Prospective EFL Teachers' Perceptions of ICT Integration: A Study of ...

Hismanoglu, M. (2012). Prospective EFL Teachers' Perceptions of ICT Integration: A Study of Distance Higher Education in Turkey. Educational Technology & Society, 15 (1), 185–196.

Prospective EFL Teachers’ Perceptions of ICT Integration: A Study of Distance Higher Education in Turkey Murat Hismanoglu Akdeniz University, Faculty of Education, Department of Foreign Languages Education, Division of English Language Teaching, Antalya, Turkey // [email protected] ABSTRACT This paper aims to investigate the perceptions of prospective EFL teachers in the distance higher education system toward ICT implementation in teaching English as a foreign language. The majority of respondents who expressed negative attitudes to ICT integration found the nature, level and delivery of the training inadequate and accordingly affirmed that they do not feel sufficiently competent to use ICT in their future subject teaching without having sufficient prior knowledge of ICT dissemination. The results of the study imply that training that will enable teachers to become competent in and receptive to ICT is quite critical in distance education realms.

Keywords Prospective EFL teachers, Distance higher education, ICT integration, Language instruction

Introduction Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has been promoted as a platform for providing learners with opportunities in any field (King, 2002; Rovai, 2002) and many significant studies have been conducted on the integration of ICT into classroom teaching to complement and modify the pedagogical practice (Hennessy et al., 2005). Due to ICT related development in the field of education, countries regard ICT as a potential tool for change and innovation in education and so make investments in ICT integration (Eurydice, 2001; Papanastasiou and Angeli, 2008). For instance, Turkey spent 400 dollars per person and allocated eleven point seven percent (11.7 %) of its budget to ICT. This rate is lower than the rates of Europe and Central Asia, since they allocate twenty two percent (22 %) of their budget to ICT implementation, yet it is still higher than the rates in developing countries (World Bank, 2007). Therefore, the Ministry of Education in Turkey attempted to set up computer laboratories and provide Internet connection in schools. To illustrate, the rate of schools with Internet connection increased from forty percent (40 %) (World Bank, 2007) to sixty-eight percent (68 %) (SPO, 2008) and it is projected that this rate will have increased to ninety-six percent (96%) by 2011 (SPO, 2006). Although investments in ICT for educational innovations and improvements purposes have been continuing, the needs of teachers who will employ it in the classroom as a staple part of the curriculum is disregarded (Niederhauser and Stoddart, 2001; Vacc and Bright, 1999). ICT does not have an educational value in itself, but it becomes precious when teachers use it in the learning and teaching process. As Shakeshaft (1999, p. 4) notes, ‘just because ICT is present does not mean that students are using it’. The impact of ICT is strongest when used in a particular content area and further supported by use across the curriculum (Ward and Parr, 2010). Since teachers are the key figures to utilize ICT in educational settings productively and to help integrate ICT into the curriculum, they need support and training to disseminate ICT integration into their classrooms. Roblyer (2002) found that many pre-service teachers are still entering universities with little knowledge of computers and appropriate skills as well as lacking positive attitudes toward ICT use in the classroom. Moreover, Gunter (2001) states that many higher education institutions are still failing to prepare pre-service teachers for positive technological experiences. Hence, it is unlikely that teachers will be able to transfer their ICT skills to their students and encourage them to implement ICT when they themselves have negative perceptions toward ICT deployment (Yıldırım, 2000). As highlighted by a variety of substantial studies, however, not all teachers have been willing to introduce ICT into their language classrooms. In the last decade, a steady stream of work has variously addressed this issue (e.g., Mumtaz, 2000; Williams et al., 2000; Galanouli and McNair, 2001; Baylor and Ritchie, 2002). Studies have also shown that, for the younger generation of teachers, the basis of this unwillingness is sometimes to be found in the training on the use of ICT provided in the teaching and learning process (e.g., Watson, 1997; Murphy and Greenwood, 1998; Strudler & Wetzel, 1999). ISSN 1436-4522 (online) and 1176-3647 (print). © International Forum of Educational Technology & Society (IFETS). The authors and the forum jointly retain the copyright of the articles. Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than IFETS must be honoured. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, to republish, to post on servers, or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from the editors at [email protected].

