The Effectiveness of an Online Language Course during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Students’ Perceptions and Hard Evidence

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Review 1

1. The recommended information has been added to the abstract.
2. The Mezirow theory section has been removed from the introduction as it makes the text heavy but clearly detailed research questions have been spelled out .
3. In the Methodology section we have included more information on what we mean by the student-centred approach, why we consider students answers valid. The small size of the sample is defined by the number of students at this particular department. This research is a sort of pilot research. We were allowed to carry out this research at a particular department which included only 22 cadets.
4. In the Results section there is information about the use of a Likert scale, and the piece about the semi-structured interviews has been removed as it this stage we are not ready to discuss the findings of the semi-structure interviews. However, at the subsequent stage of the research and writing out of the research we will deal with the analysis of the semi-structured interviews as this means of analysis is one of the three ways of evaluating an online course in the Mashaw model.
5. Now with the presence of the research questions in the Introduction, the conclusion section looks more logical as we made sure that it matches the introduction. The limitations (the size and the validation of the analytical tools) have been dealt with.

Reviewer 2 Report

 

I would like to suggest some corrections for the authors to make; 

1- abstract\ The abstract is very brief; you need to write more details about the background of the problem, the main objective, methods applied, results, and recommendations.

The introduction section needs some improvements; you need to follow a strategy to address all variables of the study in the introduction; I always advise researchers to follow the "reverse triangle approach", where you can start at the general idea and go deeper till you address the fundamental gap of the research. 

1- there is no clarity on the research problem in the introduction section; please try to highlight the main research problem and elaborate more. 

2- as a reader, I didn't catch the importance of the research clearly; please provide some information about it and previous research to support your claim. 

Please add a  Literature Review section where you can explain more information regarding the study's variables. 

The methodology part is well presented. However, it would be better to provide some information regarding the instrument itself; for instance, is it adopted or adapted? Validity? was there any pilot study? 

The results section needs more clarification. Was there any content analysis? Please add a section to make it more straightforward for the reader. 

The Discussion must be integrated with the literature and the findings. 

. In conclusion, you summarize the main objective of the research about the current research contributing to the body of knowledge. 

The title is appropriate.

This study provides the cyber range user perspective of cyber ranges in cybersecurity education by describing how educators are motivated using cyber ranges. This understanding informs stakeholders' decisions on what, how, and why to invest in cyber ranges to meet their goals in cybersecurity education.

The findings are found to be novel. 

The article is well presented. However, I would like the authors to follow the suggested corrections for the authors to make before publication. 

 

Author Response

Review 2

1- abstract\ The abstract is very brief; you need to write more details about the background of the problem, the main objective, methods applied, results, and recommendations. – it has been expanded

The introduction section needs some improvements; you need to follow a strategy to address all variables of the study in the introduction; I always advise researchers to follow the "reverse triangle approach", where you can start at the general idea and go deeper till you address the fundamental gap of the research.  – the introduction has been changed to a large extent

1- there is no clarity on the research problem in the introduction section; please try to highlight the main research problem and elaborate more.  – three research questions have been added and the rationale has been described

2- as a reader, I didn't catch the importance of the research clearly; please provide some information about it and previous research to support your claim.  – about 5 more titles have been added

Please add a  Literature Review section where you can explain more information regarding the study's variables.  – the section about the underlying model has been redrafted completely

The methodology part is well presented. However, it would be better to provide some information regarding the instrument itself; for instance, is it adopted or adapted? Validity? was there any pilot study?  - more details about the instrument have been added – why exactly is adopted and there is information about the status of this project.

The results section needs more clarification. Was there any content analysis? Please add a section to make it more straightforward for the reader.  – the section about the content analysis has been removed altogether as the explanation would unreasonably extent the length of the paper.

Reviewer 3 Report

·     This study aims to identify the perceptions of 22 EFL learners from Radio Engineering Department Eight at Russia’s Admiral Makarov State University of Maritime and Inland Shipping, following the transfer of education online during the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, it is stated that the University was about to implement blended learning even before the pandemic. Based on the results of this study, the researchers found that certain factors of the online course needed to be improved, and this was reflected in the participants' performance of various language skills.

·     The methodology should include semi-structured interviews with thematic analysis, as stated by the researchers. The results of the interviews must likewise be provided.

