An investigation into the use of presentation reflection assignments in the american studies syllabus at ULIS VNUH relevance and efficacy as perceived by lecturers and students

Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements...45 3.3.. During the three recent academic years from 200

TRẦN HOÀNG ANH, K17A

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF REFLECTION ASSIGNMENTS IN THE AMERICAN STUDIES SYLLABUS AT ULIS-VNUH: RELEVANCE AND EFFICACY AS

PRESENTATION-PERCEIVED BY LECTURERS AND STUDENTS

(Nghiên cứu về việc Sử dụng Bài tập Thuyết trình-Viết Thu hoạch trong Bộ môn Hoa

Kỳ Học ở Trường ĐHNN-ĐHQGHN: Độ Phù hợp và Hiệu quả từ Góc độ Đánh giá

của Giảng viên và Sinh viên)

M.A Combined Program Thesis English Language Teaching Methodology

60 14 10

HANOI - 2011

TRẦN HOÀNG ANH, K17A

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF REFLECTION ASSIGNMENTS IN THE AMERICAN STUDIES SYLLABUS AT ULIS-VNUH: RELEVANCE AND EFFICACY AS

PRESENTATION-PERCEIVED BY LECTURERS AND STUDENTS

(Nghiên cứu về việc Sử dụng Bài tập Thuyết trình-Viết Thu hoạch trong Bộ môn Hoa

Kỳ Học ở Trường ĐHNN-ĐHQGHN: Độ Phù hợp và Hiệu quả từ Góc độ Đánh giá

của Giảng viên và Sinh viên)

M.A Combined Program Thesis English Language Teaching Methodology

60 14 10

Supervisor: Đặng Ngọc Sinh, M.A.

HANOI - 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF FIGURES v

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Background of and rationale for the study 1

2 Aims of the research 1

3 Significance of the study 2

4 Scope of the research 2

5 Organization of the study 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Key and related concepts 4

1.1.1 Content-based Instruction and the teaching context in ULIS-VNUH American Studies courses 4

1.1.2 The presentation assignments 11

1.1.3 Relevance and efficacy 15

1.1.4 English skills in sheltered course classes 17

1.1.5 Interdisciplinary research skills 18

1.2 How does this study fit into other research? 19

1.3 Summary 19

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 20

2.1 Research questions 20

2.2 Participants 20

2.3 Instruments 21

2.4 Data collection procedures 29

2.5 Data analysis procedure 29

2.6 Summary 30

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 31

3.1 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the

presentation-reflection assignments have helped to meet the couse's objectives 32

3.2 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements 45

3.3 What do teachers and students suggest about modifying the assignments? – Practical implication and suggestions 48

3.4 Summary 50

PART C: CONCLUSION 51

1 Summary of findings 51

2 Limitations of the study 52

3 Suggestions for further research 52

REFERENCES 53 APPENDIX I Appendix 1 American Studies course outline I Appendix 2a Survey questionnaire form – Student version VIII

Appendix 2b Survey questionnaire form – Teacher version X

Appendix 3a Summary of questionnaire data – Students' Perception XII

Appendix 3b Summary of questionnaire data – Teachers' Perception XIII

Appendix 4 Median Values XIV

Appendix 5 Correlation between efficacy index and presentation score XV

Appendix 6 Summary of relevant suggestions from students XVI

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Background of and rationale for the study

In the world, research and teaching about the United States of America have a long tradition,

dating back to as early as the birth of the country At the University of Languages andInternational Studies – Vietnam National University, Hanoi (ULIS-VNUH), however,

this multi-disciplinary study field just entered the curriculum as a

subject for about a decade (Country Studies Division, 2009)

Throughout this period, the academic staff of the Country Studies division assigned toimplement the course have been constantly embarking on improving the course's contents,through modifying the structure, updating and refining materials, and perhaps moreimportantly, the teaching methods This arduous task is bound to increase in intensity asthe division has to take the lead in designing an entirely new undergraduate program onAmerican Studies for the university, which will be launched around the 2012-2013timeframe Therefore, as a junior lecturer working in liaison with the group, the author hadthe need to help revise some elements of the current teaching method used in the AmericanStudies courses, and so this thesis was an ideal chance to aid in the effort

During the three recent academic years from 2008 to 2011, the majority of students' casualfeedbacks to teachers of American Studies courses mainly expressed concerns aboutassignment requirements, assignment quality, and, naturally, assignment grading Ratherthan catering to the sporadic questions about different aspects of the course assignments,this study took the chance to investigate the core and overarching dimensions of the courseassignments already in place, i.e oral presentation and written reflection, as tangible andavailable products of the teaching and studying processes

2 Aims of the research

With said purposes, the study aimed at answering the three main questions below:

the design of the courseworks have helped to meet the course's objectives?

