Learning Italian As a FL via Virtual Museum Tasks: The Effects on Students' Positive Interdependence

Abstract

Situations of interdependence arise as individuals establish relationships of mutual reliance for the purpose of achieving common goals. Interdependence is essential in the field of language education as individuals learn from and with others, collaboratively acting to overcome communicative and task-based challenges. With the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020 and the consequent deprivation of in-person interactions and opportunities to travel, virtual resources have increasingly been incorporated in language education to engage individuals in online interactions. Despite considerable changes brought by technology to the dynamics of learning groups, little research has been devoted to the long-term effects of virtual interfaces on interdependence in language education. Drawing from studies on social interdependence applied to collaborative language learning, this thesis discusses the results of online teaching interventions conducted on a group of undergraduate and postgraduate students of Italian as FL in two institutions in the United Kingdom. The purpose was to analyse the impact of virtual museums on students’ positive interdependence in online language learning contexts. By using Kahoot!, Thinglink and Google Arts & Culture, students completed task-based language activities on exploring virtual galleries to select artwork on specific criteria. Data was collected with a mixed-methods design consisting of online classroom observations, a questionnaire, focus groups and tutors' interviews. Overall results confirmed that despite the interactional constraints of e-learning, the use of virtual museums in online language classes can support students’ positive interdependence by fostering cooperation, turn-taking, negotiation and role-assignment.