·     In addition, the inclusion of 22 participants represents a sample that is too limited to give an accurate reflection of the community's perceptions or to enable generalization. Aside from this, no research questions are provided, and there is no hypothesis to test.

·     The scale used in the survey has no clear or valid construction criteria, and even the statistical and theoretical criteria for assigning the  multiple factors of the scale need to be clarified.

·     The validation of the tools needs clarification.

·     The gender distribution of the sample should be stated, as there is no indication of whether the participants are male or female. Furthermore, the age group is not given, even though age is an important factor in learning, especially in the area of online foreign language teaching. Additionally, no justification is provided for assigning the sample to a focus group. Therefore, the methodology needs considerable improvement and clarification. 

·     The use of two theoretical approaches as the research framework needs to be justified more thoroughly and convincingly, as both approaches attempt to evaluate the course in different ways. Thus, merging them could be misleading for the construction or analysis of the tool. 

·     More explanation is required for the figures and tables of results. In particular, additional descriptive statistics could be added to the results Table, which would help clarify the participants’ perceptions. Moreover, the Figure relating to language skills needs clarifying. For example, how does the improvement of different language skills relate to the study’s central concept for evaluating the online course? Or how could it deviate in the analysis and discussion? 

·     The structure of this paper needs some improvement. The introduction is too long, and the literature review requires a distinct section of its own. Aside from this, there are a number of linguistic errors. However,  the cited references are recent and relate to the topic, although they are limited in number, especially concerning previous studies from the literature. Sourcing more studies of relevance to this topic, especially where the chosen framework is used, could justify the use of the methodology and better clarify the discussion of the results.

 

Author Response

Review 3

• This study aims to identify the perceptions of 22 EFL learners from Radio Engineering Department Eight at Russia’s Admiral Makarov State University of Maritime and Inland Shipping, following the transfer of education online during the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, it is stated that the University was about to implement blended learning even before the pandemic. Based on the results of this study, the researchers found that certain factors of the online course needed to be improved, and this was reflected in the participants' performance of various language skills.
• The methodology should include semi-structured interviews with thematic analysis, as stated by the researchers. The results of the interviews must likewise be provided. – – the section about the content analysis has been removed altogether as the explanation would unreasonably extent the length of the paper.
• In addition, the inclusion of 22 participants represents a sample that is too limited to give an accurate reflection of the community's perceptions or to enable generalization. Aside from this, no research questions are provided, and there is no hypothesis to test. – three research questions are clearly phrased now in the introduction
• The scale used in the survey has no clear or valid construction criteria, and even the statistical and theoretical criteria for assigning the  multiple factors of the scale need to be clarified. – more details have been added to explain the calculation process and the values assigned.
• The gender distribution of the sample should be stated, as there is no indication of whether the participants are male or female. Furthermore, the age group is not given, even though age is an important factor in learning, especially in the area of online foreign language teaching. Additionally, no justification is provided for assigning the sample to a focus group. Therefore, the methodology needs considerable improvement and clarification.  – the information about the age and gender was already provided in the original version; however, it was not explicated as the authors did not analyze this aspect of the research yet.
• The use of two theoretical approaches as the research framework needs to be justified more thoroughly and convincingly, as both approaches attempt to evaluate the course in different ways. Thus, merging them could be misleading for the construction or analysis of the tool.  – one approach has been removed altogether.
• More explanation is required for the figures and tables of results. In particular, additional descriptive statistics could be added to the results Table, which would help clarify the participants’ perceptions. Moreover, the Figure relating to language skills needs clarifying. For example, how does the improvement of different language skills relate to the study’s central concept for evaluating the online course? Or how could it deviate in the analysis and discussion? more information has been added to the methodology and procedure chapter.
• The structure of this paper needs some improvement. The introduction is too long, and the literature review requires a distinct section of its own. Aside from this, there are a number of linguistic errors. However,  the cited references are recent and relate to the topic, although they are limited in number, especially concerning previous studies from the literature. Sourcing more studies of relevance to this topic, especially where the chosen framework is used, could justify the use of the methodology and better clarify the discussion of the results. – 5 more recent sources have been added, and the introduction has been revises. A native speaker has edited the paper to correct the errors.

 

The limitations section has been added towards the end – there are two limitations (the size and the validation)

The research questions are clearly spelled out, and the rationale is described

The status of the project is clarified  - it is the first project in a long series of research projects as required by the management of the University.

The structure has been improved and logical links between the sections have been provided.

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

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