Recent Studies (for example Saito, 2016) have found that in addition to conventional teacher-centred feedback, peer feedback in speaking classes can provide students with meaningful learning opportunities. However, learner reticence to provide face-to-face feedback, coupled with time constraints and the recent shift to online classes can make such feedback problematic. By using the free DocAppender plug-in for Google Forms as detailed in this hands-on presentation, attendees will be shown a way for learners to provide fast and easily accessible feedback to their peers. Using Docappander, students can type their observations on a Google Form, with this feedback being automatically sent to a Google Document, thus enabling the speaker to obtain swift reactions to their speaking performance, without the need for face-to-face spoken feedback . Attendees will firstly be shown a brief demonstration of the app. I will then show how to create a simple Google Form to send feedback to individual Google Documents assigned to students. Finally, attendees will be offered suggestions for further applications of the software beyond peer review in speaking classes. This workshop will be of particular interest to those teaching debate or presentation classes.

Teaching students the skills to become confident independent learners has emerged as a requisite ability to assure success in online and mobile learning. Many students lack the training, experience and knowledge to learn autonomously and know surprisingly little about the language-learning resources available to autonomous language learners. Furthermore, learner autonomy is a concept many students are uncomfortable with as they are dependent on face-to-face learning with the guidance and supervision of an instructor. This has limited student success in the remote learning that has been forced upon them in the past year. Consequently, it has become imperative that students have the knowledge and skills to learn independently.

In this presentation, learner autonomy is presented as a teachable concept in the classroom that will help students learn better on their own away from teacher guidance and a skill they can use for lifelong learning. Such topics as learning to learn autonomously, degrees of learner autonomy, types of learners and learning styles, defining teacher-student roles related to autonomy and cultural expectations in the classroom will be discussed. Key elements of learner autonomy will be introduced as well as empirical research that assessed the effectiveness of teaching students to become more capable independent online and mobile learners. Participants will come away with a better understanding of how to empower student independence, practical examples of how students have become better autonomous learners, sites and applications for independent online and mobile learning and how remote and mobile learning will inform teaching in the future.

There has been a broad expansion of the use of social interaction to help provide environments for discussions among learners in recent years. This work has attracted a great deal of attention from researchers (e.g., Garrison, Cleveland-Innes & Fung, 2010; Meskill, 2013; Lai, Yeung & Hu, 2016; Lin, Warschauer & Blake, 2016; Peeters, 2018). There are an increasing number of studies suggesting that such social interaction outside of class appears to provide many of the conditions necessary for fostering learning (Lomicka & Lord, 2016), not the least of which is establishing a supporting platform from the teacher and peers. While there are several studies that have started to explore this potential in language learning contexts (e.g., Álvarez Valencia, 2016), results thus far have been rather mixed, with learners showing positive attitudes but limited interaction (Tran, 2016, 2018). A variety of studies have been investigated in order to figure out how to develop learner’s engagement by not only providing learner training (Stockwell & Hubbard, 2014), but also providing suitable tasks (Ellis & Shintari, 2014), or providing peer interactions as well (Philp & Duchesne, 2016). The current study investigates the types of task engagement reflected through activities done through social interactions by low and high proficiency level EFL learners. The means of technology tools is Line App in Japan. Also, the students will share Google Docs for group work. The study was carried with 31 beginner learners and 22 intermediate learners of English at a private university in Tokyo over a 14-week period. The results are discussed in terms of how cognitive, behavioural, social, and emotional dimensions of engagement expressed through the ways students participated in the social interaction.

Summary: The study investigates the types of task engagement reflected through activities done through social interactions by low and high proficiency level EFL learners in terms of how cognitive, behavioural, social, and emotional dimensions of engagement expressed through the ways students participated in the social interaction.

“Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes” is a hybrid digital-analog cooperative game in which teams race a countdown timer to defuse bombs. The team is split such that a single player, called the defuser, uses a computer to manipulate a simulated bomb only they are allowed to see, while the remaining team members, the “experts,” parse convoluted defusal instructions found in a paper manual and relay the information back to the defuser, all under intense time and accuracy pressure. The design of the game makes it a natural information-gap activity that demands both reading and communicative fluency.

The presenter used Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes in five second-year reading skills classes for science and technology students as part of a study on student perceptions of game-based language learning. Students were assigned to read a graded version of the bomb defusal manual in preparation for classwork, were given two short quizzes on the reading, and played the game in teams in two successive 90 minute classes. In the third class a questionnaire was administered.

This session will begin with a very brief introduction to Game-Based Language Learning and explain the impetus behind the activity, followed by a description of the game and associated materials. The session will wrap up with a brief presentation of the study’s findings, suggestions for using games like “Keep Talking” in the classroom, and participant questions.

Research has demonstrated that engaging students in the learning process increases their attention and focus, motivates them to practice higher-level critical thinking skills, and promotes meaningful learning experiences. This show and tell presentation will briefly examine four online tools: Pear Deck, Kahoot, JamBoard and Padlet which were used online for two months, then integrated into the face to face classes for the rest of the school year. The presenter, an educator in a private Japanese junior and senior high school in the Kansai Area will explain how she used the tools for collaborative activities in a Content Language and Integrated Learning Classroom in an EFL setting. From her personal observation and student reflection of the activities, these creative tools encouraged more collaboration and interaction among students. They not only helped the students to stay focused in class, but they continued being engaged even after the class was finished. Finally, the presenter will share some of the pitfalls she overcame while implementing these tools and what changes are needed to continue using them in the future.

How young learners engaged in both online and in person classes in a small private language school can seen in this session and show the audience their resilience through the project. This presenter provided the task-based teaching in hybrid lessons to make the students happy in language learning during the lock-down period. Especially, the “Ninja project” invited the students to support their families with actions and empowered them to learn more vocabulary expressions including action verbs trough this project. As a result of this, all students were motivated to do their presentation on Flipgrid and Padlet. The students aged from 8-12 have been learning English in person and on-line in the small private school which the presenter founded and their family have contributed to operate Zoom, Padlet and Flipgrid for learning. This presentation will show the objectives, students’ work, comments and parents‘ perspectives. In addition, the result of formative assessment is included in order to explore how the task-based hybrid teaching helped the students and their families.

This presentation introduces https://vocableveltest.org/ which was designed to help teachers and researchers estimate Japanese university learners’ vocabulary level and vocabulary size, while overcoming the limitations of the existing vocabulary level and size tests. Teachers can create online vocabulary tests based on various (1) lists (BNC/COCA, NGSL, TSL, AWL, NAWL, JACET, SUBTLEX, SKEW-J), (2) word counting units (lemma, flemma, word family), (3) band sizes (100, 250, 500, and 1000 words), and (4) sampling ratios (5/1000 to 100/100). Tests can be either form-recall (L2 to L1) or meaning-recall (L1 to L2) translation tests. Meaning-recall tests can be written or spoken receptive tests. Teachers can also create pre-and post-tests from over 7000 items. Teachers can choose to provide learners with feedback on incorrect items or not. Learners receive a profile of their lexical knowledge, while teachers can view the lexical profile of each student and class mean lexical profiles. Teachers can download automatically marked responses, typed responses, and the time taken to complete responses. An extensive bank of possible answers yield automatically marked responses. Incorrect responses are inspected, and valid meaning-recall answers are added to banks of correct answers. While valid, but none target form-recall responses result in learners receiving a further 30 seconds to respond. The purposes of the tests include (a) establishing a learner's lexical mastery level that can be used to match learners with lexically appropriate reading materials, and (b) separating learners based on their lexical knowledge that can be employed when reading, listening, or writing.