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As Rogers (1995) postulates in his theory of Diffusion of Innovation, technology adopters’ perceptions are indispensible to the innovation-decision process. He suggests that studies should focus on users’ attitudes toward ICT integration in the early stages of technology implementation. Perceptions (or beliefs or intentions) are being considered the cognitive components of attitudes and the literature shows that pre-service teachers’ perceptions influence intentions which in turn influence behaviour (Ma et al., 2005; Dillon and Gayford, 1997). For instance, according to the model proposed by Ma et al. (2005), the teacher’s intention to use ICT can be predicted by his/her subjective perceptions of its usefulness. As a general rule, and to expound the relationship of perceptions-intentionsbehaviour, it can be stressed that the more favorable perceptions are, the stronger the intentions to perform the behaviour in question will be (Ajzen, 2007). These strong links were also investigated by researchers in many other studies (Norton et al., 2000; Hu et al., 2003) and a high degree of overlap was found between the scores measuring participants’ perceptions and those measuring their intentions and the positive beliefs and intentions expressed by both scores indicated that the participants were expected to carry out their intentions . The present study relies mainly on prospective EFL teachers because “the field of foreign language education has always been in the forefront of the use of technology to facilitate the language education process” (Lafford and Lafford, 1997). Moreover, language teachers have identified various uses of ICT in the language class, including the use of the web as a tool for obtaining information, project writing, communication among a group of students through e-mail or an online chat-room, web-based course programs and publishing project work (Lee, 2000; Alvine, 2000; Lee, 2003). However, the integration of ICT into instruction has been a major challenge for every teacher because they are expected to be capable of utilizing the extensive capacities of ICT to create more effective teaching and learning activities. If we have any hope of enabling future language teachers to use ICT tools in ways that will capture new learning styles and create pathways for learners living in a digital era, ICT professional development intentions should be met by diagnosing distance learners’ needs in this respect and accordingly ‘re-tooling’ with infrequent curriculum integration. Therefore, the impetus of this research is to explore the distance prospective EFL teachers’ perceptions of ICT integration by utilizing a questionnaire consisting of questions that are somewhat related to the technology acceptance model (TAM) which was originated by Davis in 1986 (Davis, 1989). The model indicates that perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use are two specific determinants of a user’s acceptance of a technology. Perceived usefulness indicates the user’s perception of the extent that the technology will develop his job performance. This includes decreasing the time for performing the job, more productivity and accuracy. Perceived ease of use refers to the user’s perception of amount of the effort necessary for using the system or the extent to which a user believes that employing a specific technology will be easy. By means of an interview, the study also unearths factors impeding distance prospective EFL teachers’ positive beliefs and their future expectations related to ICT professional development.

Significance of the study This research study is significant for two main reasons. First, it is increasingly important to direct our attention to the centroid shift observed in the field of foreign language teaching through the technology, from the paradigm of CALL-based English language teaching to the new forms of multiple literacies, highlighting the role of ICT (Kellner, 2000; Warschauer, 2000; 2004). Second, teachers’ attitudes towards ICT integration has been a fashionable research topic investigated in many studies in the last decade (Albirini, 2006; Tondeur, van Braak & Valcke, 2007; Aydın, 2007; Teo, Lee, & Chai, 2008). However, distance pre-service EFL teachers’ attitudes towards ICT integration have been neglected in Turkey, where the major educational reforms have been made specific to ICT integration since 1997. Thus, the present study was intended not only to shed more light on distance pre-service EFL teachers’ attitudes toward ICT integration but also to reveal the factors obstructing their positive attitudes. In the following section, distance education in Turkey will be introduced to provide international readers with a basic understanding of the research context.

Distance education in Turkey ICT has been increasingly used in education and has brought up some new disciplines, or study fields, and distance education (DE) is one of the latest forms of education that basically depends on ICT use. Since DE is a modern 186

