3.Teaching Connectives through Flipped Classes for Tertiary Students: A Study

Introduction

Writing is a complex activity which involves cognitive and intellectual processes. Richards rightly says (1990, p.100) “Learning to write in either a first language or second language is one of the most difficult tasks a learner encounters and one that few people can be said to fully master. Many native speakers leave school with a poor command of writing. Even at university level students require further instruction in writing...”

Essay writing is one of the important writing tasks at tertiary level. Tertiary students need to write essays for varied purposes and different audiences. Knowledge of certain ‘essay’ elements is necessary to write effective essays in English. The elements are content, vocabulary, organisation, language use and mechanics. Of these elements, awareness about different types of connectives enables students to organise their ideas coherently and to construct complex sentences in essays. However, many students at tertiary level use coordinating conjunctions rather than subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs as the students do not possess knowledge about the usage and importance of connectives in essays.

The importance of teaching connectives is evident in the words of Tricia Hedge (2000, p. 326) “teachers can support students in their growing awareness of how to achieve accuracy in a text: of such things as how the parts of a text are linked through cohesive devices, how sentence structure can vary to develop meaning, and the role that punctuation plays. These are aspects of crafting a text, putting together pieces of English language.”

Connectives are recognized as conjunctions by Halliday & Hasan (1976), cohesive devices by Schiffrin (1987), and ‘discourse markers’ by Fraser (1999). Brown and Yule (1983) make clear that connectives are the formal markers in written texts that indicate the explicitly marked relationships and thus, help readers to relate what has been said to what is going to be said.

Jeremy Harmer (2004, p. 24) asserts that cohesive devises “help to bind elements of a text together so that we know what is being referred to and how phrases and sentences relate to each other.”

An essay without connectives is just a list of sentences grouped into paragraphs. Such essays lack clarity, accuracy and do not make much sense. Hence, teaching connectives and their significance of using them in essays is mandatory.

Flipped Classroom Technique

CALL plays a vital role in facilitating language learning. It has been exploited by many experts and researchers in such a way that its influence in language classrooms perpetually result in the formation of novel techniques suitable for teaching various aspects of language and at different levels. One such technique, which is becoming widely used recently because of its varied benefits, is the flipped classroom technique. Flipped classroom technique provides opportunities to students to involve in interactive activities unlike the traditional classrooms.

What is a Flipped Classroom?

A flipped classroom is a pedagogical model in which the typical classroom lecture and homework elements of a course are reversed.

According to Lage et al (2000, p.32) “Inverting the classroom means that events that have traditionally taken place inside the classroom now take place outside the classroom and vice versa.”

Literature Review

Ting (2003) studied the cohesive ties in the essays of Chinese EFL students. The researcher used Halliday & Hasan’s (1976) taxonomy of cohesive devices in data analysis. The finding of the study was that the errors in the additive and adversative categories outnumbered the errors in the causals and temporals categories. Tapper (2005) investigated how advanced Swedish EFL learners used connectives in argumentative essays in comparison to how American University students used them in their writing. Results of the study revealed that Advanced Swedish EFL learners tended to overuse adverbial connectives compared to American university students. Dülger (2007) identified the discourse marker use of 76 Turkish EFL learners. Results of the study suggested that a process view of writing is preferable over the product view in terms of sentence construction. Moreover, Altunay (2009) investigated the use of connectives in unplanned argumentative written discourse by Turkish ELT department students. Goldvarb X statistics program was used by the researcher for the statistical analysis. Results of the study revealed that the students did not use a large variety of connectives in their essays. Misuses of some connectives were commonly found. However, underuse and overuse of connectives were not so frequent. Findings also showed that students were not able to use some cohesive devices in correct and appropriate places, and therefore they could not produce comprehensible and coherent texts.

Jeremy F. Strayer (2007) studied the effects of the classroom flip on the learning environment: a comparison of learning activity in a traditional classroom and a flip classroom that used an intelligent tutoring system. The findings of this research showed that classroom flip students were less satisfied with how the structure of the classroom oriented them to the learning tasks in the course. However, the findings of Cara A. Marlowe (2012), who investigated on the effect of the flipped classroom on student achievement and stress, showed that the participants of the investigation reported lower stress levels in this type of classroom environment compared to other classes. While semester grades showed improvement, exam grades did not show significant improvement. Overall, students displayed positive feelings towards the treatment and enjoyed the associated benefits of being able to choose their own assignments and explore concepts they found interesting more in-depth. Lisa W. Johnson (2012) studied the effect of the flipped classroom model on a secondary computer applications course: student and teacher perceptions, questions and student achievement. The findings indicated that no benefit to using the flipped classroom instruction in a secondary computer application. Gerald Robert Overmyer (2014) investigated on the flipped classroom model for college algebra: effects on student achievement. The findings of this research show that there was not a statistically significant difference in the scores of student in the two groups; however students in the flipped sections did score slightly better than student in the traditional sections.

