# How ICT Tools Support a Course Centered on International Collaboration Classes

Shigenori Wakabayashi, Jun Iio, Kumaraguru Ramayah, Rie Komoto, Junji Sakurai

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Shigenori Wakabayashi, Jun Iio, Kumaraguru Ramayah, Rie Komoto, Junji Sakurai. How ICT Tools Support a Course Centered on International Collaboration Classes. IFIP World Conference on Computers in Education (WCCE), Aug 2022, Hiroshima, Japan. pp.261-274, 10.1007/978-3-031-43393-1_24. hal-05533326

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# How ICT Tools Support a Course Centered on International Collaboration Classes

Shigenori Wakabayashi<fnref n="1" />(✉) ID, Jun Iio<fnref n="2" /> ID, Kumaraguru Ramayah<fnref n="3" /> ID, Rie Komoto<fnref n="4" /> ID, and Junji Sakurai<fnref n="4" /> ID

**Abstract.** Here we describe a course centered on three international online collaboration classes. The participants were students at Japanese and Malaysian universities and the course used Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools to contribute to university students' language ability, willingness to study, and knowledge about their own cultures and those of their interlocutors. Various communication tools were used to support and monitor the project. The use of these ICT tools, including a newly developed application program (Dialogbook), will be presented. We describe how Dialogbook was used to set up small-group discussions, exchange comments, provide feedback between the instructor and students, and enable students' reviewing of their performance via rubric questions. The availability of such a one-stop support tool for students in the collaboration classes reduced the burden on teachers. The data collected with this application is closely examined both quantitatively and qualitatively, and the results show that the course successfully facilitated students' engagement in the project, with high motivation levels.

**Keywords:** Application · Collaboration · Communication · English · Group Activities · ICT

## 1 The Purpose and the Structure of This Article

This article reports on a university-level course as part of an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) based global education project [the SMILE project (Students Meet Internationally through Language Education)], centered on a series of international collaboration classes (November and December in 2021) based on ICT tools, where a commercial conference system (Webex), Social Networking Service (SNS) (WhatsApp), and an original, newly developed Learning Management System (LMS) for collaboration (Dialogbook) were used.

<footnote n="1">¹ Department of English Studies, Chuo University, Tokyo 197-0393, Japan
swkbys37@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp</footnote>

<footnote n="2">² iTL, Chuo University, Tokyo 162-8478, Japan
iiojun@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³ Language Academy, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor, 81310 Bahar, Malaysia
kumar@utm.my</footnote>

<footnote n="4">⁴ Workshop Initiative for Language Learning, Chiba 277-0841, Japan
riekomoto.will@gmail.com, sakurai@sekisaibo.co.jp</footnote>
The SMILE project has three major characteristics as an educational program: Participants enjoy opportunities for communicating with peers of their own generation using English as a lingua franca; Goals, activities and achievements are clearly presented and recorded through the project and reviewed systematically during and after each activity; and the project can apply to any subject or content matter, including applied linguistics and information technology, and can be adjusted to the pedagogical needs of participants and courses.

This paper focuses on the description of one course carried out at a tertiary level of education, describing the ICT tools used in the course and the data collected with one of the tools, Dialogbook. The data collected as answers to rubric descriptors showed that participants' expectations and confidence in the SMILE project were both very high, and analysis of their language production showed that participants used rich varieties of vocabulary.

This paper is structured as follows: In the rest of Sect. 1, the background of the SMILE project will be given: This project was not initiated as a solution to obstacles caused by COVID-19, but rather had its roots in the authors' long-held sense of mission as educators at this global era. In Sect. 2, the constructs of the project will be given: The whole program will be described, focusing on a specific course implemented in 2021. In Sect. 3, we focus on the ICT tools for the project, including an original application newly developed by the second author (Dialogbook), which was employed to carry out many tasks. In Sect. 4, part of the records kept with Dialogbook will be presented and discussed. These data show that the project raised learner awareness of similarities and differences between their own and their peers' cultures and their proficiency in English. Most importantly, data show that the experience gained through the course helped participants to raise their motivation for further studies. In Sect. 5, a summary and a further direction of the project will be given.

## 2 The Background of the SMILE Project

Throughout the last half of the 20th century and onward, innovations in transportation provided humankind with incredible global mobility. This, along with other factors, resulted in increased numbers of second-language speakers using lingua franca, which is primarily English in East and Southeast Asia. Studies in second language acquisition and global education have developed much during these several decades, and have revealed various phenomena, but no theory of language acquisition proposes that language can be acquired without it being used or that language experience is unimportant [1]. Some crucial aspects of interactional competence can be improved only through interaction [2].

