English trainee teachers’ perspective on synchronous and asynchronous language teaching

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English trainee teachers' perspective on synchronous and asynchronous language teaching

N.V. Tuchyna, V.V. Perlova, O.A. Chukhno

Abstract

The temporary introduction of distance education at universities owing to the pandemic leads to the necessity to develop innovative methods of on-line teaching and learning that could become an adequate alternative of on-site teacher-student interaction and improve students' professional skills. The background of the research states that in tertiary language education whose main aim is to develop students' professional communicative competence it is of paramount importance to combine synchronous and asynchronous modes of interaction with the former creating an opportunity for live communication and immediate feedback and the latter developing students' autonomy and being more flexible and convenient. As the two modes have different advantages the indices of their proper balance are still under discussion. The present study aims to explore English trainee teachers' ability to reflect on the ways of online language learning and to find out their attitude towards synchronous/ asynchronous teaching. The results of the questionnaire completed by 168 students of the Faculty of Foreign Philology at H. S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University indicate that the majority of trainee teachers are on the whole satisfied with distance teaching and learning, though a great number of students consider the ratio of synchronous and asynchronous modes inappropriate. The findings of the research also suggest that trainee teachers would like more diversity in the tools used in distance education. Moreover, the more learning experience students have, the easier it is for them to adapt to different teaching conditions and the more willing they are to acquire the skills of working with various educational tools. The received data may serve as the foundation for rationalizing the existing methods and techniques to increase the efficiency of trainee teachers' distance education. Key words: distance education, professional communicative competence, asynchronous teaching, synchronous teaching, tertiary language education, trainee teachers.

Анотація

Погляд майбутніх учителів англійської мови на синхронне й асинхронне навчання мови

Н.В. Тучина, В. В. Перлова, О. А. Чухно

Тимчасове введення дистанційного навчання у вищих закладах освіти унаслідок пандемії призвело до необхідності розробляти нові методи он-лайн навчання, що могли б стати адекватною альтернативою взаємодії викладача і студентів в умовах аудиторних занять і вдосконалювати професійні вміння останніх. У вищій мовній освіти, основною метою якої є формування професійної комунікативної компетентності здобувачів, вкрай необхідно комбінувати синхронний тип взаємодії, що створює сприятливі умови для живого спілкування й миттєвого зворотного зв'язку, з асинхронним, що є більш гнучким і зручним та розвиває здатність студентів до автономного навчання. Оскільки обидва типи взаємодії мають свої переваги, показники їхнього адекватного поєднання все ще залишаються невизначеними.

Подана розвідка має на меті дослідити здатність майбутніх учителів англійської мови здійснювати рефлексію стосовно методів дистанційного вивчення мови та з'ясувати їхнє ставлення до синхронного / асинхронного навчання. Результати опитування, проведеного серед 168 студентів факультету іноземної філології Харківського національного педагогічного університету імені Г. С. Сковороди, свідчать про те, що більшість учасників у цілому задоволені дистанційним навчанням, хоча значна кількість майбутніх учителів вважають співвідношення синхронного й асинхронного навчання неприйнятним. Отримані дані також дозволяють дійти висновку, що студенти хотіли б більшого різноманіття у виборі інструментів дистанційного навчання. Крім того, результати анкетування засвідчують той факт, що здобувані вищої освіти з довшим навчальним досвідом легше адаптуються до різних умов навчання й частіше виявляють бажання оволодівати практичними вміннями роботи з різними освітніми інструментами. Емпіричні дані можуть стати основою для раціоналізації вже існуючих методів і прийомів дистанційного навчання з метою підвищення ефективності професійної підготовки майбутніх учителів.

Ключові слова: дистанційна освіта, професійна комунікативна компетентність, асинхронне навчання, синхронне навчання, вища мовна освіта, майбутні вчителі.

Introduction of the issue

Severe quarantine constraints introduced due to the continuing spread of COVID-19 resulted in implementation of emergency remote teaching in educational institutions.

The effectiveness of teaching and learning under such conditions heavily depends on teachers' ability to quickly shift from on-site education to the remote one creating the on-line learning environment which could become a viable solution to the absence of live interaction among the participants of the educational process and support students in achieving the learning goals.

The ultimate goal of tertiary foreign language education is the development of students' professional communicative competence as well as their life skills vital for dealing with both professional and everyday challenges.

In remote education, this goal can be accomplished by using both synchronous (from Greek sяnkhronos 'existing at the same time') and asynchronous ('not coinciding in time' (Greek prefix a- 'not, without')) teaching modes with the former characterized by immediacy and interpersonal interaction and the latter known for convenience, individual pacing and flexibility.

It is evidence-driven that adequate combination of synchronous and asynchronous teaching has significant potential for stimulating students' language learning, communication, interaction, networking, autonomy increase, professional competence acquisition, elearning tools and software management skills development. Since the two modes offer different benefits to teaching and learning, it is of paramount importance to select the best ways to blend them in order to take advantage of the both ones whenever possible.

One problem concerns timing during on-line lessons. While developing the ways of combining a/synchronous teaching modes, teachers are supposed to think over the amount of time students will spend on working in each mode. On the one hand, too much asynchronous work may lead to students' lacking the teacher's attention and their feeling ignored or socially isolated. What is more, this can result in fossilization of trainee teachers' foreign language speaking and pronunciation skills owing to the shortage of real time communication and immediate feedback. On the other hand, students who spend insufficient time studying asynchronously may fail to become autonomous learners in the future which will affect their professional and personal improvement after graduating.

