Analyzing learners’ English learning process involving educational robots and IoTbased toys through the lens of zone of proximal development

Abstract

This paper reports an analysis of elementary school students' learning process as they participate in English learning activities using educational robots and IoT-based toys. Grounded on Vygotsky's notion of zone of proximal development, the analysis is conducted through the lenses of obstacles learners encounter in real learning situations as well as the causes of and the solutions to the encountered obstacles. The techniques of video and qualitative analysis are adopted to conduct this naturalistic inquiry, extracting insight from real-world data for enhancing language learning with emerging technology.