Maria Camino Bueno Alastuey

The emphasis in L2 learning has mainly focused on individual writers and monomodal academic genres (e.g. narration, argumentation), neglecting the potential of collaborative composing and the use of digital genres that introduce additional semiotic sources, for fear of having to deal with “a messy transition to digital multimodal communication” (Lotherington, 2021: 220). Yet, because Web 2.0 technological upgrades have enabled interactivity, literacy has morphed from discretely reading and writing a static page to dynamically reading and writing a multimodal one, which underpins collaborative authorship and (local and global) audience awareness. Considering the inclusion of working collaboratively with multimodal tasks in the L2 classroom, the question of how to help students effectively incorporate multimodal with academic monomodal texts remains unanswered. In response to this challenge, this study examines the design and implementation of an online task to foster multiliteracies. Thirty-seven international students of diverse disciplines (e.g. economics, engineering, history), enrolled in a Spanish as a second language course, worked collaboratively to create multimodal texts based on previously created monomodal texts. Informed by a student questionnaire and a teacher focus group, we analyzed both students’ and teachers’ perceptions to ascertain the effectiveness of the intervention and the possibilities these kinds of tasks bring to the foreign language classroom. Both sets of participants reported positive results concerning linguistic advancement, motivation, and multiliteracies development. Pedagogical recommendations related to the inclusion of this pedagogical practice are provided.

Even though the implementation of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and its results have been researched extensively, fewer works have focused on the effect of contextual factors (CF) on teachers’ beliefs and on which ones are perceived as constraints. Furthermore, no research has explored how training might change those beliefs and help to adjust or modify some of the negative effects that CF exert on teaching practices. This qualitative study explores six in-service CLIL secondary teachers’ beliefs about CF and the effect a training course had on them. Results confirmed CF are perceived as constraints to the successful implementation of CLIL, and training appears to have a positive effect in shaping negative teachers’ beliefs and attitudes into more favourable ones. This, in turn, may help teachers to cope with the unfavourable teaching situations that CF may provoke on a daily basis. Since CF still seem to hinder CLIL success, considering teachers’ beliefs about them in CLIL teacher training programmes may contribute largely to teachers’ effectiveness.

This study explores the effect of collaborative writing (CW) and peer feedback (PF) practices on subsequent individual writing assignments. Two groups of university students in a Spanish as a foreign language course experienced both CW and PF (Group 1 CW then PF; Group 2 PF then CW), and pre and posttests were analyzed for syntactic complexity, lexical diversity, accuracy, and fluency, as well as for overall quality using an analytic scale. Results suggest both treatments produced improvements, although PF was more beneficial for syntactic complexity, fluency, and overall quality, while CW led to more accurate texts. The order of treatments also affected scores: PF followed by CW produced better results in overall quality and fluency, while CW followed by PF was more beneficial for syntactic complexity and accuracy. Based on the results, pedagogical implications and recommendations, as well as limitations and suggestions for future research, are provided.

Knowledge about CLIL teaching approaches and the effective integration of ICT into learning processes seem paramount to the success of CLIL in different contexts. Nevertheless, research has shown that pre-service and in-service teachers feel unprepared for effective CLIL programme implementation. Recent research has pointed out that material design might be a successful way of improving knowledge and an aid to help teachers realise effective ICT integration efforts. This study reports on the results of a project which through the creation of specific materials for schools explores CLIL knowledge and ICT integration together with students’ perceptions in a pre-service teachers training programme. Results indicate awareness of the stages needed to develop CLIL appropriately, and capacity to use ICT in all the stages and to integrate various dimensions of knowledge together with very positive perceptions, which support learning outcomes and point to increased motivation. Nevertheless, the tasks showed ample room for improvement, especially regarding the integration of language and more innovative uses of ICT.

Previous studies have concluded that ICT are underused in primary and early childhood classrooms partly due to lack of appropriate training. This study explores ICT use and the validity of a training proposal as reported on a survey by two groups of students after their teaching practicum. Results showed traditional technological tools were used more frequently than collaborative tools and suggest that receiving an instructional technology course provided students with a broader toolkit of ICT tools, a more critical opinion of technology use and an increased sense of agency.

To date, several studies have investigated the potential benefits of using Quizlet and podcasts for vocabulary development. However, they have mainly focused on the use of available material, and its effects on receptive vocabulary acquisition and students’ motivation. In contrast, relatively little has been done to study the effects of student-generated podcasts and Quizlet flashcards sets on second language vocabulary acquisition including productive skills. Hence, the present study seeks to analyze and compare how student-created podcasts and Quizlet flashcards affect vocabulary retention, taking into account both receptive and productive vocabulary knowledge. Twenty-three adults, aged 18–61, participated in the study. The instruments used were vocabulary tests as pre-tests to check students’ prior knowledge, and as immediate post-tests to measure receptive and productive vocabulary acquisition, and a questionnaire to gauge students’ perceptions of the two methods. Results showed that although there was no significant difference between the two methods regarding receptive or productive vocabulary acquisition, and both techniques helped students to retain new vocabulary, participants expressed a greater preference for the Quizlet methodology.

One of the main aims of diverse education systems is the development of key competences to improve citizens’ capacity for lifelong learning. However, some authors have signalled the challenge their measurement entails, among them the Learning to Learn (LtL) competence, which has also been shown to be complex to define and is under research. With a pre–post-test design and a variety of assessment instruments, this study compares the effect having an educational technology course and using telecollaboration has on the development of the LtL competence in a content and language integrated (CLIL) learning environment. Four groups of teacher trainees at two different universities took initial and after treatment surveys on LtL. Quantitative and qualitative data analysis indicated that technology boosts LtL but that telecollaboration helps develop LtL reflective concepts further in the form of processes by constructing or accomplishing learning goals in similar contexts.