This study reports on intercultural learning from the perspective of student participants in an online teacher education partnership which brought together student teachers in five countries to explore and discuss technological innovations in language teaching. The student perspectives reported upon here were drawn from one intact class of graduate students who participated in this telecollaboration as part of a required sociolinguistics course, in which the telecollaboration served as a discussion point for course themes (e.g. language ideologies, language socialization, multimodal literacy, gender identities and language education, and language and ethnicity, etc.).

1. Student Perspectives on Intercultural
Learning from an Online Teacher
Education Partnership
Shannon Sauro
Malmö University, Sweden
shannon.sauro@mah.se |@shansauro | mah.academia.edu/ShannonSauro | ssauro.info

2. ““It would be good to know what kind of
‘intercultural’ exchange is actually fostered through
telecollaboration or whether telecollaboration is
mostly like to reinforce stereotypes in mostly
monologic postings?”
(Reviewer comment quoted in O’Dowd, 2015 August)
Intercultural Learning
Is what we are doing as effective as we think it is?

3. “…interaction using social technology has not necessarily
resulted in intercultural learning…. The tasks involved
students in exchanges across cultures and placed culture at
the heart of these exchanges, but the intercultural learning
was supposed to happen as an automatic result of
communication or engagement with others. In other
words, the tasks were set up as cultural tasks – that is,
tasks that focused on factual information … rather than as
intercultural tasks that involved learners in moving
between cultures and reflecting on their own cultural
positioning…”
(Liddicoat & Scarino, 2013, p. 117)
Critique of OIE
Inadequate support for intercultural learning

4.  Current OIE research does not assume that the online
interaction is the site where intercultural learning
necessarily occurs.
 Integration of online and classroom contexts and
facilitator support are integral.
 Incorporation of reflective pedagogical components
allow for increased learning opportunities.
(O’Dowd, 2016)
Counterpoint
Greater attention must be paid to the learning that takes place off-line

5.  5 country teacher-education partnership
 Expanded from a 3 country partnership (Sauro,
Spector-Cohen & O’Dowd, 2015 August)
 Inspired by the Sharing Perspectives Model of
Exchange (Sharing Perspectives, 2015).
 Three goals:
 Expert sharing of technology for teaching English
 Development of linguistic & intercultural
competence
 Hands on experience with CALL resources
The Partnership
Innovations in Foreign Language Education

6. 1. In what ways did the partnership
influence understanding of other
cultures?
2. In what ways did the partnership foster
critical reflection of the students' own
culture?
Guiding Questions
Can intercultural learning be found in a teacher education partnership

7.  One hour of each 3 hour class meeting was
dedicated to the discussion of the
telecollaboration.
 Course themes were used as a lens for these
discussions.
 A more autonomous, learner-centered approach
(Dooly, forthcoming) was used: students were
not graded on participation.
 The threaded discussions served as data for
students’ small-scale sociolinguistic studies.
The Course in Sweden
Sociolingvistik i undervisningskontext
Sociolinguistics in Educational Contexts

8. Focal Participants
Intact class of 5th year students in a BA/MA program in secondary
teacher education who are specializing in teaching English
Doctor Vem
Andy Pandy
Regina
Phalange
Jerome
Samglide
Vondollars

9.  Five audio recordings of class discussions
 Tape analysis – Note-taking while listening but no
transcription (Dörnyei, 2007)
 One semi-structured group interview
 Romantic approach – “in which the interviewer strives
to develop rapport with interviewees in an effort to
generate authentic, in-depth dialog that focuses on
participants’ meanings” (Roulson, 2011, p. 78)
 Discussion board posts
 The completed popular science papers resulting from
the small scale sociolinguistics study
 Analytic memos
Data & Analysis
An ethnographic approach

