Supporting students' Chinese learning through the platform of social media : Edmodo

Abstract

From an educational perspective this thesis explores the social media platform Edmodo as a method to support Chinese language teaching and learning in Australian public primary schools. It focuses on a teacher-researcher's exploration of using information technology "' social media, to make Chinese learnable for young beginning learners. In this context the research is timely and significant. The research is carried out as a qualitative case study that involves collecting and analysing data from teaching Chinese language in BR Public School. The aim of this study is to explore the strategies of using social media, Edmodo, to facilitate young students' learning of Chinese by creating a positive teaching and learning environment where off-class, online activities complement classroom teaching. The first of the evidentiary chapters (Chapter 4) points out the existing challenges of class-based, text-based approaches to teaching and learning Chinese. A full description of these challenges inspired the idea of incorporating Edmodo to support students' learning. The second (Chapter 5) and third (Chapter 6) evidentiary chapters foreground the implementation of social media strategies and activities in the teaching of Chinese. The findings (Chapter 7) indicate that Edmodo can be used in a supporting role to facilitate students' successful learning of Chinese language. In the case of this project, an overall assessment of the teacher-research method of professional learning in the context of Chinese language education in an Australian public primary school is that it proved to be a beneficial process.

Date of Award	2015
Original language	English