This chapter reports on findings of a mixed-methods study (n = 309) investigating changes in college-level world language educators’ technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge (TPACK) (Mishra & Koehler, 2006) and attitudes toward online language teaching after more than one year of remote language teaching. The focus was on whether and how world language educators’ remote teaching experience and online teaching-related training they received since the pandemic outbreak affected the changes. The participants’ self-reported technological content knowledge (TCK), technological pedagogical knowledge (TPK), and TPACK increased statistically significantly since the pandemic outbreak. Regardless of the participants’ training status, their TPACK increased significantly. However, only those who received training increased their TCK and TPK from pre-pandemic times to Fall, 2021. Compared to the pre-pandemic times, the participants also experienced more significant changes in terms of their acceptance of technology integration in face-to-face (F2F) teaching, as opposed to acceptance of adopting 100% online teaching and of hybrid teaching. In addition, training only significantly shaped the participants’ attitudinal changes toward adopting hybrid language teaching. This shows prolonged remote teaching experience and training provided to world language educators during the pandemic played different roles in shaping their knowledge of and attitudes toward online language teaching. Based on the findings, practical suggestions are offered as to how to provide world language educators more effective and sustainable training in online language teaching and a supportive environment for online teaching.

The South African higher education landscape has been characterized by student protest and disruption since 2015. These recurring crises resulted in the introduction of technology-mediated initiatives pre-COVID. This chapter focuses on Basic isiZulu, an L2 module, compulsory for all non-L1 speakers of isiZulu. In this mixed methods study, the qualitative component consists of a content analysis of the module for the period 2014-2022. It critiques instructional design and explains how the model proposed by Chen (2016)- ICCEE – was implemented. Thereafter, using the framework proposed by Gacs, Goertler and Spasova (2020), which was designed specifically to deal with modules that transition from face-to-face to online, an evaluation is presented. The quantitative component uses the MOODLE learning analytics data to offer a longitudinal report on student engagement with selected online formative activities in seventeen semesters from 2014-2022. A comparison of the pre-pandemic years of 2017-2019 and the ERT period of 2020-2022, yields some interesting results. The overall average percentage of student engagement with online formative activities is similar, 51.2% for the former and 51.3% for the latter. The expectation that there would have been greater engagement during ERT on account of online teaching (as opposed to blended) was contradicted. In fact, intra-pandemic engagement was low. For 2020, the triaged year, less than 50% of the cohort engaged with OFAs. 47 % of students engaged with the online formative activities in semester one, and 48% in semester two. 2021 saw statistics improving, particularly in semester 2, where 64% of the cohort engaged with the five formative activities. In 2022, engagement declined. Sadly, it was incentivization that prompted the higher level of engagement. This chapter provides an overview of how Basic isiZulu navigated the journey into a technology-mediated module. The learning analytics data reveals the critical challenge of low engagement with online formative activities.

Chapter 4 authors, Giovanni Zimotti and Alyssia Miller De Rutté, home in on a promising tech-mediated solution that emerged during ERTL, especially in applied/professional contexts: virtual reality (VR) immersion. Community-engaged language learning contexts were especially impacted by social distancing measures. To make up for the no longer available clinical settings, Zimotti and Miller examined two similar but distinct learning environments. They explored student perceptions of VR-mediated learning in the context of medical Spanish courses, finding that students experienced increased enjoyment and a reduction of anxiety. Given the increased stress often experienced during the pandemic, these were welcome additions which hold positive implications for continued VR use in L2 learning contexts post-pandemic. Nevertheless, the authors discuss how completely replacing real-world experiences with VR-mediated learning, as was required during ERTL, holds important implications which must be considered.

This chapter reports on and discusses the results of a major pan-European survey project conducted under the auspices of the Council of Europe’s ECML (European Centre for Modern Languages) and the European Commission. The project aimed at finding out how institutions, language teachers and also learners had responded to the challenges presented by successive lockdowns, social distancing, and remote emergency teaching during the COVID pandemic. The surveys also reflected on how language teaching methodologies as well as the use of digital tools and technology skills might evolve in the future, as the main aim of the initiative was not to simply record how the pandemic has affected language education, but rather to explore ways in which the skills and insights gained by both teachers and learners may bring about beneficial lasting changes in the teaching and learning of languages. Over 1700 teaching professionals from 40 countries, working at different educational levels, responded to the first part of the survey in 2021. The 2022 follow-up survey then focused on collecting the learners‘ voices, with some 1.500 learners sharing their experiences and opinions in great detail. Responses to both surveys paint a clear and rich picture of ways in which teachers and learners have coped with and confronted the challenges. In addition, the results provide insights into some of the positive changes in language teaching that the pandemic has generated. The chapter reports on the survey’s methodology and its results and also highlights some of the issues that have been raised to inform the debate on the kind of changes in teaching methodology, classroom practice, and teacher professionalization that may be impacted and initiated by teachers’ and learners’ experiences during full and partial lockdowns.

