AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF PRESENTATION-REFLECTION ASSIGNMENTS IN THE AMERICAN STUDIES SYLLABUS AT ULIS-VNUH: RELEVANCE AND EFFICACY AS PERCEIVED BY LECTURERS AND STUDENTS Nghiên cứu về việc Sử dụng Bài tập Thuyết trình-Viết Thu hoạch trong Bộ môn H

In terms of research population, the study targeted at students and lecturers involved in the American Studies courses at ULIS-VNUH.. Therefore, in the context of the American Studies co

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

TRẦN HOÀNG ANH, K17A

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF REFLECTION ASSIGNMENTS IN THE AMERICAN STUDIES SYLLABUS AT ULIS-VNUH: RELEVANCE AND EFFICACY AS

PRESENTATION-PERCEIVED BY LECTURERS AND STUDENTS

(Nghiên cứu về việc Sử dụng Bài tập Thuyết trình-Viết Thu hoạch trong Bộ môn Hoa

Kỳ Học ở Trường ĐHNN-ĐHQGHN: Độ Phù hợp và Hiệu quả từ Góc độ Đánh giá của

Giảng viên và Sinh viên)

M.A Combined Program Thesis

English Language Teaching Methodology

60 14 10

HANOI - 2011

TRẦN HOÀNG ANH, K17A

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF REFLECTION ASSIGNMENTS IN THE AMERICAN STUDIES SYLLABUS AT ULIS-VNUH: RELEVANCE AND EFFICACY AS

PRESENTATION-PERCEIVED BY LECTURERS AND STUDENTS

(Nghiên cứu về việc Sử dụng Bài tập Thuyết trình-Viết Thu hoạch trong Bộ môn Hoa

Kỳ Học ở Trường ĐHNN-ĐHQGHN: Độ Phù hợp và Hiệu quả từ Góc độ Đánh giá của

Giảng viên và Sinh viên)

M.A Combined Program Thesis

English Language Teaching Methodology

60 14 10

Supervisor: Đặng Ngọc Sinh, M.A

HANOI - 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF FIGURES v

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Background of and rationale for the study 1

2 Aims of the research 1

3 Significance of the study 2

4 Scope of the research 2

5 Organization of the study 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Key and related concepts 4

1.1.1 Content-based Instruction and the teaching context in ULIS-VNUH American Studies courses 4

1.1.2 The presentation assignments 11

1.1.3 Relevance and efficacy 15

1.1.4 English skills in sheltered course classes 17

1.1.5 Interdisciplinary research skills 18

1.2 How does this study fit into other research? 19

1.3 Summary 19

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 20

2.1 Research questions 20

2.2 Participants 20

2.3 Instruments 21

2.4 Data collection procedures 29

2.5 Data analysis procedure 29

2.6 Summary 30

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 31

3.1 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the

presentation-reflection assignments have helped to meet the couse's objectives 32

3.2 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements 45

3.3 What do teachers and students suggest about modifying the assignments? – Practical implication and suggestions 48

3.4 Summary 50

PART C: CONCLUSION 51

1 Summary of findings 51

2 Limitations of the study 52

3 Suggestions for further research 52

REFERENCES 53 APPENDIX I Appendix 1 American Studies course outline I Appendix 2a Survey questionnaire form – Student version VIII Appendix 2b Survey questionnaire form – Teacher version X Appendix 3a Summary of questionnaire data – Students' Perception XII Appendix 3b Summary of questionnaire data – Teachers' Perception XIII Appendix 4 Median Values XIV Appendix 5 Correlation between efficacy index and presentation score XV Appendix 6 Summary of relevant suggestions from students XVI

Chapter 1: Introduction

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Background of and rationale for the study

n the world, research and teaching about the United States of America have a long tradition, dating back to as early as the birth of the country At the University of Languages and International Studies – Vietnam National University, Hanoi (ULIS-VNUH), however, this multi-disciplinary study field just entered the curriculum as a subject for about a decade (Country Studies Division, 2009)

Throughout this period, the academic staff of the Country Studies division assigned to implement the course have been constantly embarking on improving the course's contents, through modifying the structure, updating and refining materials, and perhaps more importantly, the teaching methods This arduous task is bound to increase in intensity as the division has to take the lead in designing an entirely new undergraduate program on American Studies for the university, which will be launched around the 2012-2013 timeframe Therefore, as a junior lecturer working in liaison with the group, the author had the need to help revise some elements of the current teaching method used in the American Studies courses, and so this thesis was an ideal chance to aid in the effort