Chapter 1: Introduction

ii To what degree do they think the actual assignment quality has met the

assignments' requirements?

3 Significance of the study

The research did not aim to and thus did not suggest the best assignment design to be used

in the course Instead, it was expected to have a certain impact on the way how the currentassignment types of American Studies courses – and even of similar courses offered by thedivision e.g British Studies or General Geography of the UK and the US – would bedesigned, both in paper and practice, to better meet the preset course objectives It alsoserved as a referential material for researchers and teachers alike who are interested in thetesting and assessment aspect of curriculum design

4 Scope of the research

As stated, the study would look at the American Studies assignments in only two maindimensions: relevance and efficacy – whose meanings within this research context would

be interpreted later in the next chapter

In terms of research population, the study targeted at students and lecturers involved in theAmerican Studies courses at ULIS-VNUH Specifically, for practical reasons, these arestudents from the classes of QH081E, since they were the latest groups to take the courses– while all the previous groups had graduated As for the lecturers, all of them came fromthe Country Studies Division – Faculty of Linguistics and Cultures of English SpeakingCountries

Chapter 1: Introduction

PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 Key and related concepts

1.1.1 Content-based Instruction and the teaching context in ULIS-VNUH American Studies courses

Since the early 1980s, there has been a growing interest in combining language andcontent teaching In the American context, programs, models, and approaches haveproliferated in all levels of instruction, creating various forms of incorporating languageand content teaching (Met, 1991) In the mid 1990s in European countries, curriculuminnovations have been directed toward the content and language integrated learningapproach, in which both curriculum content – e.g science or geography – and English aretaught together (Graddol, 2007) All these forms of incorporating language and contentteaching fall under the heading of Content-based Instruction

Overall, it is clear that the term CBI is commonly used to describe a curricula approachwhich seeks to integrate language and content instruction This paper thus adopts the viewsimilar to that of Curtain and Pesola (1994) in which CBI involves the curriculum conceptsbeing taught through the foreign language, appropriate to the grade level of the students

Content

Met (1999) proposes that "…'content' in content-based programs represents material that iscognitively engaging and demanding for the learner, and is material that extends beyondthe target language or target culture" This paper adopts the definitions of Met (1999),Curtain and Pesola (1994), which is most relevant to the research context Therefore,

"content" here is seen as materials, or specifically "curriculum concepts", that arecognitively engaging and demanding for the learner, and is material that extends beyondthe target language or target culture

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

The rationale of CBI

Content-based instruction (CBI) bases its rationale on the premise that students caneffectively obtain both language and subject matter knowledge by receiving content input

in the target language Although it has been recently recognised by influential authors such

as Rodgers as "one of the Communicative Language Teaching spin-off approaches"

(2001), some authors contemplate the paradigm within an even wider perspective:

according to Stryker and Leaver (1997), for instance, CBI "is a truly and holistic approach

to foreign language education … (which) can be at once a philosophical orientation, a methodological system, a syllabus design for a single course, or a framework for an entire program of instruction".

The benefits of the approach are directly or indirectly associated with an extensive body ofresearch from a variety of fields Strong empirical support for CBI can be found in secondlanguage acquisition research, in teacher training studies and in cognitive psychology, aswell as in the outcomes documented by successful programs in a variety of contexts andlevels of instruction (Adamson, 1993; Dupuy, 2000)

Classification of CBI and current teaching context

Through a careful review of related literature, this paper adopts the classification used byMet (1999) Met (2007) has specified the approach as follows:

CONTENT-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING:

A CONTINUUM OF CONTENT AND LANGUAGE

Adjunct

Model

Theme-Based Courses

Language classes with frequent use

of content for language practice

Among the models above, the actual instruction model seems to fit in most with theSheltered Courses as the latter is defined by Echevarria, J., Vogt, M.E., & Short, D (2004)(cited in Short, D & Himmel, J., 2007) as shown above

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

Its neighbor, the adjunct model, can be refuted as being noted by Davies (2003) as "[its]emphasis is placed on acquiring specific target vocabulary" and "they may also featurestudy skills sessions to familiarise the students with listening, note taking and skimmingand scanning texts." These two characteristics are too distant from the course's objectives(Country Studies Division, 2007).

