Effects Of Computer-Mediated Communication On English Grammar Acquisition

This study investigates the effects of CMC (Computer-Mediated Communication) on English grammar acquisition compared to traditional Face-to-Face (FtF) learning. The participants are non English majors who take English as a foreign language from the Education Department in the University of Bologna. The participants are divided into two groups according to their attendance, those who attend classroom teaching and those who login Moodle platform will be put into Face-to-Face group and CMC group respectively to experience a one-month English learning. The research questions to be answered in the study are: a) How much do students have about their background Knowledge of English? On CMC, how much do students know and what are their attitudes toward it? Are students more pleased to adopt CMC learning style compared with the style of traditional Face-to-Face learning? b) Do attendance yields better results at the end of the course vs. non-attendance, irrespective of learning-style preferences? c) Do learning-style preferences (as seen through the initial questionnaire), namely Face-to-Face preference and CMC preference, cause differential learning in all the students irrespective of attendance or non-attendance? d) Do learning-style preferences (as seen through the initial questionnaire), namely Face-to-Face preference, CMC preference cause differential learning in the attending group? And whether learning-style preferences (as seen through the initial questionnaire), namely Face-to-Face preference and CMC preference, cause differential learning in the non-attending group.Results show that students'background of English is quite poor and they are familiar with the style of CMC learning, and a large portion of students are still more incline to traditional FtF learning; and there are no significant differences between the two modes of learning as both learning modes enhance the English grammar acquisition although CMC group performs a little bit better. However attendance does not yield better results irrespective of learning-style preferences; learning-style preferences do cause differential learning in all the students irrespective of attendance or non-attendance, even in attending and non-attending group.