Analysis of the learner content creation process in a 1:1 seamless idiom learning environment
This paper reports a pilot study on mobile-assisted language learning that focused on both creative learner output and seamless learning. In learning Chinese idioms, students proactively used smartphones on a 1:1 basis to take photos in their daily lives, subsequently in-class or online sharing and discussions took place, enhancing the students’ understanding in the proper usage of the idioms. Our analysis of the student artefacts in both product- and process-oriented aspects reveals the students’ cognitive process and learning strategies during the course of content creation. The students’ ongoing, open-ended, personal-to-social meaning making process and learner-created authentic content have indeed shown some indicators of seamless language learning and induction-based peer learning that has the potential of transforming language learning into an authentic learning experience.
Students' meaning making in a mobile assisted Chinese idiom learning environment
In recent years, we witness the rise of communicative and contextualized language learning approaches that is concomitant with developments of Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL). Im this study, we present a pilot study in MALL that emphasizes "creative learner's output" and contextualized meaning making. In learning Chinese idioms, students used smartphones on a one-device-per-person basis to capture photos of the real-life contexts pertaining to the idioms, and to construct sentences with them. Subsequently, in-class or online discussions took place, which would enhance the students' understanding in the proper usage of the idioms. The learning design is grounded in the seamless learning model that encompass in-class formal learning and out-of-class informal setting, and personal and social learning spaces. The students' ongoing, open-ended, personal-to-social meaning making process and artifacts have indeed shown some indicators of "seamless language learning" that has the potential of transforming language learning into an authentic learning experience.
Exploring Singaporean Chinese language teachers’ technological pedagogical content knowledge and its relationship to the teachers’ pedagogical beliefs
The notion of technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) has recently emerged as a key theoretical framework that could help explain the complexity involved when teachers integrate ICT into classroom teaching. While the framework has been employed in hundreds of published studies, surveys of teachers’ TPACK for specific subject matter, especially for language teaching, has been rare. In addition, there is also a lack of studies about the relationship between teachers’ TPACK and teachers’ beliefs. This study investigates the profile of Singaporean Chinese language teachers’ technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) and their pedagogical beliefs. It first validated an adapted questionnaire entitled ‘‘Technological Pedagogical Chinese Language Knowledge’’. Based on the data collected from the questionnaire, the findings reveal that the teachers rated themselves as most competent in content knowledge but least competent in TPACK. The qualitative findings provide further support on the teachers’ self-rated profile. The relationship between Teachers’ TPACK and how it is related to teachers’ constructivist or traditional pedagogical beliefs are investigated through Pearson’s correlation. The findings suggest that teachers’ TPACK is more related to the teachers’ constructivist pedagogical beliefs than to the traditional beliefs. Implications of the current study in terms of Chinese language teachers’ professional development are discussed.