4.4.2 Factors revealed by the study

The issue of age

Without any prompt whatsoever, a surprisingly great number of students mentioned the aspect of age in their responses. Also, their understanding of age as a factor in learning a language showed a variety of points of view.

Gretel (Item 3) believes that at her age, "one does not learn as easily as when one was younger". This adheres to the frequently cited belief that age influences learners' language learning aptitude. Gretel's belief is supported by Snow White (Item 4), who adds that people at her age "are afraid to make mistakes". This is another frequent belief which makes learners' progress towards fluency and greater independence in learning rather difficult.

However, the students also stated beliefs that have little support in the relevant literature. Pinocchio (Item 4) does not see herself as a 'pupil' anymore, and she believes "doing exercises would have been boring and useless for [her]". In her response to Item 8, she adds that "some of the methods (games, roleplays) were unnatural and not appropriate for [her] generation" and claims that people her age "are more conventional; children have no problems with this". Similarly, Fairy Godmother (Item 7) expands on the kind of seating arrangement where students do not sit in rows at tables – "I feel more confident at a table," she says, "maybe it's a question of age". Somehow, these students find it difficult to appropriate their role in the classroom to that of a basic school pupil – this might be suggestive of their previous learning experience and their expectations of the course. On the whole, these learners do not seem to be ready to submit themselves to games and activities that require a frequent change of roles and patterns of interaction.

However, in the case of age relating to aptitude, Pinocchio presents a surprising conclusion in Item 15: " I've come to realize that age does not really matter in learning a new language – it's only that our lives and teenagers' lives are organized in a different way – we invest our energy into and worry about different things – our job, family, household, social life, hobbies...".

4.4.3 Reactions to a more autonomous learning environment

Considering the findings in some previous parts of the research, the results presented in this section are very promising. Most reactions to the course were unquestioningly positive, and the students did mention a lot of ideas related to learner autonomy (such as interdependent learning, adopting new strategies, intrinsic motivation, opportunities for personal development, lack of directive feedback etc.), making a number of unsolicited comparisons with previous learning experience. Learners' responses in this section were elicited in Items 4, 5, 8 and 9.

Any detailed analysis of this problem would exceed the limits of this study. A concise account of the differences between previous learning experience and the Internationalization Program language course is given by Fiona in Item 5: "We were used to the old methods – memorizing vocabulary, dictations… In this course, there was a lot of speaking and improvisation, you had to react spontaneously. And lots of games as well. We had to learn to be more flexible." These views were supported and extended by Shrek (Item 5), Pinocchio (Item 8), Hansel (Item 5) and Puss In Boots (Item 5).

An account of the relevance of interdependent learning is given by Hansel (Item 5): "I like some activities in groups – we all know something and in groups, we can put it together." Similarly, Shrek (Items 4 and 5), Donkey (Item 4) and Pinocchio (Item 5) stressed the importance of cooperative learning.

For most of the students, the atmosphere and content of the course were intrinsically motivating (Puss In Boots, Item 4; Rapunzel, Item 4; Robin Hood, Item 4). Bearing in mind the previous paragraph, we may assume that the relations within the group and the experience of cooperative learning might have been sources of this motivation as well.

The students also reported on the positive effect of adopting new learning strategies. Snow White claims she "learned to find the general meaning in a text, instead of translating every word" (Item 4); this view is supported by Fairy Godmother (Item 5). Similarly, Pinocchio reports: "We were not evaluated as to our accuracy in speaking, which was quite strange at the beginning … I came to like it and nowadays, I no longer perceive making mistakes as something negative" (Item 8). Clearly, adopting these strategies has led these learners to be more independent in their pursuit of language learning.

And finally, a number of learners came to perceive the course as an opportunity for skills practice; speaking practice almost exclusively dominated their answers, as we can see in Prince Charming (Item 4), Hansel (Item 4) and Shrek (Item 5). Snow White, on the other hand, reported on the usefulness of listening practice (Item 4).

The students also voiced a few criticisms of the course; interestingly enough, a lot of these bear relation to the concepts of learner autonomy or teacher control. Prince Charming (Item 8) reports: "Sometimes the work in pairs took too long. At the beginning, I would even have done without pair work, because we knew very little English. On the whole, I would have preferred to work with the teacher". Shrek (Item 5) agrees that "in pair work, [he] might learn bad English from others". These views oppose the ideas of self-discovered, interdependent learning which lie at the heart of the concept of autonomy (as we have seen in Chapters 2.2, 2.3 and 3.2).

Also, Donkey (Item 9) reports that "some fellow students felt strange when they had to move around the classroom", and Pinocchio (Item 9) recollects an activity which was "childish". We expanded on these problems in 'The issue of age', above.

Finally, Robin Hood (Item 9) gives an interesting account of learner responsibility in the classroom: " [I didn't like] the situation where the teacher asks a question and no-one replies, even if they know the right answer. But that's the students' responsibility. When you nominate them, they answer automatically, but they do not want to answer open questions".