engleski

Students’ evaluation of hybrid foreign language instruction: Do contextual factors and pedagogical online activities matter?

In the higher education (HE) environment hybrid or blended learning has been widely adopted as an instructional format (Owston et al., 2013). Various factors that constitute computer-assisted language learning (CALL) environments (Egbert, 2005) can also be applied to hybrid settings. Possible connection between the effectiveness of hybrid instruction of English as a foreign language (EFL) and learners' subjective evaluation of various physical and temporal influences is still insufficiently explored. Greater attention should also be given to diversity reflected in learner's views on the appropriateness of technologically-supported tasks for achieving learning objectives (Adams & Nicolson, 2011). The goal of this study was to investigate the relationships between the students’ perception of aspects of (a) the hybrid EFL course and (b) online collaborative activities (e-tivities) as well as their respective relationships with (c) the use of the wiki in conducting e-tivities and (d) contextual factors related to the EFL course delivery. It was hypothesized that students’ evaluation of the hybrid EFL course would be associated with their perception of e-tivities as one of the components of the instructional design in the examined course (H1), and that students’ evaluation of the hybrid course and collaborative e-tivities would be associated with their perception of contextual aspects of course delivery, including technology usage (H2). The participants were 89 IT students of a one-semester undergraduate hybrid EFL course at a Croatian university. They were engaged in two e-tivities aimed at developing grammar competence by using a wiki and other Web 2.0 tools. A student perception questionnaire was administered at the end of the course. Quantitative data analysis revealed statistically significant positive relationships between most of the examined variables pertaining to course evaluation, e-tivity evaluation and contextual factors evaluation in both hypotheses. These findings contribute to a broader understanding of the interplay of elements in hybrid EFL instruction within the socio-constructivist paradigm.

kontekst ; hibridno poučavanje, EFL ; evaluacija ; e-aktivnosti

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