The Possibility Of Applying YouTube To Motivate Learning Autonomy

Abstract

The notion of collaborative learning and teaching inforeign language education has been popular for decades. This concept focuseson learners and encourages them to learn a language by experiential and sharedlearning. The learners are believed to learn best if they learn through theconscious or unconscious internalization of their own or observed experienceswhich build upon our past experiences or knowledge. There is an assumption thatthe learning that can result from the experience, if the activities aremanifested ‘properly’, is a commodity called ‘knowledge’. This tends to be theview of the training and development literature (Moon, 2001). Within thisconcept, the role of teachers as collaborators in the teaching and learningprocess represents a change to traditional educational patterns. Moreover,increasing numbers of instructors are realizing the importance of motivatinglearning autonomy among students in EFL (English as a Foreign Language)classrooms. In this paper, I will consider to what extent the concept of ateacher as a collaborator can be applied to the university EFL classes inTaiwan, and how to motivate EFL learners’ autonomy via YouTube. Attention is firstpaid to the theoretical grounding of the concept and the characteristics of ateacher as a collaborator. Following this, the English education contexts in Taiwanis highlighted in order to consider how far this concept can be achieved.Finally, conclusions will be drawn from this small-scale exploration.