14 FOSTERING LEARNERS’ SOCIOCULTURAL COMPETENCE of the target culture has long been on the forefront of foreign language (FL) education. In 1999, the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) stressed the need for FL learners to understand target culture members’ perspectives toward their ways of life and their contributions to the world by adding the Cultures Standards to the National Standards for Foreign Language Learning. Similarly, the 2007 report by the Modern Language Association Ad Hoc Committee on Foreign Languages emphasized the need to train FL learners to reflect on the world through the lens of another language and culture. Despite the efforts of national organizations, a recent ACTFL survey (Phillips) reports that FL educators still find it difficult to integrate extended cultural work into their lessons. Sercu found another concern expressed by surveyed FL educators—that cultural instruction re- inforces learners’ pre-existing stereotypes—particularly in introductory courses emphasizing target-language instruction. The present study re- sponds to these concerns by proposing a model in which cultural instruc- tion emphasizing the perspectives of target culture members occurred in a computer-mediated environment in English, outside of the classroom, preserving target language use for classroom instruction. The case studies reported here show three beginning French language learners’ develop- mental processes at work as they maximized their cross-cultural under- standing and minimized their pre-existing stereotypes of French people and culture in online discussions among peers. By providing a detailed description of an online classroom discussion board as a venue for learners to collectively reflect on computer-mediated cultural instruction, the study also responds to the call put forth in a recent AATF study (Lomicka Anderson and Williams) where over 60% of French teacher respondents desired to learn more about online discussion boards to improve their instruction. THE FRENCH REVIEW, Vol. 86, No. 5, April 2013 Printed in U.S.A. Maximizing Cross-Cultural Understanding, Minimizing Stereotypes: Three Case Studies by Paula Garrett-Rucks 86.5.Article 1-7:86.5 12/13/12 12:03 PM Page 14