What is it?
Role-playing in language learning comes in handy to teach both communication and intercultural skills as it places students in a specific scenario providing context and characters, they should identify in. It also teaches appropriateness, promotes self-confidence and enrich students’ vocabulary in relation to the scenario the role-play is covering. As scenario in a role-play is usually conflictual, it is also useful to improve decision-making and problem-solving skills in your students.
Benefits of e-learning
Role-playing boosts interaction among students and comes in many shapes in e-learning. It can be used in synchronous activities, to train students’ oral skills, or “disguised” in interactive videos, quizzes or other types of activities when focusing more on training decision-making and problem-solving skills.
Tips for effective role-playing
In this second case, make sure you use avatars, pictures to present the characters involved and make the scenario more realistic. As we said, role-plays should enhance students’ decision-making and problem-solving skills, so make sure your role-plays always include decisions to make, challenges to face, conflicts to solve. A way to present decisions and challenges is to create multiple-choice questions.