approach to delivering instruction, both formal and non-formal educational institutions all around the world and also in Turkey have strikingly been engaged in DE. Although DE can be traced back fifty years in Turkey, it was first mentioned in a meeting in 1927 as a means to increase the number of literate people (Alkan, 1987, p. 91). Unfortunately, it was not applied in Turkey owing to the idea that education is not possible without a teacher and a real classroom atmosphere. It appeared again in the 1970s with a closer meaning of distance education today. In 1982, the Council of Higher Education was established to plan, organise, administer, supervise and regulate all higher education institutions in the country. Belatedly, within the same year, the Open Education Faculty (OEF) was founded in Anadolu University, as it had sufficient infrastructure. Today, the OEF offers a great variety of undergraduate degree programs to more than 750,000 Turkish students across Turkey, Cyprus and Europe (Demiray, 1998). The Distance English Language Teaching (DELT) undergraduate program was established in 2000 with Basic Education Law numbered 2547 to meet the great need for EFL teachers, especially in primary and secondary schools. This was because English courses were integrated into their curricula in 2000. The DELT undergraduate program lasts for four years and during the first two years, students are provided partially face-to-face instruction for some basic courses such as contextual grammar, oral communication skills, advanced reading and writing, listening and pronunciation and then they have distance education for the last two years. As Bates & Bates (2000) state, DE programs worldwide use a range of technologies that include two-way interactive and one-way non-interactive delivery of courses. Instruction in the distance higher education system in Turkey is based on textbooks, television, CD-ROMs and radio broadcasts, which are, in general, one-way non-interactive delivery methods. The aforementioned teacher training degree program offers three courses with respect to ICT implementation. Two of them, Computer I and Computer II, aim to improve teacher candidates’ computer competency. The other, Instructional Technology and Material Design, aims to teach them how to use ICT pedagogically in the language teaching and learning processes. Nevertheless, the problem is that these courses are offered at distance through the use of mostly printed materials. Thus, prospective EFL teachers do not have the opportunity to experience ICT which is an inescapable component of powerful language learning and teaching. With this study, we aim to emphasize that prospective EFL teachers at OEF need in-class experience with ICT to be convinced of its usefulness and educational value.

Methodology Sample characteristics The study was conducted with the participation of 85 prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education in Turkey. The participants were in the final year of a 4-year program leading to a bachelor’s degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language. When the participants had distance instruction during the 4th year of their education, they were living in different regions of the country. Each participant was assigned a number during the data analysis procedure because of ethical considerations and they were reminded that this research would not be used for any assessment purposes and that personal details would be kept confidential. The demographic properties of the participants are presented in Table 1.

Gender Age Computer Literate TOTAL

Table 1. Demographic properties of the participants Frequency Male 23 Female 62 20-22 17 23-24 52 25-above 16 Yes 83 No 2 85

Percentage (%) 27 73 20 61 19 98 2 100

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Instrument and data collection After an extensive literature review of instruments utilized in different educational backgrounds (Jones and Clarke, 1994; Robertson et al., 1995; Sooknanan, 2002; Isleem, 2003; Dudeney and Hockly, 2007), a questionnaire was developed by the researchers to gather data about the perceptions of prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education toward ICT integration, rather than using an existing one. The questionnaire consisted of two parts. The first part asked about personal information such as gender, age and year of education to ensure maximum control of variables (Gay & Airasian, 2000). The second part of the questionnaire contained nine items based on a 5-point Likert scale (from 1=strongly disagree to 5= strongly agree). The development of the instrument was guided by a number of experts working in higher education settings. This panel of experts, including two professors of educational technology, two native experts and two non-native senior EFL teachers, evaluated the instrument for content and face validity and contended that the questionnaire was appropriate and comprehensive for the context of the study. To check the reliability, the instrument was analyzed through the Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient α = 0.90, which showed a high level of reliability. The questionnaires were administered to the prospective EFL teachers at OEF (N=120) through the Internet because they were in different parts of Turkey during December 2009. The return rate from OEF student teachers was 70.8% (N=85). After rigorous analysis of the collected data, 30 of these prospective teachers were contacted again to get their phone numbers for the interview session. The purpose of the interviews was to cross-check students’ responses to the questionnaire and obtain further information on their responses. 73.3 % of the contacted prospective EFL teachers (N=22) agreed to have an interview on the phone. Even though an interview via video chat tools was planned, it was not used since some of the prospective EFL teachers did not have equal opportunities to access any video chat tools. These twenty-two respondents were interviewed throughout three weeks and their responses to the interview questions were transcribed as we had no chance to record their answers. The questions that we posed in the interview were as follows: 1. What obstructs your positive perceptions toward ICT integration ? 2. Do you think that learning ICT use at a distance is a disadvantage? 3. What do you suggest to better learn how to integrate ICT?

Data analysis Data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS. 16). The demographic variables for this study were discrete data (nominal and ordinal); therefore, descriptive statistics were utilized to run for frequencies, percentages, mean and standard deviation (Beins, 2004; Heiman, 2001; Sekaran, 2003).

