Abstract:

The spread of the Covid-19 pandemic has brought many changes and challenges in the education system worldwide. The suspension of face-to-face on-site classes due to lockdown and the posterior mobility restrictions placed by governments has had a significant impact in teaching and learning practices. One of the main challenges has been the adaptation of teaching approaches and techniques along with tasks and assessment methodologies to an online and more artificial environment.

This paper outlines the adaptation of the subject English Morphosyntax to an online environment using the massive open online course MOOC and Google Meet for video conferencing online synchronous class sessions. Additionally, the aim of this study is to examine second year students’ intrinsic motivation and perception of the transition from in-class teaching to an online context. Participants were 62 second-year (N = 62) undergraduate students enrolled in the Bachelor’s degree in English Studies at Universitat Jaume I. Students completed an adaptation of the intrinsic motivation inventory (IMI questionnaire) [1] at the end of term-time. The questionnaire included a total of 31 items to be rated on a 1 (not at all true) to 5 (very true) Likert scale and two extra open-ended questions devoted to the students’ perceptions of the advantages and disadvantages of online computer-mediated classes and continuous assessment. The items of the questionnaire are grouped in different subscales to measure different aspects i.e. interest/enjoyment, perceived competence, perceived choice, pressure/tension, effort/importance, value/usefulness and relatedness. The internal consistency and reliability of the questionnaire was measured by the Cronbach’s alfa coefficient (α = .879). The statistical significance of the results was analysed by using SPSS v.26.

Initial results from descriptive statistics analysis point towards high motivation degrees and positive perception of the online adaptation of the subject (M = 3.88). The subscales of interest (M = 4.11), effort/importance (M = 4.19), and relatedness (M = 4.41) reflect high mean results, and students’ perceived competence (M = 3.76), and tasks’ value/usefulness (M = 3.95) indicate moderate to high mean scores. Conversely, pressure/tension results (M = 2.13) reported by students is low. As regards the open ended questions, the advantages of online continuous assessment are mainly related to lower stress and anxiety levels, the opportunities to retake tests and the edition and upload of oral presentations. Some of the disadvantages identified are related to internet connection issues and the access to technological resources to follow the class and hand in assignments. Also, students acknowledged the need to train their oral presentation skills in front of a real audience. Findings suggest that moderate to high motivation results and the overall positive perception of the adaptation to an online teaching and learning context may suit these days’ digital learners. Nevertheless, they also admit that some of the drawbacks implied can be counter-productive for the achievement of some of their academic goals.

References:
[1] E.L. Deci and R.M. Ryan. Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI): Scale-description. 2010. Retrieved from http://tinyurl.com/y4rdnfn7

Keywords:

Covid-19, MOOC, Google Meet, EFL, digital learners, students’ intrinsic motivation.