1.1.2 The presentation assignments

Based on a review of theoretical foundation, the assignments for a typical AmericanStudies course include group presentations on a certain topic and individual reflectionessays of group members on that same presentation and topic Other groups have to writereports/evaluation on the presentation performances of their classmates as well Both thepresentation and the reflection are graded (Dang, 2008) Since the last school year of 2010-

2011, another assignment has been integrated into the syllabus – which is essentially aseries of mini tests, called "quizzes" However, due to its relative novelty and experimentalnature, the assignment is not considered in the scope of this paper

On a side note, beside presentation, the other assignment is known under several names indifferent class – report, reflection, evaluation, comment sheet, etc Nonetheless, forconvenience, this research report would use "reflection/report assignment", or simply,

"reflection assignment", with the intent to encompass all varieties of the name

1.1.3 Relevance and efficacy

Relevance

Contextualized, in this research's terms, for both teachers and learners, the relevance factor

of the assignments referred to the degree to which the actual implementation of theassignments can help realize the objectives set out for the course Perception from bothsides regarding this factor, however, is treated separately then discussed jointly

Efficacy

The term, particularly in this research, referred to the quality and quantity of workperformed by students in its relation with the assignments' requirements (level ofadherence to guidelines) It stems from the belief that if the requirements are striclyfollowed, the intended results will be achieved

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

Accordingly, the following figure proposed another way to visualize the two concepts

relevance and efficacy in their relation to each other and to course objectives:

Course objectives

Power (Efficacy)

Angle (Relevance)

Assignment

Figure 1 - Relevance & Efficacy

Concept 1.1.2 Notions behind the objectives

There are key concepts in ULIS' American Studies course objectives which might not bereadily obvious Due to their importance, it is imperative that these concepts are made clear

in light of existing literature – "English skills" (in a sheltered instruction class context), and

"interdisciplinary research skills" Acknowledgedly, "presentational competencies" andfoci of American Studies were important concepts, too, but they were adequately defined

by the course syllabus already

1.1.4 English skills in sheltered course classes

According to The Education Alliance at Brown University, Sheltered English instruction is

an instructional approach that engages English language learners above the beginner level

in developing grade-level content-area knowledge, academic skills, and increased Englishproficiency In sheltered English classes, teachers use clear, direct, simple English and awide range of scaffolding strategies to communicate meaningful input in the content area

to students Learning activities that connect new content to students' prior knowledge, thatrequire collaboration among students, and that spiral through curriculum material, offerEnglish language learners the grade-level content instruction of their English-speakingpeers, while adapting lesson delivery to suit their English proficiency level

Among all sheltered instruction models applied, the SIOP model by Echevarria, Vogt andShort (2000) is widely considered to be one of the most effective (e.g Pearson Education,

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

2008; The Education Alliance – Brown University, 2006) The SIOP model identifies 30important elements of sheltered instruction under eight broad categories.

It would not be of much benefit to us to explore into each and every category The primaryconcern of the moment is what the SIOP model suggests teachers to test in their students –

in terms of their language skills, specifically Category VIII provides an answer

i Comprehensive review of key vocabulary

ii Comprehensive review of key content concepts

iii Regular feedback to students on their output

iv Assessment of student comprehension and learning of all lesson objectives throughout the lesson

In language regard, it seemed to focus very much on students' vocabulary, and, possibly,their grammar – in order that they could come up with adequate answers, rather thanlanguage skills Therefore, in the context of the American Studies course in question,English skills might be understood narrowly as knowledge areas of grammar and (generaland technical) vocabulary – as other English language communication skills are coveredunder the umbrella term "presentational skills" already

1.1.5 Interdisciplinary research skills

According to Beckman, A and Beckman, M (2008), interdisciplinary research is a mode

of research by teams or individuals that integrates information, data, techniques, tools,perspectives, concepts, and/or theories from two or more disciplines or bodies ofspecialized knowledge to advance fundamental understanding or to solve problems whosesolutions are beyond the scope of a single discipline or area of research practice

