspective of the participants in a telecollaboration exchange from both Spain and the United States is analysed. The students collaborated in plurinational, multicultural groups so as to complete a set of tasks, the cognitive complexity of which was progressively increased: creating a digital profile, recording an introduction video, multimedia interaction (e.g. text, audio, videoconferencing) discussing and debating suggested topics, creating digital stories and planning and delivering an oral presentation. The qualitative and quantitative data analysed were gathered by means of a pre-and a post-questionnaire. The complexity of carrying out these kinds of projects points out the need for a curricular revision which allows for the normalisation (Bax, 2000(Bax, , 2003Chambers & Bax, 2006) of Information and Communications Technologies in the classroom. This in turn would imply an effective and integrated use of those technologies within 21st century teaching practices. Furthermore, institutional support in the form of recognition, provision of...

This article focuses on the affordances of a digital storytelling project in developing students' language, digital and other skills: learning and innovation, creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, team working, and life and career skills. The project was undertaken by university English for Specific Purposes students and was conducted within an Online Intercultural Exchange between the Cyprus University of Technology and the University of Valencia. Its design was based on a Project-Based Learning (PBL) methodology. It incorporated active learning and multimodal resources and capabilities. The need for transforming language teaching pedagogies was borne in mind, as it is necessary for responding to an era of changes which requires students to be active producers of content, innovative, motivated and engaged in their own learning. The qualitative and quantitative findings were drawn from data gathered by means of an evaluation questionnaire administered to students upon completion of the project.