10. Regina: No. Cause I almost had the same and I asked, oh, why did you pick
different examples for boys and girls and the person just answered, because
boys might think that love stories are cheesy. And so I was like,
okay. But I didn’t ask again.
Doctor: So you didn’t really prod the question then.
Regina: No. I mean, I thought I was clear the first time.
And when I got the response I didn’t feel like asking.
Doctor: I didn’t want to imply that you were unclear. You didn’t force
yourself.
Regina: No. Like please answer again.
(Interview 14 January 2016)
1. Not Forcing the Question

11. Regina’s Study
“When we did the research on the
Schoology posts, I got very aware of how I
write my own posts. Because I realize that
I maybe was a bit scared of conflict and I
should have just asked more questions or
been a bit more pushed more towards
having an answer and not just again a
comment back.“
-Regina (Interview 14 January 2016)

12. Jerome: I guess the most striking one. Well, I have two but I’ll start with one.
Is of course the guy who just entered the forum and
posted three scientific articles.
Andy: Literally.
Jerome: Literally.
Samglide: Conclusion and everything.
Jerome: …I remember, I saw his post and I was like, what’s this guy. I’d never
seen him because he’d never appeared before. But I felt that I need to do
something, I need to write. So I responded and later that evening, I got a
really good response from him where he really addressed the
questions I asked, he developed my ideas. He was giving me a
really good response which I hadn’t gotten before and I was happy.
(Interview 14 January 2016)
2. A really good response

13. Jerome’s Study
“Though, I still find it alarming that
explicit disagreement was so scarce. It
means that, contrary to what I
hypothesized, disagreement does not
seem to be required for discussion to
occur. It seems that agreement, or
neutrality, plus other characteristics,
like development (see below), is just
as efficient at generating discussion..“
-Jermone (Sociolinguistic Study, 11 January 2016)
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Agreement Disagreement
Agreement/Disagre
ement
Graph 1. Amount of replies that would
agree or disagree with preceding
post(s).

14. Andy: See, I still think it’s a culture thing because I think we
live in a much more unipolar political culture where
Samglide: But who are these we? Are you talking Swedes now?
Andy: Swedes now.
Samglide: Because I’m talking sarcasm. I’m talking Reddit. I’m talking Imgur. I’m
talking all of these international places.
Andy: No, no, no. I get that.
Samglide: That’s where they use it. I didn’t learn it from Sweden.
Andy: No, I think the reason why I interpreted the written text differently from
you was because of my background. And you interpreted it one way
because of your background.
Samglide: Okay. Yeah. Of course.
(Interview 14 January 2016)
3. In Class Conflict

15. Samglide’s Multiple Cultures
“I learned that even though we’re both
Swedes, me and Andy think very different
from each other. Culture is as much group
as it is individual. You can belong to a lot
of different cultures and even though you
belong to the same, the others you
belong to will color your views so much
that it’s still not translated perfectly
between each other.“
-Samglide (Interview 14 January 2016)

16. Jerome’s Nuanced Understanding
“I feel that I’ve experienced a lot of
different views and opinions about the
online culture. I feel that that is where I
have nuanced my perception of cultures
or my experience of culture.“
-Jerome (Interview 14 January 2016)

17. Doctor Vem’s Shift
“I’d say that I definitely view our culture in a
different light, in a, it might not be okay to say,
but in a more impressive light…when I go out
to schools you often hear, or rather what I
remember, are negative comments about the
teaching experiences and students and so on,
but when we talked about it and we compared
other cultures and heard from other
countries, when we came to, for example,
gender or inter-relational skills with students,
it felt like we were very encompassing in how
we viewed the learning experience. That we
take on a lot of different perspectives, which a
lot of countries do as well, but not as
progressively as we do. “
-Doctor Vem (Interview 14 January 2016)

18. Andy’s Change in Perspective
“...it genuinely feels like what we
perceive as uniquely Swedish with this
school crisis is really the same
everywhere. There seems to be this
shared experience of public educators
working in slightly underfunded schools
and wanting to do all this stuff, but there
just isn’t money…. And there are these
structural things, obstacles I guess, for
everyone. And for a long time I genuinely
thought that was just something
Swedish.“
-Andy Pandy (Interview 14 January 2016)

