INVESTIGATION OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNING ACTIVITIES IN WEB-BASED ENVIRONMENTS INCLUDING ASYNCHRONOUS DISCUSSION FORUMS

Özcan ÖZYURT ¹ , Hacer ÖZYURT ¹

Nowadays, the wide use of the computer mediated communication tools has brought a new point of view to web-based learning environment. One of the tools of computer mediated communication called as asynchronous discussion forum is environments in which people share their ideas and opinions, so that, a social environments form up. Thus, learning activities that occur in this environment have been gaining importance. In this study, content analysis learning activities for the learning of English that formed in web based environments consisting asynchronous discussion forum are examined. In this study, using document analysis method, all existing asynchronous discussion forums for English learning and teaching in Turkey are examined and discussions in these forums are contextually analyzed. As a consequence of the analysis, it has been deduced that these environments were especially used as informal learning environments and they have a positive effect on people who use these environments during their learning of English.

Keywords
Computer Mediated Communication, Asynchronous Discussion Forums, English Learning and Teaching, Social Support Network, Informal Learning Environments,