Online EFL Assignments and Success

Abstract

Giving homework is a common practice at all levels of education, yet its impact as a pedagogical tool on the learning process is still a matter of debate. The past decade has seen the rapid development of web-based tools created for educational purposes. In parallel with these developments, researchers and educators have begun to show an increased interest in online homework systems in recent years in order to evaluate learning and to overcome the drawbacks of pen-and-paper homework. This study aims to investigate the effects of online English as a Foreign Language (EFL) assignments on student success in a university vocational school context. Participants of this experimental study were 49 first-grade students studying at Burdur Mehmet Akif Ersoy University (MAKU) Gölhisar Vocational School (GVS). Of these students, 28 constituted the experimental group and 21 constituted the control group. The study was conducted in the spring term of the 2016-2017 academic year for a 12week period. At the beginning of the study, a pre-test was applied to both groups. Next, five weekly assignments were given for the experimental group via Edmodo and for the control group as pen-and-paper homework. The findings revealed that assignments whether online or penand-paper increased students' success significantly. Moreover, the success increase of the students who did online assignments was about double that of the students who were responsible for doing pen-and-paper assignments. The study concluded with suggestions that EFL teachers should give assignments in university vocational schools and that these assignments should be given as online since they are more effective on student success.