During the three recent academic years from 2008 to 2011, the majority of students' casual feedbacks to teachers of American Studies courses mainly expressed concerns about assignment requirements, assignment quality, and, naturally, assignment grading Rather than catering to the sporadic questions about different aspects of the course assignments, this study took the chance to investigate the core and overarching dimensions of the course assignments already in place, i.e oral presentation and written reflection, as tangible and available products of the teaching and studying processes

2 Aims of the research

With said purposes, the study aimed at answering the three main questions below:

i To what degree do American Studies lecturers and students at ULIS-VNUH think the design of the courseworks have helped to meet the course's objectives?

I

Chapter 1: Introduction

ii To what degree do they think the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements?

iii What do they suggest about modifying the assignments?

3 Significance of the study

The research did not aim to and thus did not suggest the best assignment design to be used

in the course Instead, it was expected to have a certain impact on the way how the current assignment types of American Studies courses – and even of similar courses offered by the division e.g British Studies or General Geography of the UK and the US – would be designed, both in paper and practice, to better meet the preset course objectives It also served as a referential material for researchers and teachers alike who are interested in the testing and assessment aspect of curriculum design

4 Scope of the research

As stated, the study would look at the American Studies assignments in only two main dimensions: relevance and efficacy – whose meanings within this research context would

be interpreted later in the next chapter

In terms of research population, the study targeted at students and lecturers involved in the American Studies courses at ULIS-VNUH Specifically, for practical reasons, these are students from the classes of QH081E, since they were the latest groups to take the courses – while all the previous groups had graduated As for the lecturers, all of them came from the Country Studies Division – Faculty of Linguistics and Cultures of English Speaking Countries

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 Key and related concepts

1.1.1 Content-based Instruction and the teaching context in ULIS-VNUH American Studies courses

ince the early 1980s, there has been a growing interest in combining language and content teaching In the American context, programs, models, and approaches have proliferated in all levels of instruction, creating various forms of incorporating language and content teaching (Met, 1991) In the mid 1990s in European countries, curriculum innovations have been directed toward the content and language integrated learning approach, in which both curriculum content – e.g science or geography – and English are taught together (Graddol, 2007) All these forms of incorporating language and content teaching fall under the heading of Content-based Instruction

Overall, it is clear that the term CBI is commonly used to describe a curricula approach which seeks to integrate language and content instruction This paper thus adopts the view similar to that of Curtain and Pesola (1994) in which CBI involves the curriculum concepts being taught through the foreign language, appropriate to the grade level of the students

Content

Met (1999) proposes that "…'content' in content-based programs represents material that is cognitively engaging and demanding for the learner, and is material that extends beyond the target language or target culture" This paper adopts the definitions of Met (1999), Curtain and Pesola (1994), which is most relevant to the research context Therefore,

"content" here is seen as materials, or specifically "curriculum concepts", that are cognitively engaging and demanding for the learner, and is material that extends beyond the target language or target culture

S

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

The rationale of CBI

Content-based instruction (CBI) bases its rationale on the premise that students can effectively obtain both language and subject matter knowledge by receiving content input

in the target language Although it has been recently recognised by influential authors such

as Rodgers as "one of the Communicative Language Teaching spin-off approaches" (2001), some authors contemplate the paradigm within an even wider perspective:

according to Stryker and Leaver (1997), for instance, CBI "is a truly and holistic approach

to foreign language education … (which) can be at once a philosophical orientation, a methodological system, a syllabus design for a single course, or a framework for an entire program of instruction"

The benefits of the approach are directly or indirectly associated with an extensive body of research from a variety of fields Strong empirical support for CBI can be found in second language acquisition research, in teacher training studies and in cognitive psychology, as well as in the outcomes documented by successful programs in a variety of contexts and levels of instruction (Adamson, 1993; Dupuy, 2000)

Classification of CBI and current teaching context

Through a careful review of related literature, this paper adopts the classification used by

Met (1999) Met (2007) has specified the approach as follows:

CONTENT-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING:

A CONTINUUM OF CONTENT AND LANGUAGE

Sheltered Courses

Adjunct Model

Theme-Based Courses

Language classes with frequent use

of content for language practice

Among the models above, the actual instruction model seems to fit in most with the Sheltered Courses as the latter is defined by Echevarria, J., Vogt, M.E., & Short, D (2004) (cited in Short, D & Himmel, J., 2007) as shown above

