The Effect of Multimodal Learning Preferences on Two English Instructional Programs

Introduction

Technology and communicative approaches to language teaching have changed education, and specifically, foreign language classrooms. This development has prompted a more real-life learning and teaching of foreign languages. Foreign language education has become ubiquitous; it can occur inside and outside the EFL classroom, and information can be accessed anywhere and at any time (García-Sánchez & Luján-García, 2016) owing to technological advances. This is in line with Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL), a teaching and learning approach which has attracted a lot of attention (e.g., Calvo-Ferrer et al., 2016; Lin et al., 2021). Ubiquitous learning and the advances in technology have encouraged intercultural communication among language learners (Hauck & Youngs, 2008), since they can communicate with native speakers of the language they are learning and acknowledge different cultures. This has brought several benefits to the language classroom: it leads to the improvement of language skills, and it makes language learners develop more positive attitudes towards learning, as well as self-confidence (Nomass, 2013).

Contrary to traditional education, which was exclusively based on written language, nowadays modern education includes verbal and non-verbal modes of communication (Fedorenko et al., 2021; Martínez, 2014), leading to multimodality. van Leeuwen (2014) defined multimodality as “the integration of semiotic resources such as language, image, sound, video, and music” (p. 281), which are referred to as modes (Jewitt, 2008). Fedorenko et al. (2021, p. 179) emphasized two main principles: (1) multimodality is regarded as an interaction of modes which includes various sign systems, it is not restricted to linguistic signs; (2) extralinguistic resources are necessary to achieve communication. Multimodality is also encountered in foreign language education; its aim is to achieve communicative competence in the foreign language through the combination of verbal and non-verbal aspects. According to Morell (2007), “we need to go beyond the spoken words used and to also take into account, at least, the visual images, written utterances, body language and their combinations” (p. 238). In this regard, language teachers use a variety of modes in order to convey information. CALL and ubiquitous learning are strongly related to multimodality, as they promote foreign language learning through different modes and media (Stockwell, 2010; Tan et al., 2016). Multimodal teaching is thought to bring advantages to the language classroom: it improves language skills (Sakulprasertsri, 2020), it makes language learners feel more positive and motivated (Fang, 2015; Ganapathy & Seetharam, 2016), and it makes them more self-confident (Lee, 2014). To achieve communicative competence, teachers have to plan their classes and materials according to the needs and interests of their students. One of the individual factors that language teachers have to bear in mind concerns learning styles, which refer to the preferred way of processing information. In fact, multimodal learning that caters to a broad range of learning styles is said to improve the language learning of students as they feel more confident and autonomous (Paxton et al., 2017; Sankey, 2006). All in all, multimodality is increasingly present in the teaching and learning of foreign languages. The foreign language classroom has evolved into a multimodal environment in which different sensory modalities (visual, auditory, and tactile/kinesthetic) are used to process the information provided through distinct modes of presentation (e.g., videos, PowerPoint presentations, audio, pictures).