The Use Of Facebook To Promote Korean EFL Learners' Intercultural Competence
Open Access
- Author:
- Jin, Seunghee
- Graduate Program:
- Curriculum and Instruction
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- June 17, 2013
- Committee Members:
- Matthew Edward Poehner, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Jamie Myers, Committee Member
Mark Thomas Kissling, Committee Member
Xiaofei Lu, Committee Member - Keywords:
- Web 2.0
Social networking
Facebook
EFL
ESL
Intercultural communication
Intercultural competence
telecollaboration - Abstract:
- This study explored the use of the most famous Web 2.0 tool, Facebook, as a computer-mediated communication (CMC) in terms of developing Korean learners’ intercultural competence (IC) in an EFL classroom at the Korea National University of Transportation in South Korea in collaboration with a classroom at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) in the United States in an intercultural communications, 15-week course during the Fall 2012 semester. The main purposes of this study were as following: (1) examine the effectiveness and pedagogical viability of using Facebook as a new CMC tool to develop learners’ IC in the context of the EFL classroom, (2) present learners’ views and perceptions of using a Facebook tool and their intercultural learning experiences to provide a more complete picture of the effectiveness of this course, and (3) offer empirical and practical information and guidance on implementing Facebook as a new pedagogical tool to develop IC into the classroom environment to inform and contribute to current EFL classroom practices. Korean students reported enriching, helpful, and rewarding intercultural learning experiences by interacting and communicating with speakers of target culture, American students, via Facebook as a new CMC tool. Additionally, students successfully developed the components of IC by showing many instances that fall well within Byram’s (2000) assessment criteria, (1) interest in other people’s way of life, (2) knowledge about another country and culture; (3) knowledge about the intercultural communication process;(4) the ability to cope with living in a different culture; and (5) the ability to change one’s perspective, even though there were some degrees of differences in development and some conflicting results. In addition, with regard to learners’ views and reactions, most of Korean students considered their overall intercultural learning experiences using Facebook as positive and rewarding. Based on the findings that point to advantages and disadvantages of the course, some conflicting results concerning Korean learners’ IC development, and some discovered areas of improvement for the course, this study presents beneficial and practical information and also offers suggestions for teachers and practitioners to promote IC by adopting the Web 2.0 tool, Facebook, into the EFL classroom. This study contributes to a greater understanding of how a Web 2.0 tool such as Facebook can be adopted to promote EFL learners’ IC development in the classroom setting. To date, this is the first empirical study on using Facebook to develop learners’ IC in L2 research within the CMC context. Findings suggest that the adoption of Facebook, along with carefully-designed tasks, is one new effective, efficient, realistic, and practical model to facilitate the development of IC in the EFL classroom. It is particularly meaningful and useful for foreign language learners who have no opportunity to study abroad and who have no contact with the target culture as Facebook can bring numerous new possibilities for such interactions into the EFL classroom.