Innovation in Language Learning
Changes in Affective Variables over Time in Twin Multinational Facebook Language Exchanges
James A. Elwood, Meiji University (Japan)
Kiyomi Fujii, Kanazawa Institute of Technology (Japan)
Barron Orr, Universidad de Alicante (Spain)
Yasuo Uotate, University of Florida (United States)
Yuka Matsuhashi, Temple University Japan Campus (Japan)
Brent Wright, Kanazawa Institute of Technology (Japan)
Abstract
With the advent of the new millennium, technological advances have fostered language learning by enabling meaningful interaction between language learners in geographically distant contexts. Online tools such as Social Networking Sites (SNS) facilitate communication and encourage language learning (Back, 2014; Hirotani & Lyddon, 2013; Sato & Fukai, 2001). Moreover, these new technologies allow students to engage in out-of-class learning (Benson, 2011), which may comprise a larger role in learning than traditional classroom learning. Thus, the use of such enablements constitutes an important step towards learners becoming more fully autonomous.
This study reports on a 2-year project in which university students (N = 312) from Japan and the United States participated in twin language exchanges over one semester. The Japanese students studying English and the US students studying Japanese corresponded via Facebook, with each student participating in a Japanese-language exchange concerning the American students’ university life and an English-language exchange on the Japanese students’ university life; thus, all students participated in exchanges in both video and text formats in both their first language and their target language.
In this presentation the focus is on the questionnaire data that were collected at three times: the onset of the program in early autumn, the conclusion of the project in winter, and then three months hence as a followup. The battery of questionnaires measured motivation, willingness to communicate, willingness to use technology, and intercultural competence. Analyses consisted of Rasch analyses of the various instruments and repeated-measure ANOVAs to investigate changes over the three collection points. It was posited that involvement in a media-rich, computer-mediated SNS language exchange using Facebook would result in statistically significant improvements in the respective affective variables and especially in intercultural competence.
We will provide a brief synopsis of the project followed by results of the analyses and a discussion thereof. The presentation will conclude with pedagogical implications of the results and suggestions about implementing SNS language exchange projects.
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