Choosing a Language Learning Environment (Q2)

The second research question I asked was “how do [students] choose their preferred language learning environment, and how do they see certain types of courses fitting into their plan of study?” When it comes to course choice, it was clear that almost all students in the surveys and interviews considered on-campus courses to be their default course environment, unless they were a DL student or otherwise had to study online. Only one student interviewed (Vicky) chose an online course despite the fact she could have taken the course on-campus (and she said looking back now she would change her mind). In contrast, another (Rachelle) switched to on-campus study

completely after taking her first F2F course and finding it so enjoyable. This is despite the fact that it meant a significant commute (about 100km every day) from her place of residence. Even though Rachelle had previously enjoyed her online German course (which focused on writing) along with other courses in her degree taken online, once she had tried the on-campus experience she found it to be much more engaging.

This common preference for on-campus learning is likely rooted in the fact that all of the interviewees (except two online-only students) in the sample were F2F-oriented students who were mainly recruited directly from the Winter 2015 on-campus courses (the exceptions being Vicky and Maryanne, and Jennifer and Anna, who were recruited from their online courses/LEARN and by email/Google Docs, respectively). In addition, those interviewees who had started out learning German online had also then gone on to study F2F, while the rest took an online course “along the way.” Even though I hypothesized that these groups of students would prefer F2F courses, I nonetheless was surprised at how they held at best ambivalent, and at worst very strongly negative, views of OLL in particular. For those students who did take an online course, the vast majority did so for practical scheduling reasons, as corroborated by the survey results (the on-campus option was impossible or very inconvenient for them), rather than out of an interest in learning German online.

Students who were at the beginner levels had less strongly formed opinions and often had not considered learning online at all, most likely because they had not thought that far ahead in their study programs and the beginner level courses (101 and 102) were offered more often on-campus (thus, scheduling issues would not yet have commonly arisen) Advanced students, on the other hand, had put much more thought into their course choices, since most had reached a point in their

programs of study where they were facing a trade-off: take a course online to make their schedule easier to manage, or delay/rearrange their schedule to fit in an on-campus German course. Indeed, three interviewees had made significant sacrifices in their study plans (i.e. not taking a desired double major in German, taking other courses online instead, having a course schedule that was very

inconvenient) so that they could avoid having to take an online German course at all costs. In contrast, none of the F2F-only students interviewed expressed regret about taking their German course on-campus; they felt this was the right choice for them and that they would have had less success learning online. This group likely reflects well the 50-60% of students in the surveys who said they did not plan to take German online in the future, with the most common reason given being a dispreference towards, or doubts regarding, OLL. Although most of those students who had taken German online were satisfied with their experience in absolute terms, they expressed a much lower satisfaction with the online versus on-campus experience (Figure 6 in the Survey Results). The reasons for this were quite clear in the interviews—most students with mixed trajectories said they either regretted their choice to take an online course, and given the chance now would change their mind, or that despite being satisfied with the course(s) taken, they thought that taking any more than one to two online language courses was not recommendable (due to the perceived deficits of

learning online, mentioned above). This suggests that students had different (usually lower)

tendencies to idealize the on-campus environment, and three interviewees explicitly expressed this lowered expectation in their interviews in some form. For example, Jennifer said the following:

I think it was what I expected [pause] basically I didn’t expect very much [laughs]… I wasn’t too excited about having to take it online, it was kind of like a necessary thing. So I did it. But, if I had the choice, then I would have taken it in person. And so I just kind of went in going, weeell, it’s what it will be, and I need to get this credit to be able to go to the next [course], and I need to keep up somewhat of-, some sort of German.

All in all, the results indicate that students choose the learning environment that they think will best suit their learning style and personal notions of how and why one best learns languages— which, according to this study group, is overwhelmingly F2F, through live (synchronous) social interaction—and the main reasons for deviating from this preference are due to convenience or scheduling reasons. Those most likely to sacrifice by taking an online course, in turn, were students who were highly motivated to maintain the proficiency they had gained. Most of these students saw the online courses as a supplement to their primary on-campus experiences, something non-ideal that would “hold them over” until their next on-campus course. If they saw any role for online learning outside of this, it was only in the sense of the Internet providing a resource where they could find extra information and resources on certain topics, or as a platform for getting extra practice. For example, reading online grammar explanations or using the mobile language learning application Duolingo were mentioned, but both were primarily seen as supplementary to what was taught on-campus.

This “default-view” is not surprising, considering that at UW, like many other large

universities, on-campus courses are still the default mode of instruction for many students. It is also predictable considering that if scheduling requirements are the main reasons students who want to learn German give for enrolling online (as opposed to those online-only, primarily breadth-seeking students), such timetabling issues mainly arise as students make their schedule each year for the upcoming one to two terms, and it is therefore probably difficult, if not impossible, to predict in

detail ahead of time. Thus, many students would likely not say they plan to take such a course, even if in the end they do end up taking one for scheduling reasons. These results clearly indicate, however, that many students would prefer not to need to do so.