(1072) EXPECTATION AND REALITY: INSIDE AN EDMODO EFL CLASSROOM

摘要

The purpose of the present study is to: (1) explore effective ways of using Edmodo (an onlineeducational learning network) in an EFL class, and (2) determine Japanese students' perceptionsabout it. Moreover, faults in the syllabus design and teacher's initial expectations are examined incontrast to the course actual outcome. Teacher's reflections and further suggestions for a better use ofsuch an online tool are also discussed. The participants are 39 freshman students at HirosakiUniversity, Japan. The teacher has kept records of the expected and the actual outcomes ofEdmodo's use, and students' opinions are collected through a questionnaire. The first part of thequestionnaire is designed to gather answers to questions associated with a 5-point Likert scaleranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree, and the second part is designed as open-endedquestions. The results show that Edmodo can be effectively used in various manners to enhanceteaching and learning, given that both students and educators are well familiarized with all thepossibilities such a tool has to offer. Students especially enjoyed the flexibility of this tool in terms ofsubmitting assignments. Furthermore, the ability of immediately seeing the quizzes results wasregarded as being truly helpful. Finally, the teacher's expectation of the students to be 'techies' provedwrong, as few still appeared to be uncomfortable with using Edmodo at the end of the 15 week course.