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

Its neighbor, the adjunct model, can be refuted as being noted by Davies (2003) as "[its] emphasis is placed on acquiring specific target vocabulary" and "they may also feature study skills sessions to familiarise the students with listening, note taking and skimming and scanning texts." These two characteristics are too distant from the course's objectives (Country Studies Division, 2007)

1.1.2 The presentation assignments

Based on a review of theoretical foundation, the assignments for a typical American Studies course include group presentations on a certain topic and individual reflection essays of group members on that same presentation and topic Other groups have to write reports/evaluation on the presentation performances of their classmates as well Both the presentation and the reflection are graded (Dang, 2008) Since the last school year of 2010-

2011, another assignment has been integrated into the syllabus – which is essentially a series of mini tests, called "quizzes" However, due to its relative novelty and experimental nature, the assignment is not considered in the scope of this paper

On a side note, beside presentation, the other assignment is known under several names in different class – report, reflection, evaluation, comment sheet, etc Nonetheless, for convenience, this research report would use "reflection/report assignment", or simply,

"reflection assignment", with the intent to encompass all varieties of the name

1.1.3 Relevance and efficacy

Relevance

Contextualized, in this research's terms, for both teachers and learners, the relevance factor

of the assignments referred to the degree to which the actual implementation of the assignments can help realize the objectives set out for the course Perception from both sides regarding this factor, however, is treated separately then discussed jointly

Efficacy

The term, particularly in this research, referred to the quality and quantity of work

performed by students in its relation with the assignments' requirements (level of adherence to guidelines) It stems from the belief that if the requirements are stricly followed, the intended results will be achieved

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

Accordingly, the following figure proposed another way to visualize the two concepts

relevance and efficacy in their relation to each other and to course objectives:

1.1.2 Notions behind the objectives

There are key concepts in ULIS' American Studies course objectives which might not be readily obvious Due to their importance, it is imperative that these concepts are made clear

in light of existing literature – "English skills" (in a sheltered instruction class context), and

"interdisciplinary research skills" Acknowledgedly, "presentational competencies" and foci of American Studies were important concepts, too, but they were adequately defined

by the course syllabus already

1.1.4 English skills in sheltered course classes

According to The Education Alliance at Brown University, Sheltered English instruction is

an instructional approach that engages English language learners above the beginner level

in developing grade-level content-area knowledge, academic skills, and increased English proficiency In sheltered English classes, teachers use clear, direct, simple English and a wide range of scaffolding strategies to communicate meaningful input in the content area

to students Learning activities that connect new content to students' prior knowledge, that require collaboration among students, and that spiral through curriculum material, offer English language learners the grade-level content instruction of their English-speaking peers, while adapting lesson delivery to suit their English proficiency level

Among all sheltered instruction models applied, the SIOP model by Echevarria, Vogt and Short (2000) is widely considered to be one of the most effective (e.g Pearson Education,

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

2008; The Education Alliance – Brown University, 2006) The SIOP model identifies 30 important elements of sheltered instruction under eight broad categories

It would not be of much benefit to us to explore into each and every category The primary concern of the moment is what the SIOP model suggests teachers to test in their students –

in terms of their language skills, specifically Category VIII provides an answer

In language regard, it seemed to focus very much on students' vocabulary, and, possibly, their grammar – in order that they could come up with adequate answers, rather than language skills Therefore, in the context of the American Studies course in question, English skills might be understood narrowly as knowledge areas of grammar and (general and technical) vocabulary – as other English language communication skills are covered under the umbrella term "presentational skills" already

1.1.5 Interdisciplinary research skills

According to Beckman, A and Beckman, M (2008), interdisciplinary research is a mode

of research by teams or individuals that integrates information, data, techniques, tools, perspectives, concepts, and/or theories from two or more disciplines or bodies of specialized knowledge to advance fundamental understanding or to solve problems whose solutions are beyond the scope of a single discipline or area of research practice

Larson, Landers, & Begg (2011) in their effort to "add clarity and develop a set of shared definitions, values, and language about interdisciplinary research", have designed a list that sketches major area of competencies for interdisciplinary research skills, with 17 competencies falling into 3 major areas

Nevertheless, considering the practical situation of teaching and learning at ULIS, any effort to enhance students' (interdisciplinary) research skills within a certain undergraduate course would be limited only to integrating them into course assignments but not a full-fledged research in cooperation with a large, diverse team of researchers with the highest purpose of publication Therefore, the interdisciplinary research competencies would be