Results Students’ scores on questionnaire Table 2. Distribution of mean scores on the perceptions of prospective EFL teachers at the distance higher education context toward ICT integration Items Mean Standard Deviation Standard Error Mean Item 1 3.40 0.49 0.05 Item 2 2.14 0.35 0.03 Item 3 4.07 0.65 0.07 Item 4 1.89 0.61 0.06 Item 5 2.84 0.74 0.08 Item 6 3.57 0.77 0.08 Item 7 3.57 0.77 0.08 Item 8 2.52 0.50 0.05 Item 9 2.52 0.50 0.05 Overall attitude 2.77 0.19 0.02 188

As seen in table 2, the results of the questionnaire indicated that although prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education viewed ICT as a tool to help them to learn many new things (scoring 4,07 on item 3 in the questionnaire), most of these prospective EFL teachers (a) disliked using ICT (item 1, M=3,40; SD=0,49), (b) viewed using ICT in class as time-wasting (item 2, M=2,14; SD=0.35), intimidating or threatening them (item 4, M=1,89; SD=0.61), (c) felt uncomfortable when working with ICT in class (item 5, M=2,84; SD=0,74), (d) were unwilling to learn more about employing ICT in class (item 6, M=3,57; SD=0,77), (e) disregarded the power of ICT as a device to develop their teaching practice (item 7, M=3,57; SD=0.77), (f) considered modifying the curriculum to integrate ICT as a difficult task (item 8, M=2,52; SD=0,50) and (g) stated that ICT would break down too often to be of very much use (item 9, M=2,52; SD=0,50). That is, they generally displayed negative attitudes towards ICT integration by scoring lower than 4 on most of the items on the five point scale.

Interviews Factors obstructing positive perceptions toward ICT integration In response to the first question regarding the factors impeding their positive perceptions of ICT use in the language learning or teaching process, the participants expressed mainly three obstacles which were (1) the lack of exposure to lessons fully designed with ICT tools, (2) an exam-driven system and (3) studying to learn only what is to be tested. The following selected quotations (presented verbatim) are representative of the views expressed: “I have never seen a lesson fully designed with ICT tools, so how can I conduct an ICT integrated lesson for my students?” (Participant 21) “In an exam-based system, it is very difficult to learn something practical. I really wish to teach my students an Internet-based lesson but how ?” (Participant 3) “I learn what I am required to learn. If I am required to learn about ICT, I will study it as it is tested in the exams.” (Participant 9) Learning ICT use at a distance: a disadvantage? The participants were asked whether or not they thought that learning ICT use at a distance was a disadvantage. The majority of them stated that learning ICT use at a distance was a disadvantage for them due to the lack of opportunities to try ICT use, the need to do practice in a technology laboratory, and the lack of educational technology teachers. The following quotations illustrate prospective EFL teachers’ views on learning ICT use at a distance: “We are not as lucky as our peers in formal education because we have no opportunities to try ICT use.” (Participant 9) “Learning ICT use at a distance is not easy for us. We need to practice in a technology laboratory in a face-to-face classroom setting to better understand how to use ICT in a language classroom.” (Participant 17) “Learning ICT use at a distance is problem-causing for us because we have no educational technology teachers who can show us practically how to make use of ICT in a real classroom environment” (Participant 13) Suggestions to better learn how to integrate ICT In response to the third question related to suggestions to better learn how to integrate ICT, participants stressed the prominence of (a) training specific to methodologies and practices of ICT integration, (b) ICT-integrated sample lessons conducted in face-to-face classroom environments by educational technology specialists and (c) providing computer laboratories in central cities of our country to increase prospective EFL teachers’ self- efficacy and decrease their anxiety about using ICT. From the interviews with the participating prospective EFL teachers, some of the suggestions made are: 189

“Raising our computer skills in Computer I and Computer II lessons does not guarantee our using ICT because we need to have clearer ideas of how to apply these ICT skills in teaching through training in methodologies and practices of ICT integration.” (Participant 7) “We can learn how to use ICT in the language classroom by being exposed to ICT integrated sample lessons conducted in face-to-face classroom environments by educational technology specialists.” (Participant 12) “Even if we are distance learners, we should be provided with computer laboratories in, at least, central cities of our country so that we can increase self- efficacy and decrease our anxiety about using ICT skills.” (Participant 9) In this research study, the results of the quantitative data were closely connected with the results of the qualitative data. Firstly, based on the results of the questionnaire, it was indicated that most of the prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education generally exhibited negative attitudes towards ICT integration. Related to these results, the prospective EFL teachers’ responses to the first and the second questions of the interview unearthed that lack of exposure to lessons fully-designed with ICT tools, lack of opportunities to try ICT use, the need to practice in a technology laboratory, lack of educational technology teachers, exam-driven education system and studying to learn only what is to be tested were some of the underlying reasons for the prospective EFL teachers’ negative perceptions of ICT use in the language learning or teaching process. Secondly, based on the results of the questionnaire, it was also indicated that prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education viewed ICT as a tool to help them to learn many new things. In parallel to this result, the prospective EFL teachers’ responses to the third question of the interview revealed that they gave importance to (a) training with respect to methodologies and practices of ICT infusion, (b) ICT-infused model lessons offered in faceto-face classroom environments by educational technology specialists and (c) establishing computer laboratories in central cities of our country to maximize prospective EFL teachers’ self- efficacy and decrease their anxiety about using ICT.