Larson, Landers, & Begg (2011) in their effort to "add clarity and develop a set of shareddefinitions, values, and language about interdisciplinary research", have designed a list thatsketches major area of competencies for interdisciplinary research skills, with 17competencies falling into 3 major areas

Nevertheless, considering the practical situation of teaching and learning at ULIS, anyeffort to enhance students' (interdisciplinary) research skills within a certain undergraduatecourse would be limited only to integrating them into course assignments but not a full-fledged research in cooperation with a large, diverse team of researchers with the highestpurpose of publication Therefore, the interdisciplinary research competencies would be

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

scaled down and understood in this context as: (the ability to) (i) integrate concepts andmethods from multiple disciplines in designing interdisciplinary research protocols, (ii)read journals outside of his or her discipline, and (iii) engage colleagues (experts) fromother disciplines to gain their perspectives on research problems.

1.2 How does this study fit into other research?

This research would best contribute to, among all relevant studies, the body of researches

on sheltered instruction, which until recently dominated by commanding and

"enlightening" principles by Echevarria, Vogt and Short Specifically, going along with theorder of the day – "think globally, act locally", this study will provide a very tangiblereview of the testing and assessment facet of sheltered instruction classroom in a well-defined, local context

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

The preceding chapter briefly reviewed the literature on the research topic for thetheoretical basis of the study This chapter, on the practical side, discussed theparticipants, the research instruments, and the procedure of data collection and dataanalysis as a means to maximize the validity and reliability of the whole research

2.1 Research questions

Again, this study aimed at answering the three main questions below:

the design of the courseworks have helped to meet the course's objectives?

ii To what degree do they think the actual assignment quality has met the

The first group composed of 532 students in 22 classes of QH081E – third year students atthe moment they participated in the survey The research targeted at this group of students

as they were familiar the procedures and requirements in Country Studies courses as theyhad taken two courses on General Geography of the UK and the US and British Studies inthe previous semesters and they had just completed the course in question of AmericanStudies before the end of their third year These students were asked to participate in aquestionnaire survey, which is elaborated in the next parts

The second group of participants are teachers of the Country Studies Division who taughtAmerican Studies to the QH081E classes Given the small number of teachers – 6 people –and the research's concern, data yielded from this group of participants was treated

Chapter 3: Methodology

qualitatively to provide deeper insights and explanation to the issues arose Two of theteachers have more than 10 years of experience in teaching these courses, while the othersrange from 2 to 5 years This group of teachers were invited to give responses to aquestionnaire survey, followed-up by a short in-depth interview.

2.3 Instruments

The methodology of this research is a combination of quantitative and qualitativeapproaches – with the former played a more significant role, as it would provide largesketches of the situation while the latter would provide a basis for further interpretation ofthe situation Three data gathering instruments were utilized to collect data needed toanswer the research questions as well as for the purpose of triangulation The first one is aquestionnaire survey in two slightly different versions – one issued to students and theother teachers The second one is interview, carried out after each participating teacherfinished answering the survey The last one is secondary analysis of data on students'American Studies scores – most importantly the presentation-reflection scores

2.3.1 Questionnaire

The central instrument was a questionnaire survey in two similar versions It helped collectdata about teachers' and students' perceptions about the relevance and efficacy of theAmerican Studies assignments Both versions were designed around the two coredimensions As a matter of course, the underlying connections of each question item to thesaid dimensions were not disclosed This instrument was chosen for its various advantagesand compatibility with the aim of the research

The 5-point Likert scale was adopted as the core framework for the design of thequestionnaire Most questions were formulated on this scale in form of statements, andparticipants were asked to respond to these statements Possible responses range from 1-Strongly disagree to 5-Strongly agree The last open-ended question was utilized in order

to gain more qualitative data for the third research aim The questionnaire consisted of 40questions [See Appendix 1a and 1b for the final questionnaire forms]

About the two versions for students and teachers, the only significant difference amongthem lied in the way in which each question was worded The other minor variation wasthe informational question on teaching experience for teachers and class for students

Chapter 3: Methodology

2.3.2 Interview

This instrument was used in this research as a small, supplementary tool to assist thequestionnaire survey All 6 teachers participated in the research were invited to engage insmall talks in which they only needed to elaborate on one main question, which was anexpansion of the open-ended question in the questionnaire Here they provided furtherexplanation to back up their comments No student was invited to participate in theinterview

