English-language education at tertiary level: Between low- and high-tech
Convenor: Anila R. Scott-Monkhouse
The status of English in academia as language of international communication requires high and multimodal student proficiency. The goal of this colloquium is to discuss a student survey conducted at five universities in Czech Republic, Israel, Italy and Uzbekistan, and evaluate the role of CALL in boosting student autonomy. A questionnaire we designed in 2019 focused on the students’ assessment of various formats of CALL; a new survey was developed in 2021 to verify changes in attitudes. Our analyses will consider institutional contexts (modes of instruction, learner goals, exposure to English beyond class settings), as well as the sociolinguistic situation in each country.
Paper 1: English-language education at tertiary level: Between low- and high-tech, CZECH REPUBLIC
Libor Stepanek, Language Centre, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic
This presentation aims to analyse the influence of ICT use in EAP courses on learning and examining processes at Masaryk University (MU) before and during the pandemic situation. The position of CALL in EAP courses is addressed in the context where Czech, Slovak and English are the official academic languages. Masaryk University offers a variety of face-to-face, blended and fully online, one-to-four-semester courses, intensive courses, summer schools, and individual sessions. Each faculty and each student can choose their own style and intensity of language support; the only requirement is passing an exam or acknowledgement of the student’s language competencies by the Language Centre. Language exam formats also vary considerably. Teachers use in-class and online tests, portfolios, task-based and project-based tests, or interviews based on autonomous or self-directed learning.
Teachers and students have always been encouraged to use an original Masaryk University LMS “Information System” or Moodle, Zoom and MS TEAMS during the pandemic, all of which have been supported by the university IT support team. Numbers of students taking online courses and language support, and numbers of teachers teaching or testing online were growing steadily before the pandemic, and almost all classes and exams have been taught and conducted online during the pandemic. This section focuses mostly on difference in f2f and online exams and seeks to understand the post-pandemic strategies for change in this area.
Paper 2: English-language education at tertiary level: Between low- and high-tech, ISRAEL
Maria Yelenevskaya, Dept of Humanities and Arts, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel; Michal Tal, Dept of Humanities and Arts, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel; Claudia Zbenovich, Dept of English, Hadassah College Jerusalem, Israel
This presentation analyzes how digital technologies integrated into EAP courses at Israeli universities have influenced the learning process in both face-to-face classes and online teaching during the pandemic period. A specificity of the application of CALL in EFL teaching arises from the Israeli sociolinguistic context. Despite the hegemony of Hebrew, about 40 languages are spoken informally and for many students English is their third language. EAP courses at Israeli universities are mandatory term-long programs required of those whose scores in SAT exams are low. Although English is a high priority subject at school, its prestige in academia drops drastically as it is not regarded as an academic subject. Each university has its own curriculum, and there is pressure to switch from face-to-face or online only to hybrid courses.
We seek to understand whether digital components of teaching enhance interactive learning and students’ productive skills, or make students’ approach to learning more automatic and less reflective. We examine which activities are advantageous for online classes, and how a specific technology may promote students’ autonomy and help their confidence in choosing the how and why of learning. We also look at how language teaching methods changed due to the advent of online classes, including course management systems, interactive tutorials, quizzes and multimedia modules, discussion forums, and text-to-speech programs. The survey reveals that being often more computer-literate than their instructors, students opt for a wider use of digital technologies. We analyze how a combination of CALL with conventional teaching affects teacher-student in-class and online interaction.
Paper 3: English-language education at tertiary level: Between low- and high-tech, ITALY
Anila R. Scott-Monkhouse, Language Centre, Parma University, Parma, Italy
Students at Parma University (Italy) sit a mandatory exam of general English as a Foreign language during year 1 in both Bachelor’s and Master’s degree courses. The module is entirely online for undergraduates (with only occasional remedial face-to-face support), whilst up to 2020 it was blended for MA students. PhD students of STEM subjects were also offered a blended course in EAP based on continuous assessment. Before the pandemic, use of online resources and tools for self-study was encouraged through multimodal teaching in class, and in a flipped classroom approach too, since materials, progress tests and mock exams are available on the University platform (Elly). Students’ work online can be tracked by the teacher, and communications take place via Elly or email (collectively or individually). Despite their being so-called ‘digital natives’, however, students appeared to struggle with the commitment and independence required by this kind of learning, and the purpose of empowering the learner and fostering autonomy seemed to be defeated. The pandemic has apparently determined a slight change of attitude in the students, who seem to be less reluctant to take responsibility for their learning and use technology for academic purposes, while at the same time determining a strong desire for human contact and willingness (if not almost longing) to return to class tuition. The survey aims to investigate the change in students’ attitude towards technology and the underlying reasons.