The Study

The current study addresses the impact of teaching connectives through flipped classes to develop the essay writing skills of tertiary students. The study is significant as the impact of teaching connectives through flipped classroom technique is rarely explored by the researchers. The objective of the study is to determine whether teaching connectives through flipped classes has any significant impact on developing the essay writing skills of tertiary students. The study tries to find answers to the following research questions:

· Does flipped classroom teaching have positive impact on the development of essay writing skills of tertiary students?

· Is there a significant difference in the number of coordinating conjunctions, subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs in essays between the experimental group and control group?

· What are the attitudes of the participants of experimental group towards flipped classes?

The Context of the Study

The context of this study was the first year students of science and humanities department of Hindustan University, Chennai, which offer various courses to the students who have finished higher secondary level of education. The students in this University are from Tamil Nadu as well as other states and countries.

The Need for the Research

The observation of students regarding the language acquisition in the classroom indicated that the students have different levels of writing abilities. This is attributed to the fact that the students come from different schools; few have been exposed only to vernacular medium classes before entry to University. Nevertheless, the students have to write essays on general topics and topics specific to their major area of study. It is highly essential for students at tertiary level to learn to write essays in different forms, especially, to organise their ideas coherently and to avoid misconception of ideas by readers. The focus of the study was on helping students to improve their essay writing skills and to motivate all students to take part actively in English class activities.

The Design of the Study

The design of the study was comparative experimental which involved two groups: the control and the experimental. The experimental and control groups’ data before and after the treatment were collected, analysed and compared to evaluate the impact of using flipped classroom technique to teach connectives in developing essay writing skills of tertiary students.

The Participants of the Study

The participants of the experimental group were eighty two first year BBA students and the participants of the control group were seventy three first year B.com students of Hindustan University. To determine the homogeneity of the two groups in terms of language proficiency, informal interviews with semi-structured questions were conducted to the teachers of English and MBA departments. The participants, who were at an intermediate level of English language skills, belong to the age group between 17 - 22 years. The participants of both the experimental and control groups studied English as a second language for between 6 and 12 years.

Flipped Classroom Activities on Connectives

The participants of the experimental and control group were given instructions on connectives for a week during their English periods. The experimental group was taught connectives through flipped classes whereas the control group was taught using traditional classroom method of explaining different types of connectives with examples and giving homework on writing tasks.

For the experimental group, a group mail was created and materials based on connectives were sent to the participants in advance. The following materials were selected and sent to the experimental group through the group mail.

· Power point slides on different types of connectives(cohesive devices, subordinators, coordinators and conjunctive adverbs) with definition, explanation and examples

· Native speakers’ speeches with sign post language and famous songs in English

· Animated videos on stories with sequence markers

· Articles in different forms and structure - descriptive, narrative, chronological, cause and effect, problem and solution, and compare and contrast.

The participants of the experimental group were instructed to check their mails every evening and follow instructions. They read the articles, went through the slides, listened to the native speakers’ speeches and watched animated videos carefully so that they could participate in the next day’s class activities effectively.

English class activities included the following tasks:

· Sorting out the connectives based on their types

· Participating in quizzes - name the appropriate connective.

· Participating in just a minute speech using sign post language

· Participating in group discussion using functional language

·

Sharing recipes -sequence the process

· Doing worksheets on matching, gap filling and complex sentence formation exercises.

· Paragraph and essay writing tasks -use connectives appropriately

The researcher acted as a facilitator of these activities and observed the participants’ involvement during the activities. The outcome of these activities was that the participants demonstrated active participation and exhibited 100% interest towards the various tasks on speaking and writing conducted in the class.

and the experimental group.

Sample of a Flipped Classroom Activity

Quiz on Connectives

The participants of the experimental group were sent a power point slide on types of connectives as a home work material and instructed to go through the slide carefully. The slide contained the meaning and explanation on the usage of different types of connectives with examples. In the next day’s English class, a quiz based on the power point slide was conducted. The participants were divided into seven groups and the quiz was conducted using a single round of questions (Appendix I). By the end of the quiz the participants had sufficient knowledge on the different types of connectives.

Outcome of the Quiz Activity

When the quiz was conducted, 100% participants’ involvement was observed. The activity promoted the learning of meanings, usage and the position of connectives in sentences.

Data Collection

The researcher administered a pre-test and a post-test on essay writing tasks for both the experimental and the control groups before and after the treatment. The participants were given 40 minutes each for the pre-test on the topic, Using computers : Advantages and Disadvantages and the post-test on the topic, Effects of Pollution in the Environment . The writing measure (Table 1) which is adapted from the measure designed by Hirotani, 2009 was used to measure the quantitative data, i.e. results of pre-test and post-test in terms of the number of coordinating conjunctions, subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs.

Table 1 shows the Writing Measure (Adapted from Hirotani, 2009)

A self reflection questionnaire (Appendix II) was given to the participants of the experimental group to elicit their attitudes towards the flipped classroom technique.

