Vietnam National University

University of Social Sciences and Humanities – Ho Chi Minh City

Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature
--- 000 ---

COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING

A Final Paper

Presented to

Đặng Tấn Tín, PhD

In Partial Fulfillment
Of the Requirement for the Completion of
The TESOL graduate course in
COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING

By
Mai Thi Hong Dung

Email: maidung089@gmail.com
Cell: 01694442585

19/08/15

Computer Assisted Language Learning – TESOL MA Program – August 19th Page 1

 COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING

A Final Paper

Presented to

Đặng Tấn Tín, PhD

Assignment 3: Major essay

USING GOOGLE DOCS TO HELP STUDENTS ENHANCE

WRITING SKILL THROUGH COOPERATION LEVEL IN
COLLABORATIVE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

Computer Assisted Language Learning – TESOL MA Program – August 19th Page 2

 TABLE OF CONTENT

I. Introduction

II. Literature

1. Web – based tools and collaborative learning

2. Google docs

3. Related studies

III. Context of EFL teaching and learning in Vietnam

and implications

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 I. Introduction
Online learning has become more and more popular thanks to the development of
technology, and online collaborative learning environment also helps students who are not
able to consult their teachers face to face gain and share knowledge. The term collaborative
learning has been differently defined in various different approaches. According to Smith
and MacGregor (1992) collaborative learning is concerned with the “joint effort” of
students in group or teacher and students. Additionally, it can be seen as a positive factor
influencing student’s active learning. (Kieser & Golden, 2009). It was claimed that
collaborative learning can help students enhance or improve their language accuracy and
fluency (Elola & Oskoz, 2010) and provide chances for them to give peer – feedback (Ware
& O’Dowd, 2008). This advantage of web – based environment can create opportunities to
share knowledge, build relationship in the community, and limit the delay of feedback from
teachers for both feedback givers and receivers. (Corgan, Hammer, Margolies, & Crossley,
2004,).

Being aware of the benefits of collaborative learning, many online applications for the
purpose of collaborative learning have been developed, such as wiki which is a component
of Web 2.0, Wordpress which can help students collaborate in storytelling, blogging and
website building, Google Hangout which fosters students to share photos, videos out of
classrooms. Among the updated online programs, google docs appears to be a better
collaborative tool “especially for those to whom collaboration is of vital importance”,
(Gralla, 2010). Google docs is a free online word processor that allows users to create and
edit documents and collaborate with others at the same time. Therefore, it can be regarded
as a powerful tool for teachers to assign tasks requiring interaction and collaboration in
groups. Firth & Measureur (2010) believed that google docs is a flexible and practical tool
outweighing the shortcomings of technical problems such as “potential speed or
accessibility issues”.

II. Literature Review

1. Web – based applications and collaborative learning:

According to Olivares (2005), collaborative learning aims at developing students’ learning

autonomy, creating a comfortable atmosphere for group discussion and idea exchange. It is
believed to be involved in groups, but collaborative learning fosters individual opinions and
encourages each member in the group to critically and confidently express their clear
attitude on a particular issue and come up with a solution together. Collaboration consists of
three separate levels which are coordination, cooperation and reflective communication
(Engeström, 1992). At coordination level, students are put in groups and made sure that
they work towards the same goal, as a result they can produce a successful work with
coordination. At cooperation level, students work on a problem and try to find out a
solution that they all agree. Therefore, teachers need to provide some ICT tools to help
them be connected together. For instance, a shared document with the same content is
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supplied to a group of students. The document is stored online through some free platforms
such as Google Drive, wiki, facebook or Google Docs. They interact synchronously through
chat functions of these websites or asynchronously for those who are not convenient in
terms of time and space through discussion boards or forums. At reflective communication
level, students are expected to reflect critically on the shared work, what they have learnt
through the work and what can help them improve their learning. Similar to the cooperation
level, students are required to collaborate synchronously or asynchronously in this process.

Collaborative writing is the term referring to the “projects where written works are created
by multiple people together (collaboratively) rather than individually” (Wikipedia). As a
matter of fact, many teachers incorporated web – based tools to enhance students’
collaborative writing. It is believed that popular tools for collaboration are comprised of
google docs, wikis, blogs, etc. To compare the students’ learning of EFL or ESL classes
using technology applications and face – to – face ones, many studies have been conducted
and different results were found. A lot of research concluded that with the use of
technology, students ‘collaboration can be facilitated and their learning results can be
improved. Chen (2008) explored the effectiveness of using wikis in an EFL class in Taiwan
in terms of students’ learning outcomes, and he drew a conclusion that there was a
significant difference between control and experimental groups in reading and listening
ability. The group with wikis performed better in these skills than the one which did not
experience this application. Raman, Ryan, & Olfman (2005) also found a similar result
when exploring the use of wikis to facilitate collaborative activities in a knowledge
management class. The case study showed that wikis can support the creation of
collaborative knowledge in an academic environment.