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Practical Basis

scaled down and understood in this context as: (the ability to) (i) integrate concepts and methods from multiple disciplines in designing interdisciplinary research protocols, (ii) read journals outside of his or her discipline, and (iii) engage colleagues (experts) from other disciplines to gain their perspectives on research problems

1.2 How does this study fit into other research?

This research would best contribute to, among all relevant studies, the body of researches

on sheltered instruction, which until recently dominated by commanding and

"enlightening" principles by Echevarria, Vogt and Short Specifically, going along with the order of the day – "think globally, act locally", this study will provide a very tangible review of the testing and assessment facet of sheltered instruction classroom in a well-defined, local context

Chapter 3: Methodology

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

he preceding chapter briefly reviewed the literature on the research topic for the theoretical basis of the study This chapter, on the practical side, discussed the participants, the research instruments, and the procedure of data collection and data analysis as a means to maximize the validity and reliability of the whole research

2.1 Research questions

Again, this study aimed at answering the three main questions below:

i To what degree do American Studies lecturers and students at ULIS-VNUH think the design of the courseworks have helped to meet the course's objectives?

ii To what degree do they think the actual assignment quality has met the assignments' requirements?

iii What do they suggest about modifying the assignments?

2.2 Participants

As the research scope indicated, there are two groups of stakeholders from the Faculty of English Language Teacher Education and Faculty of Linguistics and Cultures of English Speaking Countries that can participate in this research

The first group composed of 532 students in 22 classes of QH081E – third year students at the moment they participated in the survey The research targeted at this group of students

as they were familiar the procedures and requirements in Country Studies courses as they had taken two courses on General Geography of the UK and the US and British Studies in the previous semesters and they had just completed the course in question of American Studies before the end of their third year These students were asked to participate in a questionnaire survey, which is elaborated in the next parts

The second group of participants are teachers of the Country Studies Division who taught American Studies to the QH081E classes Given the small number of teachers – 6 people – and the research's concern, data yielded from this group of participants was treated

T

Chapter 3: Methodology

qualitatively to provide deeper insights and explanation to the issues arose Two of the teachers have more than 10 years of experience in teaching these courses, while the others range from 2 to 5 years This group of teachers were invited to give responses to a questionnaire survey, followed-up by a short in-depth interview

2.3 Instruments

The methodology of this research is a combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches – with the former played a more significant role, as it would provide large sketches of the situation while the latter would provide a basis for further interpretation of the situation Three data gathering instruments were utilized to collect data needed to answer the research questions as well as for the purpose of triangulation The first one is a questionnaire survey in two slightly different versions – one issued to students and the other teachers The second one is interview, carried out after each participating teacher finished answering the survey The last one is secondary analysis of data on students' American Studies scores – most importantly the presentation-reflection scores

2.3.1 Questionnaire

The central instrument was a questionnaire survey in two similar versions It helped collect data about teachers' and students' perceptions about the relevance and efficacy of the American Studies assignments Both versions were designed around the two core dimensions As a matter of course, the underlying connections of each question item to the said dimensions were not disclosed This instrument was chosen for its various advantages and compatibility with the aim of the research

The 5-point Likert scale was adopted as the core framework for the design of the questionnaire Most questions were formulated on this scale in form of statements, and participants were asked to respond to these statements Possible responses range from 1-Strongly disagree to 5-Strongly agree The last open-ended question was utilized in order

to gain more qualitative data for the third research aim The questionnaire consisted of 40 questions [See Appendix 1a and 1b for the final questionnaire forms]

About the two versions for students and teachers, the only significant difference among them lied in the way in which each question was worded The other minor variation was the informational question on teaching experience for teachers and class for students

Chapter 3: Methodology

2.3.2 Interview

This instrument was used in this research as a small, supplementary tool to assist the questionnaire survey All 6 teachers participated in the research were invited to engage in small talks in which they only needed to elaborate on one main question, which was an expansion of the open-ended question in the questionnaire Here they provided further explanation to back up their comments No student was invited to participate in the interview

2.3.3 Secondary data analysis

This study aimed at using QH081E students' presentation scores for the American Studies subject with a purpose to look for any significant correlation among all the data gathered The data was archived by the Faculty of English Language Teacher Education

2.4 Data collection procedures

The questionnaire survey was conducted in the following steps:

1 Introducing about the research via student mail group with the aid of a student coordinator This introduction reached all students of QH081E

