The Academic Events Group, 9th World Conference on Educational Sciences

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The Preparatory School Students’ Use of Social Learning Environments and Its Effect on Their Success and Comprehension of What They Read
Murat Tezer, Fatma Köprülü

Last modified: 2017-01-25

Abstract


As a result of today’s fast changing world, the expectations of both the students and educational institution have changed rapidly. Therefore, traditional education, in other words, face to face education, is gradually being abandoned because it is not assumed effective for any circumstances. In our circumstances today, the most important problem is students’ lack of motivation in learning a foreign language tried to be taught through traditional methods.

Social network provides various benefits for educational settings. Edmodo is a private social network, which is a secure learning platform for students and teachers. The home page is set up in a very similar way to Facebook. It is basically an online classroom where teachers and students can interact. It helps teachers to work and communicate with students and colleagues in a more effective and easier way. It also provides a safe and easy way to connect to and collaborate with students and colleagues, share content and videos and have access to students’ homework and send announcements.

The purpose of this study is to define the Preparatory Students’ use of Social Learning environments and its effect on their success and comprehension of what they read.

The current study is a descriptive survey model. The participants of the study were 208 elementary students from the Preparatory School of Near East University in the academic year of 2016 – 2017 fall semester.

Data collection tools were online Edmodo usage questionnaires and reading comprehension tests that were developed by the researchers.

Data gathered shows that more than 79%of the participating students can find extra information in Edmodo. Nearly 70% think that Edmodo enhances communication and interactivity. Nearly 50% think that Edmodo increases student enjoyment of learning and confidence in their ability. On the other hand, more than half of the participants think that Edmodo promotes better complex conceptual understanding. More than 90% follow Edmodo on the internet for their English lesson. Most of them follow it three times a week.

As a result of the t-test conducted, it has been discovered that the students who are successful in mid-term results were eager to use Edmodo. These students find Edmodo as an effective tool for supporting their learning. The findings indicate that the students who use Edmodo have the chance to improve their reading skills and increase their success.


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