2.3.3 Secondary data analysis

This study aimed at using QH081E students' presentation scores for the American Studiessubject with a purpose to look for any significant correlation among all the data gathered.The data was archived by the Faculty of English Language Teacher Education

2.4 Data collection procedures

The questionnaire survey was conducted in the following steps:

1 Introducing about the research via student mail group with the aid of a student

coordinator This introduction reached all students of QH081E

2 The coordinator forwarded the questionnaire form to monitor of each class

3 All monitors then forwarded this form to their class' members, who later returned the filled forms to their respective monitor

4 All monitors packed the forms together and sent back to the researcher via email.For teachers, the form was sent directly to each, who then returned the filled form directly

to the researcher Later they were interviewed independently after their asnwers were readthoroughly

As for the data on students' American Studies scores, first, the researcher needed to gain anauthorization from the faculty This was done after an archive access request form hadbeen filled and filed into the faculty office's archive Then the researcher had full accessand the right to use all QH081E students' American Studies scores for the purpose of thisresearch

Chapter 3: Methodology

2.5 Data analysis procedure

Questionnaire and interview data

Data from questionnaire was first grouped together on "community" basis, i.e students'forms were grouped according to their class, while all teachers' forms were taken togetherunder the "teacher group"

Raw data was then sorted out and enumerated thoroughly with the aid of specializedcomputer programs (primarily MS Excel – as it would take much more time with SPSS).The nominal choices (1-Strongly disagree, 3-Uncertain, etc.) were converted to numeraldata

Responses were also grouped into batches under the same principles presented in section3.3.1 on how the questionnaire was formulated and analyzed quantitatively for meaningfulinterpretation and discussion in the next chapter

Responses from the open-ended question were taken into analysis in tandem with datafrom interviews to shed light into the more in-depth issues Due to the nature of open-ended questions and the scope of interview, this data group was analyzed qualitatively,with the focus zoomed in on what had been said rather than how many people said what

Chapter 3: Methodology

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Although the research expected to receive survey feedbacks from 532 students, due

to some restraint in communication and cooperation, the research could just access 466students in 20 out of 22 classes – which means a coverage rate of 87% Furthermore,among these 466 entries, after an arduous filtering process, 149 were considered to beinvalid because the participants simply copied the answer from each other Eventually,there remained only 317 valid entries, accounting for 60% of the original target population.Still, this sufficed to draw up conclusions at confidence level of 95% and confidenceinterval of 3.44

In the other group, all 6 teachers were able to participate and their answers were all valid –among them only 4 were able to join in the interview Teachers' responses were allanalyzed qualitatively, because their small number would hardly make up manystatistically meaningful conclusions for the purpose of generalization to a larger (teacher)population They would be more meaningful in some situations where teachers' andstudents' perceptions were collated Therefore all of of the charts below dealt with datafrom students' reponses only, unless noticed otherwise

The analysis below was organized on the basis of solving each research question, usingrelevant data from all three sources, in stead of data yielded from each type of instruments

3.1 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the reflection assignments have helped to meet the couse's objectives

presentation-Objective 1a – Providing students with general knowledge about the US in the past and at the present

In the discipline of American Studies, as in many other content subjects, the first andforemost concern was the amount (and quality) of knowledge passed on to learners In thecontext of the American Studies course at ULIS, this body of knowledge was generallydivided into two interconnected groups: (i) general knowledge – American geography,

Chapter 5: Conclusion

demography and so on, and (ii) specific knowledge themes – with five predetermined foci:history, beliefs and values, politics, economy, and education.

Questions 1 and 2 addressed the general knowledge group, by asking participants'evaluation of the degree to which presentation-reflection assignments helped them toacquire general knowledge about the US in considerable depth The distribution ofresponses was as follows:

Almost 70% agreed or strongly agreed that the presentation assignment did help them toacquire the general knowledge adequately, compared to 46% with the reflectionassignment It was also reflected in the median value of 3 for presentation (see appendix 4),this type of assignment was believed to be more effective in improving learners' generalAmerican Studies knowledge than the reflection assignment (median value 2) A medianvalue of 2 meant that the majority of respondents chose option 3-Uncertain When studentsfelt uncertain about their improvement, or lack of it, then it was impossible to assert thatthe reflection assignment was able to help students with general knowledge