In primary education, English grammar learning focuses on single-sentence formation. However, reports show that nearly half of upper-grade students in primary schools demonstrate grammatical errors in their single-sentence production. This points to the need to improve instruction on single-sentence formation at elementary schools. Since conventional English instruction relies on textbook teaching, which leads to insufficient contextual language use of target language items, this Show-and-Tell session will provide an overview of how a theme-based situated learning environment consisting of a robot and toys (R&T) supported by Internet of Things (IoT) technology was created to help elementary students use English sentence patterns. The authors will show how content-language integrated learning (CLIL) is incorporated into a R&T farm English learning game, along with embodied cognition based on sensory-based guided play and scaffolding of robotic prompts to make English syntax learning closer to real life. Specifically, the audience will be shown two design-based research (DBR) cycles of the Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, and Evaluate (ADDIE) model. The first DBR cycle focuses on (a) the needs analysis stage concerning the English learning needs of middle- and upper-graders in Taiwan, (b) the implementation of the R&T game on farm English with 15 fifth graders; and (c) the evaluation stage with learning outcomes based on pre- and post-test measures and interviews. The second DBR cycle, which involves the R&T game enhancement and pilot testing with six upper-grade students, will also be presented. Suggestions and principles for the R&T English learning mode will serve as content to take away from this presentation.

Research shows TGT Cooperative Learning fosters interpersonal relations that motivate higher academic achievement regardless of learners’ abilities and aptitudes. TGT stands for Teams Games Tournaments. A mid-2019 study quantified the net effects of an online Team Challenge vocabulary tournament among 4,001 first-year EFL students in 123 classes at six universities. All students used the same self-study vocabulary app over the same time period. 2,001 students participated in a Team Challenge tournament and 2,000 did not. Pre and post tests show students on teams learned and retained an average 48% more words than students studying alone. As one teacher wrote, “My students learn thousands of words with the app but the Team Challenge transformed the experience from self study to a team effort where students pull together and motivate each other.” Details about the study approach; methods, outcomes, and opportunities for teachers are outlined in this report. Teachers will learn how to organize teams of learners to participate in free Team Challenge vocabulary tournament. Students who participate can be expected to learn from 1,000 to 3,000 new words during a tournament. Teachers can use the information in this report to conduct their own cooperative learning tournaments with any educational apps that are capable of supporting such an event. Few EFL teaching professionals are familiar with TGT Cooperative Learning and therefore further studies about team-based cooperative learning experiences are suitable and appropriate for publication in journals and school and community news sites.


Trilling and Fadel (2009) emphasized the importance of 21st-century skills. The 3Rs (Reading, 'Riting, 'Rithmetic) and 7C’s (Critical thinking, Communication, Collaboration, Creativity, Career and learning self-reliance, Cross-cultural understanding, Computing and ICT literacy) have been particularly important. However, the 8Cs should now be emphasized in L2 pedagogy with the addition of ‘coexistence with AI.’ In this presentation, the results of two case studies focusing on Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) and Challenge-Based Learning (CBL) will be presented. Case study 1 included Japanese students from Aoyama Gakuin University (AGU) and Waseda University in Tokyo (n=196) and was implemented online from May 2020 to January 2021 using Zoom, as well as the SNS programs Facebook and Line for added support. Pedagogical training focused on helping students find solutions to many issues now faced in the 21st century such as global warming and human rights. Throughout the online program, training in higher-order thinking skills was emphasized. The second case study (n=38), also COIL-based, was conducted from October 2020 to November 2020. A total of 19 AGU students and 19 National University of Singapore (NUS) students participated in a joint seminar conducted using Zoom. In both case studies, students delivered final presentations which were evaluated using the PeerEval software. Students greatly benefited from the language and cultural exchanges and provided positive feedback on their 8-week virtual seminar experiences. Finally, the results of a survey that was disseminated twice to participants of both case studies (in July 2020 and January 2021, respectively) will be presented. The survey focused on gauging students’ opinions about their online virtual learning experiences during COVID-19. Some of the notable survey results included: (1) 70% of students felt the online classes improved their speaking skills; (2) 80% of students felt the international exchange positively impacted their intercultural communication skills; (3) 65% of students felt PeerEval was effective; and (4) although students preferred online English classes, they used the Internet in Japanese outside of the classroom. These results would seem to suggest that COIL and CBL can be effective in providing ample opportunities for students to use English regularly and improve their higher-order thinking skills.