Discussion Researchers have long argued for the inclusion of ICT in foreign language teacher training (e.g., Blake, 2001; Schrier, 2001; Lord and Lomicka, 2004). In this respect, some studies examined the actual content of technology training modules (e.g., Johnson & Johnson, 1999; Rava and Rossbacher, 1999; Hargrave and Hsu, 2000), while others explored teachers’ attitudes toward and perceptions of technology and its pedagogical uses (e.g., Albirini, 2006; Tondeur, van Braak & Valcke, 2007; Aydın, 2007; Teo, Lee, & Chai, 2008). Unlike the studies done in formal higher education settings that documented positive teacher attitudes toward the use of ICT as teaching tools (e.g., Le and Le, 1999; Brandl, 2002), this research study done in a distance higher education context unearthed negative teacher attitudes toward the use of ICT in language teaching. Lack of exposure to lessons fully-designed with ICT tools, lack of opportunities to try ICT, the need to practice in a technology laboratory, lack of educational technology teachers, an exam-driven education system and studying to learn only what is to be tested were some of the underlying reasons for the prospective EFL teachers’ negative perceptions of ICT use in the language learning or teaching process. These findings provide evidence in support of Schoepp (2005), Sicilia (2005), Toprakçı (2006), Albirini (2006), Balanskat et al. (2006), Özden (2007) who indicate that lack of effective training is the most frequently encountered barrier to successful ICT integration. The results of this study also apparently show that despite having basic computer skills, prospective EFL teachers in distance education were not confident in using the technology to improve their own productivity and bring about a pedagogical change in their teaching methods. Hence, the need for conducting undergraduate courses on the basis of ‘learning by doing’ is evident. At this juncture, distance teacher training programs should reconsider their training approaches in order to provide prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education with more conducive and nonthreatening learning environments so that these prospective EFL teachers can experience ICT tools, gain confidence and increase self-efficacy for technology integration (Wang et al., 2004; Teo, 2008). Moreover, this research study reveals that prospective EFL teachers in distance higher education, despite having negative attitudes toward ICT integration and not utilizing it in the classroom, viewed ICT as a tool to help them to learn many things. This finding is in line with the finding of Smeets (2005) who stressed that most teachers do not 190

utilize the potential of ICT to maximize the quality of learning environments, although they value this potential quite significantly. At this point, it should be emphasized that prospective teachers’ beliefs are one step toward developing effective professional development (Mueller et al, 2008) since their beliefs about the role of ICT for learning and teaching are important in teachers’ pedagogical reasoning and they influence teachers’ behaviour (Webb and Cox, 2004) and their beliefs often limit their efforts to integrate ICT into classroom practices (Pelgrum, 2001). Finally, it is obvious that unless teachers perceive the new technologies as valuable, they will be unwilling or unable to use them meaningfully. Accordingly, the importance of professional development for successful infusion of ICT in the classroom is strongly endorsed in the literature (e.g., O’Brien et al., 1999). Baylor and Ritchie (2002) found that support for professional development and the level of technology are embraced in the classroom. As a last remark, given participating prospective teachers’ limited experience in employing educational ICT and their lack of exposure to ICT-infused teaching methods, the points they made seem commonplace when compared with those from other findings (e.g., Alvine, 2000; Pope and Golub, 2000).

Implications, limitations and conclusion The educational implications of the study Distance EFL teacher training programs should reevaluate their teaching methods and give importance to training specific to methodologies and practices of ICT integration, ICT-integrated sample lessons conducted in face-to-face classroom environments by educational technology specialists and providing computer laboratories in central cities of our country to increase prospective EFL teachers’ self- efficacy and decrease their anxiety about using ICT skills.

Limitations and future directions This study has three main limitations which are as follows: 1. 2. 3.

