5.3.1.7.1. Results from The Research Journals. Finally, three teachers chose the worksheet entitled The Life Cycle of a T-shirt (which was already piloted in the university context; thus, its description can be found in Section 4.3.1.7.). Two of them, Ubul and Édua wrote and uploaded a journal entry, therefore, their experiences were subjected to analysis. Both participants chose this topic because they wanted to try an alternative approach to the topic of fashion, a topic that frequently appears at language exams. Furthermore, Édua believed that this topic would appeal to her students as it fits their interests. Soon she had to realize that even though her students may be interested in clothes, “this sort of alternative approach does not figure in their mindset” (J/LC-É-1). After this realisation, she felt even more strongly about “getting the message across” (J/LC-É-1). In both groups, the students seemed to like the prediction activity and their teachers reported on surprise on the students’ behalf, as they were “shocked to see that their predictions were less than the real numbers” (J/LC-U-1). The vocabulary activity posed some challenges for the students, but they were asked to use an online dictionary in both groups to help them find out the meaning of certain words (even though in Édua’s group, some extra help from the teacher came in handy). The students seemed to enjoy the video too, but while in Ubul’s group it was easy to do the while-watching activity, Édua’s group struggled with it (soon she realized that she should have played it one more time for them). Both Édua and Ubul wrote about the discussion activity. Based on their answers, it is apparent that the two groups differed a lot from the point of view of background knowledge: while Ubul wondered at how smart his students were and how deep their background knowledge was, Édua posited that there were observable gaps, even in their practical knowledge (e.g., they have never heard about darning holes in socks). Both teachers wrote about using the online resources they were provided with, apart from the worksheet: Ubul used the interactive handout provided for the prediction activity and Édua used the fashion footprint link for a whole class discussion. What became evident from the entries was that both of them appreciated that they could select freely what to include from the worksheet and what not to: both of them assigned only parts of the research project as homework for their students. In their overall assessment of their lesson, both teachers noted that they think the lesson was eye-opening for their students and they truly believe they will consider those ideas they were familiarized with during the lessons.

 

5.3.1.7.2. Results of the Student Feedback. From the three groups, all in all, 39 students took part in the lessons dealing with the TED animation; nevertheless, only 31 of them filled in the feedback sheet. The students, once again, seem to have enjoyed the activities, as they awarded an average of 4.23 (SD = .68) to the first question on the feedback sheet, inquiring into how much they enjoyed the activity sequence. Regarding the question asking them about the extent to which they felt the activities helped them improve their language skills, they rated it an average of 4.09 (SD = .98). Finally, they felt that the activity sequence helped them improve their 21st-century skills as well to a certain extent, as they gave it an average mean of 3.67 (SD = 1.11). The top skills they think the sequence developed were communication skills (22), researching skills (20) and problem-solving skills (18).