2 The coordinator forwarded the questionnaire form to monitor of each class

3 All monitors then forwarded this form to their class' members, who later returned the filled forms to their respective monitor

4 All monitors packed the forms together and sent back to the researcher via email For teachers, the form was sent directly to each, who then returned the filled form directly

to the researcher Later they were interviewed independently after their asnwers were read thoroughly

As for the data on students' American Studies scores, first, the researcher needed to gain an authorization from the faculty This was done after an archive access request form had been filled and filed into the faculty office's archive Then the researcher had full access and the right to use all QH081E students' American Studies scores for the purpose of this research

Chapter 3: Methodology

2.5 Data analysis procedure

Questionnaire and interview data

Data from questionnaire was first grouped together on "community" basis, i.e students' forms were grouped according to their class, while all teachers' forms were taken together under the "teacher group"

Raw data was then sorted out and enumerated thoroughly with the aid of specialized computer programs (primarily MS Excel – as it would take much more time with SPSS) The nominal choices (1-Strongly disagree, 3-Uncertain, etc.) were converted to numeral data

Responses were also grouped into batches under the same principles presented in section 3.3.1 on how the questionnaire was formulated and analyzed quantitatively for meaningful interpretation and discussion in the next chapter

Responses from the open-ended question were taken into analysis in tandem with data from interviews to shed light into the more in-depth issues Due to the nature of open-ended questions and the scope of interview, this data group was analyzed qualitatively, with the focus zoomed in on what had been said rather than how many people said what

Chapter 5: Conclusion

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

lthough the research expected to receive survey feedbacks from 532 students, due to some restraint in communication and cooperation, the research could just access 466 students in 20 out of 22 classes – which means a coverage rate of 87% Furthermore, among these 466 entries, after an arduous filtering process, 149 were considered to be invalid because the participants simply copied the answer from each other Eventually, there remained only 317 valid entries, accounting for 60% of the original target population Still, this sufficed to draw up conclusions at confidence level of 95% and confidence interval of 3.44

In the other group, all 6 teachers were able to participate and their answers were all valid – among them only 4 were able to join in the interview Teachers' responses were all analyzed qualitatively, because their small number would hardly make up many statistically meaningful conclusions for the purpose of generalization to a larger (teacher) population They would be more meaningful in some situations where teachers' and students' perceptions were collated Therefore all of of the charts below dealt with data from students' reponses only, unless noticed otherwise

The analysis below was organized on the basis of solving each research question, using relevant data from all three sources, in stead of data yielded from each type of instruments

3.1 Perceptions of teachers and students of the degree to which the reflection assignments have helped to meet the couse's objectives

presentation-Objective 1a – Providing students with general knowledge about the US in the past and at the present

In the discipline of American Studies, as in many other content subjects, the first and foremost concern was the amount (and quality) of knowledge passed on to learners In the context of the American Studies course at ULIS, this body of knowledge was generally divided into two interconnected groups: (i) general knowledge – American geography,

A

Almost 70% agreed or strongly agreed that the presentation assignment did help them to acquire the general knowledge adequately, compared to 46% with the reflection assignment It was also reflected in the median value of 3 for presentation (see appendix 4), this type of assignment was believed to be more effective in improving learners' general American Studies knowledge than the reflection assignment (median value 2) A median value of 2 meant that the majority of respondents chose option 3-Uncertain When students felt uncertain about their improvement, or lack of it, then it was impossible to assert that the reflection assignment was able to help students with general knowledge

Combined, presentation and reflection could only do a fairly good job in helping students with general knowledge, with nearly 60% agreed that they did (combined median value being 2.5) As for teachers, with the median value being 3, they seemed to believe a little more robustly in the ability of the presentation assignment to help their students in the general knowledge department

Objective 1b – Providing students with knowledge about the US in some specific themes

As for the specific knowledge themes – the questions tried to differentiate perceptions toward each of five major themes The median values yielded show that all five themes received 3 points, meaning they were more or less equally effective However, the distribution chart below showed that knowledge of history was the weakest points of all, having only 60% respondents' rating agree or strongly agree – compared with 70-75% of other knowledge foci A hint for an proper answer lied in the responses to the open-ended question Although not relevant to the question being asked, some students commented that lectures on history was the most boring of all

Teachers had the same level of belief in this regard, with their median value being 3

Chapter 5: Conclusion

To sum up, overall, both teachers and students largely agreed that the two assignments both helped to boost students' knowledge – with the reflection assignment being the slightly weaker agent