2. Google docs:

Google docs – a Microsoft Office online program for creating and editing texts - is one of
popular tools in web 2.0 applications which enables any user to share opinions on the same
content to edit or remix an existing text. (Thompson, 2008, p.19). This free online word
processor can allow users to create and edit documents and collaborate with others at the
same time. Therefore, it can be regarded as a powerful tool for teachers to assign tasks
requiring interaction and collaboration in groups. Firth & Measureur (2010) believed that
google docs is a flexible and practical tool outweighing the shortcomings of its technical
problems such as “potential speed or accessibility issues”. Chinnery (2008) also suggested
that google docs is a productive tool which helps both teachers to grade, keep attendance
and students to peer edit a particular word document. In other words, users can make use of
it for many purposes and forms. It is advantageous and beneficial for collaborative activities
in the way that teachers can control edit setting, students can work simultaneously, chat
with other students, save changes and retrieve past versions (Ragupathi, 2013). However,
what makes google docs a truly revolutionary application is the way it helps users to
“collaborate with other on a single document in real time”. Users do not have to wait for

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their turn to edit the document when it’s passed to another one. Therefore, Google docs and
its special features can be seen as a popular online application for collaboration (Thompson,
2008, p.19).

3. Related studies:

Regarding students’ writing abilities, Suwantarathip & Wichadee (2014 ) compared those
who collaborated in a writing assignment with the support of google docs with those who
did not in face – to – face classroom. The both groups were asked to complete four writing
tasks and then the data collected was analyzed by t- test. The findings suggested that
students in the experimental group gained higher mean score than the ones in the control
group. Similary, Edwards (2011) carried out a case study to examine the effectiveness of
using this tool for the improvement of undergraduate students’ writing skill. Fourteen out of
fifteen students had positive attitude to the use of google docs in terms of being accessible,
being easy to collaborate in a writing group and preferring using it. It is also said that
google docs can facilitate students to different ways of communication with different
collaborative writing modes such as pair work or group work ( Brodahl, 2011). However,
he could not draw any definite conclusion about whether student’s writing ability can be
enhanced through google docs or not because the results only showed that more than 70%
of the students had a positive attitude to commenting and editing others’ contributions to
group work.

Students’ positive attitude towards the application of google docs in collaborative writing
and effective results above can be explained by three reasons which are the collaboration
method, the amazing feature of google docs to motivate students to learn and more
contribution to the work. For the first reason, students are provided chances to read, edit and
give feedback to their peers simultaneously, as a result, they are aware of their peers’
mistakes such as wrong spelling, inappropriate language, and illogical organization.
Accordingly, they become more self- conscious of their spelling, language use, etc.
However, others would believe that with face to face group, students can also be self –
aware of their mistakes through discussion. It can be true, but the limited amount of
collaboration in this group may cause a little improvement. For example, in google docs
group, students can easily see what their peer write and how they generate ideas through the
chat box or comment, as a result, they are able to give feedback in real time and think more
critically in a comfortable way that is not face to face. In contrast, working in face to face
groups for a writing task may not help students much as students might feel shy to give
opinions in front of their peers in order not to lose their faces when making mistakes. The
negative psychology in this group hinders the discussion, hence brings little collaboration.
The second reason attributed google docs to the success of students’ writing abilities. As a
matter of fact, google docs allows users to gain more knowledge by comparing two versions
in real time without restriction of time and space. By this way, students develop a deeper
understanding of their sentences, organization, language in a better way. The opponents

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may raise the similar issue in the way that in the face to face group, students can also
compare two versions of writing pieces. However, I do not quite agree with this since in
this group, students tend to be more passive and usually listen to others’ versions. Another
thing is that they can not listen to two versions or look at them simultaneously and
conveniently like in the google docs group. Additionally, thanks to working collaboratively
on the same document, students can create and co-edit an online material that helps them
recall what they have learnt in the course. The extent of contribution to the work can be
another factor leading the success of students. In face to face group, students can also work
collaboratively, but it is quite difficult for teachers to check who contributes more or less, as
a result, students may not be very serious about their duties and the whole task. In contrast,
in the group with the support of google docs, they know that their teacher can check
whether they are working enthusiastically or not. In other words, they are more motivated to
contribute to the group task.

III. Context of EFL teaching and learning in Vietnam and implications

It can not be denied that Vietnamese students are familiar with traditional classes with one
or two teachers and a large group of students. Moreover, the notion of teaching and learning
online and applying learning management system abbreviated as LMS is still a strange one.
It was reported by a descriptive research by Le and Lin (2010) that Moodle has been used
as the most popular website to support teachers who wish to create online courses. Dang &
Nguyen (2014) conducted a study exploring the perspective of students on using ICT in
language teaching and learning and they found that most students had a “positive attitude
towards ICT use to study English and expected that ICT should be used more frequently in
the classroom in order to maximize language learning and teaching”. However, few studies
on web – based tools for enhancing students’ collaborative writing has been found. This can
be explained that collaborative writing using web – based tools in general and google docs
in particular has not been applied popularly. It goes without saying that using technology in
EFL brings some particular benefits, but it depends on the context of the institution, , the
design of the syllabus, the goal of the lessons, and the need of the students. As a result,
language teachers should be flexible in adopting suitable tools for their class. However, it is
worth pointing out that with adequate condition and demands met, google docs is advisable
to be used in a collaborative writing class to help improve students’ writing skill.

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