eTwinning in the EFL Classroom - Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

This literature review provides an overview of the challenges and opportunities with eTwinning from teachers’ and students’ perspectives. eTwinning is a part of the Erasmus+ program that supports school collaboration across the EU. Two of the eTwinning program’s aims are: 1) to provide an opportunity for cultural exchange, and 2) to enhance language learning. The eTwinning platform helps schools in the EU to establish contact with each other to be able to collaborate on different projects. In addition, through the eTwinning platform, teachers can take part in online learning events, such as workshops and seminars. In 2015, 301,944 teachers were registered on the platform and 40,205 projects completed. These numbers motivate an overview of eTwinning. One of the findings of this literature review is that eTwinning support foreign language learning, but this finding is based on self-reported data. This finding, therefore, indicates that there is a lack of studies that test if there is a language development or not because of eTwinning. Furthermore, there are few eTwinning studies conducted in Sweden, and especially, from a student perspective which indicates a need for further investigations.