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Article published In:
Chinese as a Second Language (漢語教學研究—美國中文教師學會學報)
Vol. 54:3 (2019) ► pp.221–256

Learners’ perceptions of a Wiki-enhanced TBLT approach designed and implemented at the syllabus level

| Iowa State University

This study examines learners’ perceptions of an approach for improving Chinese-as-a-Foreign-Language learners’ language proficiency, especially their speaking ability. Built upon the Distributed Design Model, a wiki-enhanced, Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) approach was designed at the syllabus level, taking into consideration various learning contexts. The approach was implemented and evaluated. Findings show that the overall design of this approach and most of the different components of the pre-task, core-task (interviews with native speakers, wiki-writing, and in-class presentations), and post-task activities were very positively perceived by the students. All students liked this design and enjoyed the class. The main reasons include (1) Students valued the opportunity to interact with native speakers outside the classroom; (2) The in-class presentations gave them an opportunity to express their personalities; (3) They liked the fact that the wiki-essay writing was connected to the in-class presentation because this helped them prepare the content of their presentation, also enabled them to develop writing and speaking on a single topic so they could become more advanced in that topic; (4) They also liked the consistency in organization and the eight units being procedurally similar. The learners held varying views on a few components of the pre-task and post-task activities.

Keywords: Task-based Language Teaching, TBLT, Distributed Design, Educational Engineering, Technology Enhanced TBLT, Chinese-as-a-Foreign-Language, CFL
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
  • 3.The study
  • 4.Research questions
  • 5.Design of the syllabus
    • 5.1Eight units designed
    • 5.2Sequence of the tasks
    • 5.3Teacher’s role
    • 5.4An example unit
  • 6.Methodology
    • 6.1Participants
    • 6.2Assessments
    • 6.3Data analysis
  • 7.Findings and discussion
    • 7.1Perceptions of pre-task activities
    • 7.2Perception of the core tasks: Interaction with native speakers
    • 7.3Perception of the core tasks: Wiki-essay writing and commenting
    • 7.4Perception of the core tasks: In-class presentation
    • 7.5Perception of the post-tasks: Unit comprehensive exercise and reflection
    • 7.6Perception of the design: Harvest of learning strategies, culture, and friendship/learning environment
    • 7.7The most beneficial and the most and least favorable core tasks
  • 8.Conclusion
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 28 August 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/csl.17030.zha
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