The Effects of an Online Learning Management System on Students' Academic Socialization: A Qualitative Study on a Chinese Graduate Course

Blended learning which combines face-to-face instruction and online learning is increasingly important and pervasive in China. Guided by the theory of 'Language Socialization', the researchers explored the situated learning experiences of four Year 1 graduate students while they were adapting to the new academic environment through the graduate course of 'Second Language Acquisition' at a university in Beijing. In this course, a WeChat connected to the Blackboard learning system was used. Student-teacher interactions on the WeChat and Blackboard, classroom observations, and interviews were used for data collection. Results from four case studies illustrated that academic adaptation was a complex sociocultural phenomenon in which students gradually became competent members of the academic community. Moreover, Learning Management Systems (LMSs) were of great help for them in adapting to a new environment and developing negotiating competence in their new academic communities. [For the complete proceedings, see ED600837.]