Bringing it all together: Strategies students apply when synthesizing information Ilse Born-Lechleitner Centre for Business Languages and Intercultural Communication Johannes-Kepler-University, Linz

Background to teaching Johannes Kepler university (JKU) Business, law, science and medical faculties 20,000 students Languages mainly taught to business and economics students

Information 3 I n f o r m a t i o n 3 Information 2 Information 2 Report Memo Editorial Recommen- dation Recommen- dation Analysis of trends Relevance for company Relevance for company Information 1 I n f o r m a t i o n 1

Task Integrated 3 skills (video, audio) - speaking about it in class Reflection - what can I do with information Actual product might not reveal time spent on it

Sample 22 students, , 10 male, 12 female 1 Erasmus "Business English I", B2+ Business, Social Economics, Cultural studies, Business and Education

Data set 21 student interviews 21 self-evaluations

Interviews - results Difficult to find article (14) Liked free topic choice (18) and enjoyed doing it (18) Creative (19) Openness of talks ("we could do whatever we wanted") Finding a role Vocabulary (14)

I think the vocabulary tests helped me more because there I had to learn the vocabulary. And for the research package is just... search for the German translation and maybe some synonyms. But I never learned them to remember them in the future. (17f)

Roles Same role, different companies (9) "All my texts are memos", "all my writings are s" Different roles and companies in all 5 "entries" (8) "I tried to write all [text] types..." No roles (3)

I tried to... act in different roles. Once I was a research manager, then a sales manager and... human resource manager and once I was an assistant... and wrote to a shareholder. I tried to mix it up. (10m)

What is a good Learner? Gets good grades from start? Struggles at beginning and succeeds in passing course? Look at both ends of spectrum

Focus on 2 learners who finished with "Sehr gut" 2 learners who struggled and passed with "Genügend" Strongly expressed need to get better

Self-evaluation I could practice and further improve I trained especially my speaking and writing skills I am convinced that my vocabulary actually improved quite a lot. (1m) Every beginning is difficult At the beginning of this semester it was really hard to speak the language My skills slowly improved step by step My pronunciation and my English skills in general are improvable (5m)

Self-evaluation 2 I had the feeling that this course would be a lot of work The longer the semester lasted, the more I enjoyed the course The work we had to do... was very enriching [it] was really helpful to stay organized during the semester At the beginning of this course my mind searched desperately for words.. After the first homework I realized that I would have to study a lot. It took me hours to catch the content and the key facts of the A&F article.

Strategies Metacognitive Stay organized Evaluate activities Social Good teamwork motivated Social Talk English with friend Get help from student union Attend summer course Self-study Listen to CD, watch TV, read books

Teachers Organization Deadlines, finding texts Feedback and encouragement Immediate, oral and written Point out possibilities around course Tandem learning, AISEC/IAESTE, self-access centre

Finally, I have to say that I'm proud of myself that I finished the course. I didn't give up although I sometimes was close to it. I definitely developed my English skills. (22f)