In chapter 6, Luca Giupponi, Bethany Zulick, and Emily Heidrich Uebel examine college-level language instructors’ incorporation of technology through the lens of Diffusion of Innovation (DoI) Theory (Rogers, 2003). In particular, four DoI characteristics were found to influence teachers’ decisions to innovate, including Compatibility, Results Demonstrability, Relative Advantage, and Ease of Use. The pandemic was transformative for the study participants, helping them refocus on learners’ needs and engage with digital tools to innovate their teaching.

In chapter 7, Claudia Sánchez-Gutiérrez, Ana Ortega Pérez, Ana Ruiz Alonso-Bartol, Paloma Fernández-Mira, Diane Querrien, and Shelley Dykstra offer a unique viewpoint from six teaching assistants on ERTL instruction during the pandemic as it compared to a return to the new normal post-pandemic. Unlike an abundance of research on ERTL which has pointed to elevated levels of stress and emotional labor, especially as experienced by educators, the authors explain how this was not the case in their particular context of a large lower-division Spanish program. The authors point to several key reasons, including their belonging to a close-knit community of practice, well-structured leadership that included lead TAs for each course level within the program, and a pedagogization of technology (Rapanta et al., 2021), which encouraged instructor flexibility and innovation. Similar to the findings from Rüschoff, as well as Guiponni and colleagues, this research points to educators’ ability to adapt during a crisis – be it through their own reflection, the participation in professional development, or through local support.

This chapter provides a snapshot of what it meant for language teachers to transition to online teaching during the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Particularly, our study delves into teachers’ attitudes towards online teaching and determines which factors predict such attitudes. Data from 308 language teachers in 43 countries was collected via a survey. A Latent Class Analysis classified participants into three groups according to their attitude: Negative Attitude (n=97); Neutral Attitude (n=145); and Positive Attitude (n=66). Also, the variables Teaching experience, Training during the pandemic, and the interaction between Institution and Training before the pandemic were predictors in the model. These translates in the following trends: (i) teachers with more than 15 years of experience had a higher probability of belonging to the Negative Attitude Class, (ii) Teachers who received training during the pandemic had a higher probability of belonging to the Neutral Class, while those who did not receive training were most likely categorized in the Negative Class, and (iii) Teachers in primary and secondary schools had less positive attitudes than those in language schools and tertiary institutions. Additionally, we explored the content of the training received during the pandemic and the challenges experienced during this time. The results revealed that training focused primarily on low-level skills (i.e., technical competence) and that the areas that set participants apart related to the management of online sessions and motivating students, both of which were reported by a higher percentage of participants in the Positive Attitude group. Regarding challenges, participants reported difficulties motivating students, designing effective activities, and encouraging students to talk during synchronous sessions. The triangulation of these data sources allows us to identify areas in the training that should be emphasized to make training more effective and sustainable, even in moments of crisis.

With the return to a “new normal” (Egbert, 2020) post-pandemic, many questions remain, including about how the pandemic impacted student language proficiency (Moser et al., 2021). The current chapter explores the impact of changes brought about by the 2020 pandemic on student language proficiency, particularly the swift move to online language learning during Emergency Remote Language Teaching (ERLT) and our subsequent return to various course modalities post-pandemic, including traditional, blended/hybrid, and online courses. While pre-pandemic research has consistently found there to be little or no significant differences in terms of how modality impacts student proficiency (Aldrich & Moneypenny, 2019; Blake et al., 2008; Grgurović, et al., 2013), recent research on ERLT during the pandemic has shown mixed results. Authors (in press), for example, found that students forced to take their general Spanish courses online during the pandemic scored significantly higher on the STAMP test of language proficiency in three out of four skills–reading, listening and speaking (writing remained constant)–than those in the same courses offered solely face-to-face (F2F) pre-pandemic. We were curious to see if this trend would continue in the semesters immediately following ERLT, whence courses were simultaneously offered in both F2F/hybrid and online modalities. This chapter follows up on Authors (in press) findings by examining proficiency results in online and F2F courses during the 2021-22 academic year (AY), comparing them to F2F-only courses pre-pandemic, and online-only ERLT courses during the pandemic. Findings revealed significant proficiency gains among students in the post-pandemic F2F courses across three skills (reading, writing and speaking) as well as overall, compared to the online students as well as a much higher variability among students in the online courses. Additionally, both post-pandemic modality groups outperformed forced on-ground pre-pandemic students and underperformed forced-online ERLT students. These findings build upon our understanding of the impact of the pandemic on student language proficiency as we move forward into a new normal.

In chapter 10, Elizabeth Lavolette and Mayumi Asaba discuss how they used ERTL to create materials for asynchronous online delivery for the ERTL timeframe and possible use in flipped instruction thereafter. Using best practices for creating online lectures they developed materials for two content-based English courses in Japan. These materials addressed their immediate needs for asynchronous online teaching during the pandemic and served as the starting point for creating flipped classes once instruction resumed face-to-face. The flipped classroom was intended to provide more opportunities for peer interaction than is customary in English courses in Japan – thereby the need to address the COVID-19 remote teaching crisis provided a pathway to address the crisis in insufficient spontaneous oral interaction in English classes. Students enjoyed the online lectures – though they were perceived as more helpful if they included Japanese in addition to English. Students reached the learning goals – though improvements for the future to reach a deeper understanding of the materials were suggested. Lavolette and Asaba took advantage of the pandemic to create a delivery format that may be more suitable for the needs of their learners (i.e., more speaking time).