This study contains prospective EFL teachers who are in distance English teacher training departments. Because of this reason, the results of this study cannot be generalized to include prospective EFL teachers in formal education contexts or prospective teachers in other departments of OEF. There are approximately 7,500 prospective EFL teachers in the DELT program. However, we were able to reach only 85 of these prospective EFL teachers. Hence, the results that we obtained cannot be generalized to the whole population. The data gathered through interviews is limited to the respondents who voluntarily participated in these interviews. It is likely that interviewing with more respondents could help us gain more insights related to this subject.

Accordingly, more qualitative studies should be directed to explore how prospective language teachers perceive ICT integration in language instruction. Furthermore, studies that compare and contrast perceptions of prospective EFL teachers in formal education contexts with those of prospective EFL teachers in distance education can be done.

Conclusion ICT presents a powerful learning environment for learners in the classroom. Many countries make investments in ICT integration as ICT is viewed as an effective tool for renewing educational practice in any field. Because teachers are the main characters to employ ICT in educational contexts, they should be trained in how ICT can be integrated into the teaching process. In the present study, almost all of the respondents expressed their preference for face-toface training instead of distance training of ICT use in the language teaching process and most future language teachers are very traditional in that they are less enthusiastic about learning ICT skills. Unfortunately, many higher education institutions cannot provide pre-service teachers with positive technological experiences. Thus, pre-service teachers with negative ICT perceptions cannot transfer their ICT skills to their students and stimulate them to deploy ICT when they start teaching. However, if we aim to make future language 191

teachers deploy ICT tools in language instruction, we should investigate pre-service teachers’ perceptions of ICT integration since perceptions are good indicators of intentions and future behaviors in future language teaching and diagnose pre-service EFL teachers’ needs in relation to the integration of ICT into instruction. As teacher training is at the first zenith and as ‘the heat is on’ for those who prepare educators for effective use of ICT (Knierzinger et al., 2002), for more effective solutions, special attention should be paid to revising and updating the curricula, equipment and educational materials on a permanent basis in the faculties of education. As to distance higher education in Turkey, it is to be noted that ICT can create a better teaching and learning environment in schools (Akkoyunlu and Orhan, 2001) as long as prospective teachers are trained well through a curriculum rescued from traditional behaviorist approach domination and the curricula, equipment and educational materials are designed with a more internationally accepted and fast-growing educational model based on practicing and experiencing. Unfortunately, achieving this aim in a distance education setting is rather difficult as the students live in separate places. Considering the time and place independency feature of distance education, we suggest two major ideas: 1.

2.

The course related to ICT integration, Instructional Technology and Material Design, should be offered within the first two years of the program, during which prospective teachers can come to central cities to join the partially face-to-face sessions. Thus, prospective EFL teachers may decide on what facets of ICT they need to explore and learn them by doing in the classroom. If the above-mentioned course is offered in the last year of the program (as is the case in the current system), computer laboratories should be established in big cities, if possible in all the cities of the country, so that distance learners can attend face-to-face sessions at least once a month. To supplement this continuous training, prospective EFL teachers can be required to prepare ICT-integrated lesson plans and then present them in their practice schools, whereby they can get feedback from their supervisors.

In doing so, certain problems should be solved such as lack of computer laboratories for distance learners, insufficient staff in the area of ICT training, insufficent access to ICT tools and lack of research in this field. As Altun (2007) suggests, there is an urgent need for relevant empirical research in line with the integration process in Turkey.

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APPENDIX A. Questionnaire for Distant Students of English Language Teaching Department in Turkey With this survey, we hope to collect data about the perceptions of prospective EFL teachers at distance higher education context toward ICT integration. The questionnaire consists of two parts. In the first part, you are asked to fill in your personal details. In the second part, you are requested to read nine statements below and then rank the items between 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). (1=totally disagree 2= disagree 3= no strong opinion 4= agree 5= strongly agree) Part I Age: ______ Gender: _______ Year of education ________ Can you use computers? ___________________________________________________ Have you taken any course related to ICT use? _________________________________ If yes, please specify these courses: __________________________________________ Part II Attitudes to Technology

Information

and

Communication

1

2

3

4

5

1. I enjoy using Information and Communication Technology. 2. I think using ICT saves time in class. 3. I know that ICT can help me to learn many new things. 4. Using ICT does not intimidate or threaten me. 5. I feel very confident when it comes to working with technology in class. 6. I want to learn more about using ICT in class. 7. I believe that ICT can really improve my teaching practice. 8. Changing the curriculum to integrate ICT is possible. 9. ICT does not break down too often to be of very much use. Thank you very much for your collaboration. Murat Hismanoglu

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