This paper examines whether a web-based training on English discourse intonation leads to better spontaneous speech quality for Mandarin Chinese speakers who reside in the U.S. and in China. The four-week fully online training consisted of meta-instruction videos as well as listening and speaking activities, including instant visual pitch contour…

Videoconferencing tools, like Skype, etc., are being increasingly used in language education worldwide. Despite assumed socio-affective and pedagogical benefits of using webcams in synchronous online language lessons, such as the feeling of co-presence or the possibilities of non-verbal communication, little is known about attitudes held by…

In this article, we set out to assess QuADEM (Quality Assessment of Digital Educational Material), one of the latest methods for evaluating online language learning courseware. What is special about QuADEM is that the evaluation is based on observing the actual usage of the online courseware and that, from a checklist of 12 different components,…