As the title suggests, in chapter 11 Kimberly Morris, Mikaela Robarge, and Pablo Robles-García report on how students confronted the crisis with craft across several language programs. As they transitioned through the pandemic, students had the opportunity to take language courses in different modalities, including online asynchronous, online synchronous, hybrid, and fully F2F. This mixed-method study of students’ experiences in these modalities in Spring 2021 builds on Morris’ prior research on teacher experiences. As in the other chapters of this section, Morris and her colleagues used the pandemic disruptions to explore students’ perceptions of ERT practices in different modalities. In general, students perceived all modalities as effective and reported no significant differences in their workload, feedback, and time and effort between spring 2021 and pre-pandemic, regardless of modality. Students saw benefits and challenges in each format, although these differed by student profile and instructional practices. It is also clear that the continued life conditions of the pandemic influenced their experience with the modalities, specifically their comfort, ability to interact successfully, sense of community, and motivation.

This chapter investigates language teachers’ emotions about technology and their perceptions of their emotion labor through technology in remote language teaching. The sudden switch to online teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic has led to many publications about technology in language teaching. Their findings illuminate the importance of teachers’ affect (e.g., Li et al., 2021). The current chapter expands on these discussions by focusing on teachers’ emotion and emotion labor while teaching remotely. A concept originated in sociological inquiries, emotion labor refers to the work of regulating the feelings of both one’s own and others. It has been borrowed into applied linguistic research to capture the centrality of affect in language education (e.g., Miller & Gkonou, 2018). However, remote teaching brings pressing questions about emotion labor, as technology presents different modes and modalities for mitigating feelings. This study included 19 teachers of six languages from postsecondary institutions across the U.S. Each of them was interviewed twice. Using appraisal theory (Martin & White, 2005), our analysis focused on the affective attitudes construed in the teachers’ interview discourse. The findings are organized based on two types of technologies – 1) Zoom, and 2) social media platforms. The teachers described Zoom as a platform to connect to their students and conduct the work of care. However, the physical distance made it sometimes impossible to engage in embodied emotion labor, thus leading to feelings of disconnection simultaneously. Social media were used to encourage informal opportunities for target language use. Yet several teachers experienced the dilemma of not being able to be “off” work, while others reported that the students disengaged in these out-of-class use of social media because the platforms are emotionally not associated with learning. These findings highlight the need to incorporate affect in research and professional dialogues about technology in language education.

In chapter 13, Marta Tecedor and Inmaculada Gómez Soler make recommendations for teacher training based on a global survey-based Latent Class Analysis of language educators’ experience during the early days of ERTL. They classified participants into negative, neutral, and positive attitudes toward online education. Teachers with more experience tended to be more negative; teachers who received training during the pandemic tended to have a neutral rather than a negative attitude; and pre-K12 teachers were less positive than those teaching in higher education or language schools. The training that educators received was emergency training, that addressed mostly immediate needs and low-level skills and not the kind of deep understanding and reflection that is needed to change attitudes. As in other chapters (e.g., Gokool and Naidoo), educators reported challenges with motivation and designing engaging learning environments. Implied in Tecedor and Gómez Soler’s study is that a by-product of ERTL was a shift in attitudes and that those attitudes were influenced by pre-pandemic and thereby pre-crisis conditions. This is similar to the observations made by Landry and Hamel in part 2 of the book.

In chapter 14, Elena Schmitt and Anastasia Sorokina analyze the evolution of their MS TESOL program during and after the pandemic. The forced ERTL opened the opportunity to explore flipped model online courses (similar to Lavolette and Asaba in part 3 of the book) and Schmitt and Sorokina designed a flipped curriculum in synchronous teacher training coursework that had been partially implemented before the pandemic. Across the iterations students were able to reach the course and program goals. Over time, students’ attitudes toward online courses shifted to the more positive as they gained experience in the online format and could make a mindful choice of modality. While logistical reasons for opting for online courses still persisted, in the post-ERTL phase, learners also selected the online courses because of the increased focus on student-to-student interactions and community building opportunities. In the initial stages of ERTL, learners expressed concerns regarding the absence of a sense of community and challenges with interaction. However, this perception evolved as the program increasingly underscored the significance of fostering community and connections within their online courses. Being a commuter school in a state with a critical demand for ESL teachers, the pandemic presented the program with a path to further refine and enhance courses across delivery formats.

Chapter 15 is the conclusion to the book and aims to answer the following questions: (1) What were the major lived experiences and lessons of the COVID-19 pandemic? (2) What are some recommendations for constructively, productively, and sustainably moving forward?