The project-based learning in foreign language teaching as a means of stimulating autonomous learning in the faculty of foreign languages

Participants

In this research, data were collected through polling 41 undergraduate students from the first to the fourth year of study. There are 6 freshmen, 5 second-year students, 9 third-year students and 21 graduates. As it may be seen from the pie chart below, fourth-year students make up a little above the half of all the participants of the survey.

Thus, due to the small amount of first-, second- and third-year respondents, I will formulate the conclusions regarding linguistic students in general without concentrating on the distinct year of study. Furthermore, languages under consideration are English (7), French (15), Spanish (13), German (5), Italian (1) and Chinese (3).

To examine possible improvements in respondents' autonomous language learning, level of motivation, language and learning skills, I conducted qualitative research by asking students to fill in a post-PBL survey at the end of the academic year. The survey employs a five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). In outline, it aims to ascertain students' opinions about whether their autonomous language learning has improved after accomplishing a great number of projects. The statements concern the key features of autonomous learning and motivational changes as well as the set of most vital language and learning skills mentioned in the literature review.

Analysis of the Survey

The survey is divided into 3 major parts: (1) General questions and Projects; (2) Autonomous learning statements; (3) Level of motivation, language and learning skills statements;

(1) General questions and Projects

The first part consists of 5 general questions concerning students' name (optional), year of study, target language, types of projects students participated in (multiple choice question) and forms of their final products (multiple choice question).

As can be seen from the first part of the chart 1 (from a. to e.), the most common type of projects is the research one with about 75% of votes, however, it should be noted that most of the students has participated in various types of project. As regards the second part of the chart 1 (from f. to h.), we can notice that almost every student participated in projects with different number of members in it (from individual to group projects).

As regards the forms of students' final artifacts (chart 2), the leading role belongs to the presentation whereas other possible variants (e.g. video, survey, article, translation, etc.) obtain rather similar results, except for the “website” and “other” variants.

(2) Autonomous learning statements;

The second part of the survey is devoted to the core characteristics of autonomous learning and consist of 10 statements evaluating students' opinions about whether they acquired the features of autonomous learner after the realization of different projects.

Approximately the equal number of students, from 60% to 70%, assume that after accomplishing a variety of projects, they can better determine their learning objectives, track their progress and organize their learning process whereas 10% of students cannot agree with these affirmations (graphs 1-3 in Appendix section). However, only 55% of respondents agree that they are able to plan their study time more rationally and productively while 25% made their choice between `Disagree' and `Strongly disagree' (graph 6). Also, around 75% of learners claim that they got more actively engaged in the productive use of their L2 and more motivated to operate it outside the classroom (graphs 4-5). Besides, most of the students believe that they are capable of working and learning successfully both individually and within a group (graphs 7). Furthermore, 73% and 88% of respondents respectively can search for authentic resources and employ various types of technology in language learning more easily and efficiently (graphs 8-9). All in all, an overwhelming majority of students firmly believe that after participating in plenty of projects, they started to take more responsibility for their learning process (graph 10).

(3) Level of motivation, language and learning skills statements;

The last part of the survey contains 15 affirmations and serves to examine learners' beliefs about probable shifts in their motivation, language abilities and learning skills as a result of project-based learning.

The outcomes of the following four statements should be considered and discussed jointly as they represent factors of the motivational change. Thus, firstly, 33 students in opposition to 5 state that their desire to work hard over their target language has raised which brings us to the concept of intended learning effort (graph 11). Secondly, 35 respondents started to see themselves as those who can speak a foreign language and hence became closer to their ideal L2 self (graph 12). Finally, the learners generally acknowledged that both collective and individual work on projects decreased their language anxiety, but a little more people voted for the work within a group (graphs 13-14).

As regards students' learning abilities, on average, 70% of respondents think that their planning and problem-solving skills have enhanced. Nevertheless, 20% of students cannot confirm the improvement of their planning skills similarly to those 25% of people who plan their study time less effectively (graphs 17-18). Furthermore, 35 students out of 41 argue that it has become easier for them to operate with authentic materials (graph 19).

Moving to the learners' language skills, we must single out an exceptional statement without a single negative answer and with a maximum number (nearly 90%) of agree learners, which indicates that respondents' writing skills in their L2 has increased (graph 20).

The statement about an improvement of learners' public speaking skills has almost identical results with only one `strongly disagree' person. Besides, 80% and 85% of people respectively contend that their translation/interpretation and reading skills undergone improvement. However, 30% of respondents are not sure that their listening comprehension skills in the target language has been enhanced (graphs 21-24).

Finally, an approximately equal number of students (33 and 35) allege that they have become more active and productive during their language classes and that they have generally improved their target language proficiency (graphs 15-16). The last statement of my survey reveals respondents' thoughts about their foreign language classroom performance and a great deal more than a half of people confirm the overall improvement of their grades whereas 22% of interviewees are `not sure' (graph 25).

2.2 Results and Discussion

To sum up, the first part of the survey demonstrates students' experience in participating in a wide range of project's types as well as in creating a vast number of different final products.

The second, however, the most essential section of the post-PBL survey indicates that 9 out of 10 statements concerning characteristics of autonomous language learning behavior, have a positive tendency among the students (i.e. the percentage of positive responses [`Agree' and `Strongly agree'] is much more than half). Nevertheless, as it was mentioned in the literature review, the concepts of autonomous language learning and learners' motivation are interdependent. Thus, the conclusion about the change in students' level of language autonomy should be made only with regard to the changes in their level of motivation.

The third and the last part of my survey was designed to assess students' motivation after accomplishing several projects as well as the changes in their language skills and learning abilities. Apparently, the respondents' answers have proved that working on the project-based tasks reduces students' language anxiety and instigate learners' interest and willingness to thoughtfully study their target language. Besides, major improvement can be traced in students' writing, reading, oral presentation and translation skills, with some less amelioration of their listening skills.

As a result of profound survey analysis, we can conclude that the PBL method does enhance students' ability to take responsibility over their learning process at the HSE Faculty of foreign languages. In addition, students' motivation level, a bunch of language skills and learning abilities have undergone certain improvement.

Conclusion

english language institution learning

Overall, this research serves as an attempt to propose the implementing of the PBL method within higher linguistic educational institutions to provide students with opportunities to develop their lifelong learning skills. Admittedly, the core of lifelong education lies in the ability to learn autonomously or take control over one's learning process. If students acquire such skills and abilities, as a result, it will be easier for them to adapt to the modern society, to adjust to frequently changing environments and situations, to find solutions to their real-life problems, to integrate to various cultures, groups or societies, and to communicate successfully with different people. Thus, a great deal of research has been directed towards the possible impact of the PBL method on autonomous learning.

The present thesis has partially proved the powerful positive influence of the project-based learning over fostering autonomous learning among HSE linguistic students. Moreover, the results obtained may promote using the PBL approach to improve learners' motivation, language skills and learning abilities during the foreign language classes. Nevertheless, there are two principal limitations that must be considered. The first constraint of this study concerns the environment where the survey took place. Thus, the outcomes of the conducted research might apply only to the HSE linguistic students. The second limitation refers to the insufficient number of survey participants for more accurate identification of results. For future research, I suggest polling more students in order to determine the role of PBL in improving learners' autonomy at each distinct year of study.

All in all, this research paper elucidates the potential of project-based learning approach in encouraging autonomous learning among students of the higher educational institutions.

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