The sudden move online undertaken in response to the escalating Covid-19 pandemic brought dramatic changes to our lives. Just as teachers quickly relearnt how to run their courses and classrooms, students learnt new ways of getting things done, and described using electronic dictionaries and online concordances, proofreading their work with online grammar sites, and translating L1 sentences with Machine Translation (MT) before paraphrasing them or swapping out unfamiliar vocabulary. The research project described here explores student strategies to complete written assignments over a 15-week English for Academic Purposes university course. Students completed assignments asynchronously each week on the learning management system to replace regular classroom lessons and accompanying homework. A total of 40 students recorded reflective videos about their learning strategies to do so. They gave informed consent for their videos and other course work to be used for research purposes. Students reported making use of a wide range of tools to support their learning and spoke candidly about developing processes to not only streamline their work, but also to deepen their learning and make it more personally satisfying. A subset of learners also described using MT for whole document translation at the end of their writing process to check their work before submission. The more of these tools that learners reported using, the more significant improvements they reported in their confidence in L2 writing ability. Students revealed active use of a variety of technological strategies that can be incorporated in future writing courses.

This presentation will describe how English Bento was used in two different learning environments. English Bento is a multi-skill language learning platform delivered on mobile devices that gives students opportunities to train speaking, listening, comprehension, grammar, vocabulary as well as repair their interlanguage. It includes in-app metrics and allows teachers to set assignments and track progress, score, and time-on-task using a web-based dashboard. A brief overview of the activities will be explained, followed by how the app was used in two different remote classroom settings. The first was an intensive 2-week remedial program that allowed students (TOEIC 220-330) to earn an English credit. The app accounted for over 60% of their workload, with textbook worksheets accounting for the remainder. The second setting was an existing listening and speaking remote course, which gave intermediate-level students (TOEIC 480-620) the opportunity for significant speaking and listening practice. A survey with open-ended and Likert scale questions was administered to students to gauge their experience. The in-app score metric from the app was used as a direct measure of learning outcomes. The app scoring is a measure of ability as it measures both accuracy and time to complete. The students' pre-post English scores were measured and compared and with a similar class from previous year. A comparison of the groups and how they differed will be discussed, along with recommendations on how to use English Bento in an existing class.

At a glance, Japanese university students are adept at using technology--and they are in terms of entertainment. Using digital technology to assist their language learning seems to be something they avoided, or are not interested in. A case study to explore why Japanese 1st year university students were not using technology for learning, and their experiences and perceptions when introduced to digital tools (readily accessible software, online resources and functions of computers and smartphones), was conducted in an academic English course at a women’s university in Kyushu. Digital tools were integrated into the regular coursework with tasks requiring their use over one term (N=72). Tasks ranged from infographics to animated video presentations. An open-ended survey (Reflective Activity) and interviews explored student experiences and changes in perceptions while prior to the course, students completed a survey reporting on their high school technology experience. The qualitative data were analysed using the factors from the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and its educational revisions as an analytical framework. Most students were receptive to using technology for language learning with the data suggesting lack of awareness as the main reason for poor digital literacy and lack of productive interaction. Two major factors influencing student perceptions, and an unexpected uniquely Japanese socio-cultural factor, arose as possible barriers to technology adoption. These factors will be presented and discussed, as well as introducing a model for overcoming these challenges through the integration of technology into any type of course (Technology Integration Model for Japanese Learners).