Data Analysis and Interpretation

The study was an attempt to determine the impact of teaching connectives through flipped classes to develop the essay writing skills of tertiary students. This section presents the result of the data analysis. For this purpose, inferential statistics was used to analyse the data. First, the data collected from the participants of both the groups on the pre-test was analysed by counting the number of coordinating conjunctions, subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs manually. Then the data collected from the participants of both the groups on the post-test administered after the treatment was analysed. Both the results were compared to measure the efficacy of ‘teaching connectives through flipped classes’ on developing the essay writing skills of the tertiary students. The comparative bar chart (Figure 1) below shows the average number of coordinating conjunctions, subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs found in the pre-test essays of the control group.

Figure 1 compares the pre-test scores of the experimental and the control group

The bar chart (Figure 2) below shows the number of coordinating conjunction, subordinating conjunction and conjunctive adverbs found in the post-test essays of the control group and the experimental group.

Figure 2 compares the post-test scores of the experimental and the control group

Interpretation of the Questionnaire Given to the Experimental Group

A 4-point Likert scale questionnaire (Appendix II) with ten questions was given to the eighty two participants of the experimental group at the end of the treatment to gather their opinions regarding the flipped classroom experience. Most of the participants’ responses showed positive attitude towards the flipped classroom learning experience. For instance, for item 10

“I think the flipped classroom technique will facilitate better learning than the usual classroom teaching method,” 61% of the students opined that they strongly agree and 16% of the participants agreed. However, 6% of the participants strongly disagreed and 6% disagreed. The following pie chart (Figure 3) shows the percentage of participants and their attitudes towards flipped classroom.

Figure 3 shows the percentage of participants and their attitudes towards flipped classroom

Result of the Data Analysis

The number of the three types of connectives, coordinating conjunctions, subordinating conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs, were counted manually in both the pre-test and post-test essays of the experimental and the control groups. The average of each type of connective in the pre-tests and post-tests were taken and compared. The following tables (Table 2 and Table 3) show the average numbers of each type of connective found in the pre-tests and post-tests of both the groups respectively.

Table 2 Pre-test Average Scores of Control and Experimental Groups

The above table demonstrates the homogeneous level of both the control and the experimental groups.

The following table (Table 3) depicts the increase in the number of connectives used by the participants of both the control and experimental groups. However, there is a relatively significant difference in the scores of the experimental group, which was given connectives instruction through flipped classroom technique when compared to the control group that was taught connectives through the usual classroom teaching method.

Table 3 Post-test Average Scores of the Control and the Experimental

Findings and Discussions

The evaluation substantiates the fact that there is a marked improvement in the essay writing abilities of the participants of the experimental group when compared to the control group. The improvement seen in the participants is due to the instruction of connectives through the flipped classes they participated. This is evident by the improvement, quantity and accuracy seen in using connectives by the control group in the post-test.

The findings of this study are significant because the previous studies on connectives did not instruct students using the flipped classroom technique. This technique has enabled the experimental group to actively engage in studies at their comfort zones, especially using internet. The participants of the experimental group were also given opportunities to practice all the four language skills unlike the traditional classrooms. The participants did not spend their valuable learning time during English classes by listening to lectures and writing down notes instead they actively participated in speeches, group discussions, quizzes and writing tasks. The present study investigated the use of flipped classroom technique in developing the essay writing abilities of the tertiary students. The findings of the study revealed that the participants of the flipped classes had more positive attitude and intrinsic motivation toward learning connectives which improved coherence in their essays considerably. Moreover, the participants of the experimental group had opportunities to read different types of essays as homework materials, which had exposed them to much more language input on various topics and indirectly taught them to structure their essays effectively in paragraphs.

Implications and Conclusions

Flipped English classes give special attention to the language needs of the students and remove their anxiety. Moreover, they provide extensive opportunities for students to learn the key elements of writing: vocabulary, sentence construction, grammar, spelling and punctuation even though the focus was on teaching connectives. Each class offered the experimental group well planned speaking and writing tasks to build their confidence, knowledge, motivation and enhance their essay writing skills. The speeches and English songs sent to the students exposed them to native speakers’ English and facilitated the students to learn pronunciation, stress and intonation.

Scope for Further Investigation

Flipped classroom strategy not only developed the tertiary students’ use of connectives in essays but also enabled them to write creatively. This utilitarian technique of flipped classroom will be highly useful to teach engineering and technology students. The students will be motivated to become self- directed and will take responsibilities for their own studies, which is one of the most important benefits of CALL.

Limitations of the Study

The main limitations of the study are

· If flipped classes are not planned cautiously, portion completion will become an issue.

· It is an extra burden for teachers of English since flipped classes need careful preparation, a specific plan on the intended speaking and writing tasks based on the next day’s learning objectives.

· Teachers need enough time to plan, prepare and send materials to students based on the next day’s class.

· Regular internet access is required for the teachers and the learners. If a learner doesn’t check mails due to internet failure, that learner cannot participate successfully in the class activities, the following day.