19. D A R S J
Intercultural attitudes X X
Knowledge of social groups
and practices in one’s own
and in one’s interlocutor’s
country
X X
Skills of interpreting and
relating
X X X
Skills of discovery and
interaction
Critical cultural awareness X X X X
Self-Evaluation of Learning
Applying Byram (1997) to their own experiences

20. 1. In what ways did the partnership influence
understanding of other cultures?
 Through in class conflict that arose through analysis
of discussion board postings.
 Through online discussion regarding technology and
resource challenges common across contexts.
2. In what ways did the partnership foster critical
reflection of the students' own culture?
 In class conflict that arose through analysis of
discussion board postings.
 Analysis of students’ own interactional styles
through a small-scale sociolinguistics project.
 Through online and offline discussions invoking
educational norms and relationships between
students and teachers.
In Sum
Where did intercultural learning appear to occur?

21.  Byram, M. (1997). Teaching and assessing intercultural communicative competence. Clevedon, UK:
Multilingual Matters.
 Dooly, M. (forthcoming). Telecollaboration. In C.A. Chapelle & S. Sauro (Eds.), The handbook of
technology in second language teaching and learning. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
 Dörnyei, Z. (2007). Research methods in applied linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 Liddicoat, A.J., & Scarino, A. (2013). Intercultural language teaching and learning. Malden, MA: Wiley-
Blackwell.
 O’Dowd, R. (2016). Learning from the past and looking to the future of online intercultural exchange. In
R. O’Dowd & T. Lewis (Eds.), Online intercultural exchange: Policy, pedagogy, practice (pp. 273-293). New
York: Routledge.
 O’Dowd, R. (2015, August). Twenty years on and still reinventing the wheel? A critical review of
telecollaborative exchange in FL education. Paper presented at the annual meeting of Eurocall, Padova,
Italy. Video retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwCsUAytOB8.
 Roulson, K. (2011). Interview ‘problems’ as topics for analysis. Applied Linguistics, 32(1), 77-94.
 Sauro, S., Spector Cohen, E., & O’Dowd, R. (2015, August). Innovations in teaching? A critical look at a
three-country teacher education partnership. Paper presented at the annual meeting of Eurocall,
Padova, Italy.
 Sharing Perspectives. (2015). Retrieved from: http://www.sharingperspectivesfoundation.com/
References
Slides Available At: http://www.slideshare.net/Shansauro

22.  “Beyond school and work, I enjoy traveling (like most of you!), watching
movies and TV-shows (like most of you!), and follow the U.S. presidential
politics (like some of you?). In late January of next year, I plan to combine
two of these things and go to Iowa for the caucus.”– Andy Pandy
 “Spain I have already visited once and, while beautiful, was too hot for my
Viking-genes to handle, sorry. – Doctor Vem
 “I've lived a short while in both Scotland and England and I lived 3 years in
Lund to study at their University, but I keep coming back to Malmö.”-
Samglide Vondollars
 “Last year I was on exchange studies in Toronto Canada where I went to X
University...” – Regina Phalange
 “I am not much for traveling and have not been much abroad, Denmark
and Germany being the only two countries I have visited.” – Jerome
(Discussion Board Intro Posts, 10-11 November 2015)
Student Backgrounds

23.  “Through learning about others, you learn about yourself.” – Andy
Pandy
 “You view yourself through different cultural mirrors. See the
differences and similarities.” – Doctor Vem
 “It’s not about using others to view yourself. It’s trying to take an
outside approach to all of it no matter who you are. It’s just kind of
trying to be objective when it’s impossible to be it.”- Samglide
Vondollars
 “Learning through culture, like your own. When you become aware of
your own culture, you can learn from someone else’s culture.” –
Regina Phalange
 “I think one aspect of intercultural learning is kind of nuancing what
culture means and interculture means…I think it’s important to talk
about what we mean about culture and culture not being equal to
countries.” – Jerome
(Interview 14 January 2016)
Student Definitions