Objective 2 – Helping students develop presentational competencies

Presentational competencies were the second objective prescribed the syllabus They were identified as (i) writing skills, (ii) oral communication, (iii) visual representation, and (iv) electronic discussion It was here that we could see a clearer distinction between the roles

of the presentation and the reflection assignment in both students' and teachers' perception

It could be seen clearly that oral communication and visual representation was believed to

be the two improvements triggered by presentation assignments (with both medians being 3) The improvement in oral communication received better rating with 78% respondents agreed or strongly agreed and that of improvement in visual representation was 66% Writing skills and electronic discussion was neglected behind with the median values of 2 for both – especially the writing skills, with 32% disagreed or strongly disagreed, 40% uncertain, and only 26.5% agreed and 1.5% This could be explained through the nature of the presentation assignment, in which the foci were on the elaboration of oral arguments and/or information presenting and, to a lesser extent, the way visual aids were prepared Whilst, writing was limited to short sentences and box language Not surprisingly, teachers agreed totally with students on this (with median values being 2, 3, 3, 2 respectively)

On the other hand, we could have a different perspective into the presentational skills – from the regard of reflection assigments Students only acknowledged reflection assignment's role in enhancing their writing skills (median 3 with 64% agreed or strongly agreed), while remained unclear in the other three components (all three medians being 2) Teachers, on the hand, seemed to be more vehemently by opining that while the reflection assignment helped students improve their writing skills, it did not directly help students improve the other three Their median values for writing skills was 3, oral communication and visual representation were 1, and electronic discussion was 1.5

Because these two types of assignment were designed to complement each other, the combined effect of both helped students to improve their writing skills, oral communication and visual representation within the context of presentational skills

We could also see that when contrasting with the presentation assignment, the reflection assignment lagged behind in terms of improving students' presentational skills It would be partly explained by some students that the report assignment was uninspiring and they generally could not reach the required depth, or it was neglected by teachers because much

more in class time, effort and focus was reserved to the presentation assignment

Objective 3a – Offering the students opportunities to improve their English languages

The third objective was essentially a combination of two smaller objectives The first one was offering students opportunities to improve their English languages Since it would be impossible to "count" opportunities, the corresponding questions aimed directly at how the participants perceived the degree to which their English capacity was improved (or degraded) owing to the assignments in question

For both types of assignments, the perception was very favorable to "improving general vocabulary" – median 3 for students and median 3.5 for teachers with presentation and both median 3 for both students and teachers with reflection To "improving terminologies and grammar" through presentation, students were divided, as there were no clear trend of agree or disagree as with general vocabulary Both their medians stayed at 2 It would be the same for the reflection assignment if not for the observation that students believed their grammar had got better thanks to the assignment A considerable 61% either agreed or strongly agreed with the statement, giving it a median value of 3

Taken together, both presentation and reflection had relatively positive influence on students' English capacity – so they perceived, with around 55% agreed or strongly agreed and around 10% disagreed and 2.5% strongly disagreed Presentation helped students to improve their general vocabulary, while reflection their general vocabulary and grammar The capacity of wielding terminologies, despite an important aspect of any specialized content subject, was not believed to be better Teachers, nevertheless, believed rather

or strongly agreed However, if we look at their median values, then consultation was the method largely ignored by students in doing their presentation-reflection assignment (median 2), and thus, logically, the corresponding competency would not develop as a result of these assignments For the two other competencies, their medians were both 3, so

in a large sense, the assignments did help them to hone some of their interdisciplinary research skills, although very restrictively

Considered all three competencies together, around 55% respondents agreed that the two courseworks had helped them to achieve certain improvement in their interdisciplinary research skills, with an average median of 2.67 This is a positive yet not satisfying signal

to the contribution of the assignments to realize the course's objective Teachers, alternatively, evaluated the realization of these competencies on relatively lower scale values Their corresponding median values for (the use of) "Concepts and Methods",

"Documents", "Consultation" were 2.0, 2.5, and 2.0 This implied their uncertainty of the students' application of these research methods The highest ranking, "Documents", could only received a 2.5, so it was not enough to conclude that the teachers thought the course was successful in this objective

Objective 4 – Preparing students who are interested in American Studies for their further study of the discipline

Question 25-28 corresponded to the forth objective – preparing students who are interested

in American Studies for their further study of the discipline These questions yielded rather consistent responses from both students and teachers, with more than 60% student