Goh Kawai and Akio Ohnishi EdMedia-2014 Tampere, Finland 2014-06-23 15:00-15: 45

1. Case study of an online English language course that emphasizes self-assessment of speaking and writing Goh Kawai and Akio Ohnishi EdMedia-2014 Tampere, Finland 2014-06-23 15:00-15:45

2. abstract We report a case study where 2600 university freshmen learn the English language in an online environment that emphasizes speaking and writing skills. The language material and learning tasks are designed so that learners can estimate by themselves the appropriateness of their language production. Instructors do not comment on the learners' speaking or writing. The course is offered in the 1st semester of the freshman year, and lasts 15 weeks. Learners take a diagnostic test during week 1, and TOEFL-ITP during week 9. During the past 8 years, mean scores for the diagnostic test have remained unchanged, while mean scores for TOEFL-ITP have risen steadily. We believe this course format may be suited for intermediate language classes that lack instructors able to provide corrective feedback to learners.

3. introduction Hokkaido University (Sapporo, Japan) has offered an online English language course since 2006 (Hokkaido University, 2013). All freshmen (approximately 2600 each year) take this course during their 1st semester. Between 4 to 5 instructors and 12 to 17 teaching assistants each year assist learners via 2 learner management systems (LMSs) that deliver content over the web (Hokkaido Video, 2013, VERSION2, 2013). The 2 LMSs are used concurrently for redundancy against system failure, and for encouraging competition among vendors; however the learning content does not overlap across LMSs. The learning objectives are (a) to manage time -- assignments are given in blocks that are due in several weeks, instead of several days the freshmen were accustomed to in high school, and (b) to improve both receptive and productive skills, with focus on speaking practical English and writing technical English (Anderson, 2013). Most autonomous online language learning courses at Japanese universities focus on reading and listening (Aoyama Gakuin, 2013, Kyushu University, 2013, Osaka University, 2013, Tohoku University, 2013). Our course adds speaking and writing, because learners request those tasks. Unfortunately, we are forced to limit formative, corrective feedback to each student because we lack staff. We have too few instructors (their primary duties are courseware development, plus administrating classes, personnel, and computer systems). Many of our TAs have only intermediate English language proficiency (their primary role is routine clerical administration, plus some technical support, but limited language guidance). Regardless of cutbacks in staffing, our freshmen deserve and require training in language production. Earlier attempts at peer-based learning failed, because many of our students are competitive and individualistic (they see no advantage in assisting less-capable classmates). Since then, our approach to solve our dilemma has been to select speaking and writing tasks that allow learners to estimate by themselves the appropriateness of their language production.

4. prosody Prosody (that is, features such as intonation, speed, and rhythm) may be partially self-taught, because the underlying skills are found in most languages. Students say the utterance multiple times, then view their pitch contours in order to discern broad prosodic patterns in their speech, and compare them with the native-speaker target.

5. telephone simulator 85% of our learners have never made a phone call in English. Students practice simulated telephone calls over the web.

6. telephone simulator Prompts are randomly chosen and combined to form a meaningful conversation. In one example, where learners call a restaurant to reserve a table, 17 different recorded prompts are used to create over 2700 calls.

7. technical writing 75% of our freshmen major in technical fields, and rely on figures and tables to convey their message. We believe technical writing can be partly self-taught by providing learners with fairly rigid writing templates that learners complete by inserting phrases matching the specific context. Learners write captions for graphs (histograms, pie charts, radar charts, scatter plots, regression lines), photographs (experimental apparatus, microscope imagery), and tables (simple tables consisting of text only).

8. technical writing

9. TOEFL-ITP scores Our course is offered in the 1st semester of the freshman year, and lasts 15 weeks. Learners take a diagnostic test during week 1, and TOEFL-ITP during week 9. During the past 8 years, mean scores for the diagnostic test have remained unchanged, while mean scores for TOEFL-ITP have risen steadily. We suspect that more students are continuing to study English language after taking their entrance examinations 6 weeks prior to start of the semester. (Data for 2014 not yet available.)

10. conclusion Although we would prefer to teach smaller classes, our mandate precludes that option. We believe our course format may be suited for intermediate language classes that lack instructors who are able to provide corrective feedback to learners. It may also be suited for flip learning classes, because our format is suited for self-study (Sams & Bergmann, 2012). We hope that our experience helps institutions facing limitations similar to ours.