Learning product and process of how English learners as researchers actually produce with scaffolds of three web-based referencing tools: Research with mixed methods

This study investigated the use of three online referencing tools on translation and writing performance of twenty-two college students. The referencing tools included a bilingual concordancer, a bilingual collocation tool and a bilingual dictionary. An offline writing task was given before and after four online tasks in order to know the impact of online exercises on the learners’ written production without the use of the tools. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected; they included the scores of students’ pre-writing, post-writing and the four tasks, records of the tracker on the frequency of look-up entries, and think-aloud protocols of four participants which show their thoughts in the process of production. The results show variations of the learners’ preferences, different look-ups as recorded, and significant improvement of their writing. Also, descriptive data from the think-aloud protocols enable CALL researchers to understand not only how learners actually produce in writing and translation tasks with the scaffolds of referencing tools, but also learners’ decisions on the use of different reference-tools in the process of production.