Combined, presentation and reflection could only do a fairly good job in helping studentswith general knowledge, with nearly 60% agreed that they did (combined median valuebeing 2.5) As for teachers, with the median value being 3, they seemed to believe a littlemore robustly in the ability of the presentation assignment to help their students in thegeneral knowledge department

Objective 1b – Providing students with knowledge about the US in some specific themes

As for the specific knowledge themes – the questions tried to differentiate perceptionstoward each of five major themes The median values yielded show that all five themesreceived 3 points, meaning they were more or less equally effective However, thedistribution chart below showed that knowledge of history was the weakest points of all,having only 60% respondents' rating agree or strongly agree – compared with 70-75% ofother knowledge foci A hint for an proper answer lied in the responses to the open-endedquestion Although not relevant to the question being asked, some students commented thatlectures on history was the most boring of all

Teachers had the same level of belief in this regard, with their median value being 3

Chapter 5: Conclusion

To sum up, overall, both teachers and students largely agreed that the two assignmentsboth helped to boost students' knowledge – with the reflection assignment being theslightly weaker agent.

Objective 2 – Helping students develop presentational competencies

Presentational competencies were the second objective prescribed the syllabus They wereidentified as (i) writing skills, (ii) oral communication, (iii) visual representation, and (iv)electronic discussion It was here that we could see a clearer distinction between the roles

of the presentation and the reflection assignment in both students' and teachers' perception

It could be seen clearly that oral communication and visual representation was believed to

be the two improvements triggered by presentation assignments (with both medians being3) The improvement in oral communication received better rating with 78% respondentsagreed or strongly agreed and that of improvement in visual representation was 66%.Writing skills and electronic discussion was neglected behind with the median values of 2for both – especially the writing skills, with 32% disagreed or strongly disagreed, 40%uncertain, and only 26.5% agreed and 1.5% This could be explained through the nature ofthe presentation assignment, in which the foci were on the elaboration of oral argumentsand/or information presenting and, to a lesser extent, the way visual aids were prepared.Whilst, writing was limited to short sentences and box language Not surprisingly, teachersagreed totally with students on this (with median values being 2, 3, 3, 2 respectively)

On the other hand, we could have a different perspective into the presentational skills –from the regard of reflection assigments Students only acknowledged reflectionassignment's role in enhancing their writing skills (median 3 with 64% agreed or stronglyagreed), while remained unclear in the other three components (all three medians being 2).Teachers, on the hand, seemed to be more vehemently by opining that while the reflectionassignment helped students improve their writing skills, it did not directly help studentsimprove the other three Their median values for writing skills was 3, oral communicationand visual representation were 1, and electronic discussion was 1.5

Because these two types of assignment were designed to complement each other, thecombined effect of both helped students to improve their writing skills, oralcommunication and visual representation within the context of presentational skills

Chapter 5: Conclusion

However, there was the "electronic discussion" skill untouched Although listed in thecourse objectives, the concept of electronic discussion was left blank, and hardly any effort

to integrate this skill into the process of doing these assignments could be seen in thesyllabus In reality, the researcher had to explain to the students the definition of electronicdiscussion as meant implicitly in the syllabus before issuing the questionnaire

We could also see that when contrasting with the presentation assignment, the reflectionassignment lagged behind in terms of improving students' presentational skills It would bepartly explained by some students that the report assignment was uninspiring and theygenerally could not reach the required depth, or it was neglected by teachers because muchmore in class time, effort and focus was reserved to the presentation assignment

Objective 3a – Offering the students opportunities to improve their English languages

The third objective was essentially a combination of two smaller objectives The first onewas offering students opportunities to improve their English languages Since it would beimpossible to "count" opportunities, the corresponding questions aimed directly at how theparticipants perceived the degree to which their English capacity was improved (ordegraded) owing to the assignments in question

For both types of assignments, the perception was very favorable to "improving generalvocabulary" – median 3 for students and median 3.5 for teachers with presentation andboth median 3 for both students and teachers with reflection To "improving terminologiesand grammar" through presentation, students were divided, as there were no clear trend ofagree or disagree as with general vocabulary Both their medians stayed at 2 It would bethe same for the reflection assignment if not for the observation that students believed theirgrammar had got better thanks to the assignment A considerable 61% either agreed orstrongly agreed with the statement, giving it a median value of 3

Taken together, both presentation and reflection had relatively positive influence onstudents' English capacity – so they perceived, with around 55% agreed or strongly agreedand around 10% disagreed and 2.5% strongly disagreed Presentation helped students toimprove their general vocabulary, while reflection their general vocabulary and grammar.The capacity of wielding terminologies, despite an important aspect of any specializedcontent subject, was not believed to be better Teachers, nevertheless, believed rather

Chapter 5: Conclusion

strongly that the assignments helped build students' English capacity in all three aspects,especially in terms of general vocabulary.

