Abstract
This research-based chapter explores East Asian international graduate students' challenges in the U.S. higher education environment and identifies how technology-enhanced instructional practices can increase their active participation in the classroom. The classroom-based intervention study was conducted in a Master of Arts program in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) at a research university in the Western U.S. The participants were 56 students in this TESOL program. The three types of technology (Padlet, Plickers, and Poll Everywhere) were selected based on criteria including ease of implementation and positive influences on students' participation and learning in class. The data were collected through a pre- and post-survey and three weeks of classroom observation. The resulting qualitative observational and survey data revealed consequences of the technology enhancements in instruction in terms of changes in students' active participation in class, insights produced into critical cultural understandings, and relationships to learning outcomes.
TopBackground
Internationalization trends within higher education have resulted in steady growth of the international student population at U.S. universities. In 2007, the number of international graduate students in U.S. universities was 276,842; by 2017, this number had increased to 382,953 (Institute of International Education [IIE], 2018). Of this population, Asian students constitute the largest segment, representing almost three-quarters (74%) of all international graduate students in the U.S., with East Asian graduate students accounting for 57% of the total Asian graduate students and 42% of the entire international graduate students in the U.S. (IIE, 2018).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Classroom Response Systems: A policing system for students that serve as a synchronous formative assessment data for instructors and students.
Padlet: An online bulletin board where students can interact with peers or instructors, display content knowledge, engage in collaborative work, and participate in group or class discussions by communicating with each other through text, video, audio, images, and URL links virtually.
Sociocultural Learning Theory: Learning occurs through social interaction. Learners can experience achievement beyond what they could do alone through the guidance and collaboration of others.
Plickers: A closed-response polling system using the instructor’s computer and smartphone where students each have paper cards that have a unique QR code with each orientation of card assigned a letters A, B, C, and D. Student participation is listed, but their answers are anonymous.
Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK): Three interplaying knowledge arenas central to teachers’ ability to effectively support classroom learning.
Poll Everywhere: An open- and closed-response online polling system where students individually or in groups engage on their computers, tablets, or smartphones in a conversation through a given link to respond to or interact with instructors, usually anonymously.
Language Socialization: The process of (re)constructing an individual’s belief and identities through interactions in a language community.
Active Learning: Participation that accesses more advanced forms of learning through mediation by teachers as well as by peers.