Evaluation of international educational programme student engagement in Spanish classes in a multilingual learning environment

Abstract

Importance. The main goal of the study is to study the impact of multilingual education of uni versity students on the degree of their involvement in the educational process, as well as to prove the positive impact of involvement on the level of mastery of a second foreign language – Spanish. Although the impact of engagement on student achievement in traditional learning has previously been extensively researched, less is known about how it influences student learning in the context of multilingual learning. The research contributes to the study of student learning engagement in higher education by exploring the less studied context of learning in a multilingual environment.

Materials and Methods. The study involves 2 groups of 3rd year undergraduate students (N = 47) of Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University. To identify the degree of student engage ment in the process of learning Spanish, questionnaires, testing and statistical methods are used.

Results and Discussion. In the experimental group (N = 23), a multilingual approach is imple mented. In the control group (N = 24), the English Medium Instruction-based approach is used. The Student Engagement Scale is measured using the three most common dimensions identified by researchers (behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement). Paired samples Student’s t-test and Pearson’s correlation test are performed to analyze descriptive statistics.

Conclusion. Based on the results of student engagement, it can be concluded that students in the experimental group show a higher level of emotional and cognitive activity.