Resultados prueba REC

As is the nature of mixed-methods research, the study contained data from multiple sources once an informed consent had been obtained from the participants. There were eight types of data, both quantitative and qualitative, collected during the whole project.

4.3.1 Pre-project questionnaire

A pre-project questionnaire was distributed to the two selected classes after the participants were briefed on the purpose of the study, and had had an opportunity to ask questions about what would be involved. The questionnaire consisted of three main sections, including bio data, collaborative learning experience, and computer usage expertise. In addition, students‟ preliminary attitudes towards collaborative learning and the use of technology in the language classroom were also added as part of the questionnaire.

Information from this survey helped to attain a better understanding of the students‟ individual, socio-cultural, and academic backgrounds prior to the project activities and also assisted during the after-chat interview. The information was also used to gauge how much technical help they would need during the project as previous research (Cornelius & Boos, 2003, for example) has shown that learners exhibited decreased mutual understanding and coherence and increased coordination and

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accommodation difficulties when they did not receive sufficient training in communicating via CMC.

The questionnaire was piloted on a colleague and a student as a non-native speaker to help identify questions which might be ambiguous or difficult to interpret, and to ensure if the layout and content were user friendly (Appendix O).

4.3.2 Synchronous discussion transcripts

The FTF group discussion was recorded and transcribed; then all the transcripts of both FTF and electronic chat discussions were collected. As there were 30 students in each class, 10 FTF group discussions and 10 electronic chat discussions were obtained, making up the total of 20 transcripts, approximately 30-60 minutes in length each. Information from the transcript analysis helped to identify the amount of participation and the level of interaction, leading to the synthesis of information. The transcripts were also referred to during the after-chat interviews in order to get a better understanding of students‟ behaviours during the online chat discussion.

4.3.3 After-chat interview

An interview schedule was prepared right after the students finished the online chat discussion in week four. The ten groups of three students each in the CMC class were invited for an interview with a semi-structured approach, which was believed to allow for spontaneity and flexibility (Zafeiriou, Nunes, & Ford, 2001). The interview questions consisted of those relating to the students‟ behaviours, reflections on, and perceptions of the chat discussions (Appendix P). Group interviews were thought to be an effective way of obtaining information as the students would be less inhibited and would be able to help each other express ideas. In addition, the participants were asked to discuss some of the notable incidents arising from the chat exchanges. The purpose of these group interviews was to gain understanding of the nature of the synchronous online discussions as part of the collaborative learning.

All of the interviews were audio recorded using a digital voice recorder and transcribed for later analysis. Notably, transcripts of the interviews were put into word documents and emailed to individual students to request any modifications,

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additions, or further comments arising from their schemata. However, no additions were collected perhaps because the students were so busy during that time of the semester or they thought they had expressed their ideas thoroughly during the interview.

4.3.4 Asynchronous peer reviews

A total of 60 students‟ drafts together with their peers‟ feedback were collected, including 30 pen-and-paper drafts and 30 wiki pages. Instances of peer review were counted, sorted out, and coded using the qualitative analysis software, NVivo. Data gathered from these drafts and correlated feedback helped to examine how effective ACMC peer reviews were in comparison with pen-and-paper.

4.3.5 Final collaborative products

All 20 final collaborative writing products from 20 collaborative groups, with 10 from the control class and the other 10 from the CMC class, were collected at the end of the project. Quantitative data attained were three linguistic features of the writing products, namely grammatical accuracy, syntactic complexity, and lexical density. In addition to this, a qualitative evaluation of the 20 essays was conducted in consideration of the content, the organisation and structure, and the use of language. The purpose of analysing this type of data was to compare the final collaborative products between the two forms of treatments: control and CMC.

4.3.6 Post-project questionnaire

The participants in the CMC class were invited to complete a post-project questionnaire right after the project. The questionnaire was designed according to a 4-point Likert scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree). The use of Likert scale questions would allow for different possible responses and give some indication of strength of feeling. The middle point of „neutral‟ or „don‟t know‟ as in many popular 5-point Likert scale models was purposefully removed from this questionnaire to encourage students to think deeply before deciding to agree or disagree with 24 items in the questionnaire (Appendix Q). Below is an example of the questionnaire item:

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Please circle the following statements

1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = agree 4 = strongly agree

I like learning English with computers. 1 2 3 4

More specifically, the 24 4-point Likert scale questions was categorised into 5 groups. Besides item 1 asking if they like learning English with computers generally, items 2-5 were questions relating to the synchronous chat; items 6-10 were related to the use of wikis. Items 11-15 evaluated the students‟ perceptions of the online collaborative learning while items 16-20 concerned the course benefits for various language skills. The last items, 21-24, explored affective dimensions of learning. In addition, 6 open-ended questions were offered at the end of the questionnaire sheet for those students who wanted to freely express their other personal opinions and suggestions.

The questionnaire aimed to attain students‟ evaluations, reflections on, and perceptions of the whole process as well as the product of the collaborative project. Similar to the first survey, this questionnaire was piloted on a colleague and a student for any ambiguous questions, and to ensure user friendliness of the included items.

4.3.7 Post-project interview

While the post-project questionnaire was useful for collecting factual, quantitative information, e.g. whether students like or dislike a particular point or task, it did not collect more detailed, qualitative information, such as why they liked or disliked those points or tasks. So, a schedule for a second, post-project interview was prepared for individuals and groups who wished to volunteer. Again, as for the first interview, the design was semi-structured to invite more profound thoughts about the collaborative project (Appendix R). The initial intention of conducting some group interviews to get deep qualitative data from the participants was not feasible due to time constraints. Therefore, only 14 individual interviews were conducted during the last two weeks of the semester.

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All interviews were audio recorded and transcribed for evaluating students‟ reflections on and perceptions of computer-mediated collaborative learning. Again, transcripts of the interviews, before being imported into NVivo for analysis, were put into word documents and emailed to individual students to request corrections, additions, or further comments to help enrich the data collection. Nevertheless, only one student added some more comments.

4.3.8 Observations

Various observation techniques, including keeping a diary, taking notes, taking photos, and especially, keeping the online blog as the main tool of reflection, were used during the time of conducting the project. Physical backdrops and individual students were observed for any emerging themes or interesting details and behaviours during the project. The purpose of this observation approach was to enable the researcher to experience the setting as a whole while being immersed in the classroom environment. This was valuable information for triangulation of data with the other sources for data analysis.