Another matter of a considerable concern in the process of developing the techniques of blending synchronous and asynchronous teaching is the diversity of e-learning tools and activities used by the teacher. If the teacher sticks to a single e-learning tool, students may lose interest and become demotivated. Moreover, they will not be given a chance to get acquainted with modern e-learning software and it will have a negative impact on their professional competence and life skills acquisition.

However, too much diversity may cause students' being overwhelmed and even frustrated due to the need to simultaneously focus on language learning and e-learning software management.

It is also necessary to mention that nowadays a lot of practitioners feel difficulties in teaching remotely because they stick to the techniques that were created and meant for teaching in the classroom but which do not work in distance mode without an appropriate adaptation. At the same time, modification of teaching materials for distance lessons requires deep understanding of peculiarities of synchronous and asynchronous modes and principles of their organization that make them different from traditional teaching.

Current state of the issue. Rapid technological advances in the area of information and communication technology have raised extensive research on distance education in the last few decades.

A. Saykili focuses on critical evaluation of various definitions of distance education and presents a new one that reflects the technological and pedagogical circumstances of the 21^st century.

The scholar defines distance education as a form of education which brings together the physically-distant learner(s) and the facilitator(s) of the learning activity around planned and structured learning experiences via various two or multi-way mediated media channels that allow interactions between/among learners, facilitators as well as between learners and educational resources [8].

A. Saykili emphasizes that learners in distance education are in the center of the learning experience taking more responsibility for their own performance. The researcher also points out that the instructor should serve as a guide rather than a source of knowledge giving the learner more choice as to what tools to use and involve learners into decision-making process [8].

N.S. Chen, H. S. Ko, K. Lin and T. Lin categorize the mode of interaction in distance education into asynchronous, which allows the sequence of interaction between a teacher and a student to happen at different times, and synchronous (also called 'live' or 'real-time'), which requires the presence of both parties simultaneously for teaching and learning to take place [1].

It should be mentioned that in our study we share the scholars' viewpoint and define synchronous distance teaching as teaching which happens online when a teacher and a group of students take part in a lesson at the same time.

Asynchronous teaching, on the contrary, involves a teacher and students working separately at different times with the use of various information and communication tools.

Highlighting the two most important advantages of synchronous interaction in distance education, namely immediate feedback and increased level of motivation and obligation to be present and participate, the scholars describe an online synchronous learning model which covers synchronous lecturing and 'office- hours' modes [1].

S. Hrastinski explores the potential of synchronous communication in online discussion and proves that the use of a synchronous chat, as a compliment to asynchronous discussion board, affects participation positively with students feeling confident that other participants of the teaching and learning process will respond to their ideas [3].

B. B. Levin, Y. He, H. Robbins and H. Holly conduct comparative analysis of trainee teachers' reflective thinking in synchronous and asynchronous case discussions.

The findings of the study indicate that the participants engaged in synchronous discussions have higher levels of critical reflection [5]. On the other hand, asynchronous elearning is regarded by scholars as more suitable for discussing complex ideas [4]. It is claimed to be more flexible, reduce stress levels and foster students' independent learning [6].

I. Pulity discusses the pedagogical possibilities offered by the combination of synchronous and asynchronous modes of interaction in a translational e-language learning environment and analyzes the level of learner engagement with a/synchronous tools through instructor's perspective. The results of the questionnaire distributed to teachers by the researcher revealed that a hybrid e-learning approach generates high level of motivation and adequate levels of effectiveness [7]. synchronous education student english competence

P. Fidalgo, J. Thormann, O. Kulyk and J. Lencastre conducted a multinational study (in Portugal, the UAE and Ukraine) on students' perceptions on distance education. It was found out that among students' major concerns about distance programs were time management, motivation and English language skills, which, however, did not diminish their interest in taking online courses [2].

The outline of unresolved issues brought up in the article. Despite the numerous studies in the area of synchronous and asynchronous modes of distance education, foreign language teachers are in great need of scientifically grounded methods of remote teaching which would distribute, integrate and balance synchronous and asynchronous modes effectively. Since in the learner-centred approach, which is widely applied all over the world, students are viewed as equal participants of educational process, before developing such methods we consider it necessary to answer the questions that have been paid little attention to in scientific literature:

What is future teachers' opinion on distance education currently provided by universities? How do they reflect on the modes of their e-learning and their efficiency? Are they able to reflect on it as both learners and future teachers? We firmly believe that taking into account students' preferences in distance learning may significantly increase the effectiveness of the teaching process and enhance trainee teachers' academic performance.

Aim of the research. The aim of the study is to look deeper into trainee teachers' attitude towards the ways of integrating synchronous and asynchronous modes of language teaching in distance education and to explore their ability to reflect on the ways of on-line language learning.

Results and discussion

To explore students' experience of distance education in 2020-2021 we designed and administered a questionnaire to trainee teachers at H. S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University.

It was completed by 168 students of the Faculty of Foreign Philology majoring in English, 138 of them enrolled in the Bachelor's program in 2017 (33 students), 2018 (37 students), 2019 (33 students) and 2020 (35 students) and 30 in the Master's program in 2020. In order to ensure higher response rates and reliability of the data, we conducted the questionnaire on-line through Google Forms without collecting students' email addresses, which made the procedure anonymous, and limiting responses to one response per user.

The questionnaire comprised 9 questions of the multiple-choice format. In the last question about the tools which teachers use in distance education students could select several options and add their own ones as well. Simple statistical tools were used to analyze the received data.

The results of the survey are presented in Table 1.

Table 1 The Data Collected through the Questionnaire