Objective 3b – Offering the students opportunities to improve their interdisciplinary research skills

It could be seen that the order of manifestation of the three competencies, from highest tolowest frequency, was as follows: using documents from other fields of study was the mostpopular, with nearly 70% agreed or strongly agreed; using concepts and methods fromother fields of study came second, with 55% agreed or strongly agreed; and consulting withteachers or experts from other fields of study came last, with only about 42% agreed orstrongly agreed However, if we look at their median values, then consultation was themethod largely ignored by students in doing their presentation-reflection assignment(median 2), and thus, logically, the corresponding competency would not develop as aresult of these assignments For the two other competencies, their medians were both 3, so

in a large sense, the assignments did help them to hone some of their interdisciplinaryresearch skills, although very restrictively

Considered all three competencies together, around 55% respondents agreed that the twocourseworks had helped them to achieve certain improvement in their interdisciplinaryresearch skills, with an average median of 2.67 This is a positive yet not satisfying signal

to the contribution of the assignments to realize the course's objective Teachers,alternatively, evaluated the realization of these competencies on relatively lower scalevalues Their corresponding median values for (the use of) "Concepts and Methods",

"Documents", "Consultation" were 2.0, 2.5, and 2.0 This implied their uncertainty of thestudents' application of these research methods The highest ranking, "Documents", couldonly received a 2.5, so it was not enough to conclude that the teachers thought the coursewas successful in this objective

Objective 4 – Preparing students who are interested in American Studies for their further study of the discipline

Question 25-28 corresponded to the forth objective – preparing students who are interested

in American Studies for their further study of the discipline These questions yielded ratherconsistent responses from both students and teachers, with more than 60% student

Chapter 5: Conclusion

respondents agreed or strongly agreed with the respective statements across all fourcategories: (the preparation for further study in terms of) knowledge, English skills,interdisciplinary research skills, and presentational skills The medians were all even at 3,indicating that both teachers and students were satisfied with what the assignment hadhelped the students prepare for their further study in the discipline (if they had a chance to).

It seemed that when judging things in a larger perspective, both students and teacherstended to be less critical than when focusing on each

3.2 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements

Efficacy, or the ability of assignments to be carried out along the lines laid out in thesyllabus, was a vital index to show the degree to which the assignments could contribute tothe achievement of preset objectives or not Students' and teachers' perception in thisregard was gauged through 8 questions for the presentation assignment and 3 questions forthe reflection assignment And the result was positive

The presentation assignment

As for the presentation assignment, most (approximately 70%) students agreed or stronglyagreed that they had followed the guidelines very strictly, with median values across 8items being seven 3's and one 4 (average 3.1) Teachers even had slightly strongerappreciation of their students' adherence to the presentation guidelines (average median of3.3)

The report/reflection assignment

The reflection assignment efficacy received slightly less positive evaluation from studentsand teachers Around 60% student respondents agreed or strongly agreed that their pieces

of reflection had met the requirements of the assignment Consequently, the median valueswere 2.7 among students and 3.0 among teachers

Correlation between efficacy index and presentation score

In an attempt to find the correlation between the efficacy (perception) index and students'presentation scores, which took both assignments – presentation and reflection – into

Chapter 5: Conclusion

consideration, the researcher used students' official presentation scores (as filed by thefaculty) jointly with data yielded from the questionnaire survey.

In this calculation, means were used to calculate average scores and average efficacyindexes for each class This enabled the calculation of the differences between the scoresand efficacy indexes of each class and the average scores and efficacy indexes of the whole

20 classes (See Appendix 5 for details)

With this method, positive correlations between the efficacy indexes and presentationscores were identified:

 A 1 point increased in presentation efficacy index would yield 2.14 points increased

Chapter 5: Conclusion