Concerning language education, it is desirable to supply opportunities to meet fellow non-native speakers of the target second language: Communicating in English among learners who share their first language is not ‘natural’ as a form of genuine communication, although it is a classroom activity observed at schools in countries around the world, including Japan. Yet most learners have little experience using English genuinely with those who do not share their first language, except perhaps (near) native-speaker teachers in their classes. With regards to cultural awareness, it is important for learners
to meet people who do not share their backgrounds to become aware of cultures and values different from their own, which also deepens their understanding of their own culture and values.

Given the internet and ICT tools currently available, it may appear easy to set up opportunities where learners use English as a genuine means of communication. However, the reality is different: Instructors and institutions have little ‘practical’ connection with other instructors or institutions outside their own community. Besides, they generally appear to lack knowledge relevant to utilizing ICT to set up such collaboration. The first two authors of this paper were involved in international collaboration projects at Chuo University, Tokyo, from 2011 to 2015, when the university received a substantial grant from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan to promote global education. With our colleagues, we set up several credit-awarding classes, in which Japanese students visited institutes abroad, worked with non-Japanese students, and interacted with foreign students in collaboration classes via a teleconference system. These global project-based courses established human resource networks, making it possible to carry out the SMILE project.

The principle aim of the SMILE project is simple and clear: To provide students with opportunities to meet and communicate with speakers who do not share their first languages via the internet (and physically in person if conditions allow). From the viewpoint of second language acquisition, students should have plentiful opportunities to use the target language to become proficient interactors in the language. Experiencing genuine use of the target language should help learners obtain the integrative and internal motivation to keep them studying. It should be mentioned here that, in addition to the course described in this paper, three other collaborations (Japan-Taiwan high school collaboration; Japan-Indonesia high school collaboration; and Japan-Thailand university collaboration) were carried out around the same time, but for reasons of space, we do not elaborate on these collaborations here. Interested readers are referred to the website of the Workshop Initiative for Language Learning [3].

# 3 Overview

## 3.1 Participants

Participants in the collaboration classes consisted of two groups of students: One included 12 Japanese university students (nine third-year and two fourth-year undergraduate students, plus one first-year Master’s student), all of whom were majoring in English linguistics. They belonged to the Department of English Studies, and their proficiency in English was evaluated as A2-B1 in Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR); the other group included ten second-year university students in Malaysia, who studied in a teacher-training (TESL) course and studied the Japanese language as well. They were recruited from a Japanese class, and participation was voluntary. Their proficiency in English was B1 or higher. The 22 students were divided into six groups, three to four members each (two from Japan and one or two from Malaysia). The professors from Japan and Malaysia and a coordinator attended the collaboration classes. No support technician attended the class. Because of COVID-19, all students from Malaysia participated in the class from home, while most students from Japan
gathered in a classroom. All participants understood the purpose of the project and the data collection and signed an informed consent form before the course started.

## 3.2 Preparation, Main Events, Wrap-up, and Review

Preparations for this specific course started with the first author's invitation to the third author. The two professors have known each other for more than 10 years and their established relationship helped to set up the project. In early September 2021, they finalized the dates of three collaboration classes. A coordinator, who might be regarded as a teaching assistant in the regular term, ensured that everything went as planned. During the collaboration, nothing occurred to seriously disturb ICT communication or classroom activities, but a large typhoon hit Malaysia, and we had to make sure that students from Malaysia would be able to attend the collaboration class (see Sect. 3). In this situation, the coordinator played a critical role as an anchorperson between the two institutes.

The classroom activities on the Japan side in the Japan-Malaysia joint program are summarized in Table 1: The course on the Japan side was taught once per week, and each class lasted for 100 min. Japanese students prepared three dimensions in advance for the collaboration classes during the first three classes of their course: English skills, contents, and manipulation of ICT. These classes included exchanging information, and students did their own research and preparation outside of the classroom. The main event of the course was the three collaboration classes where Japanese students met their Malaysian peers in small groups online. A discussion session lasted for 25-30 min, and they participated in two sessions during each class, resulting in a total of six sessions. The participants in the first and second sessions were the same throughout these classes. One student on the Japan side missed two classes, but the rest attended all classes. One interim review and preparatory class was placed between the first and second collaboration classes on the Japan side because that day was a national holiday in Malaysia. After the three collaboration classes, two classes on the Japan side were used for wrap-up and review of the collaboration classes.

# 4 ICT Tools

This section describes the ICT tools used during the collaboration classes. It should be mentioned that the collaboration classes and the rest of the course could not have been carried out without them, even if a human resource network were available. The most important tool was the newly developed application, Dialogbook, which was used throughout the course for multiple purposes.

## 4.1 Tools for the Communication Among the Instructors and the Coordinator

The ICT tools used for this course included email, Webex, and WhatsApp, and they were used to exchange information among the instructors and a coordinator. Setting up a communication bypass during the sessions proved to be quite important. WhatsApp was used just before the third session when a typhoon hit Malaysia; otherwise, the Malaysian students might not have been able to attend the collaboration classes (Fig. 1).
<table><caption>**Table 1.** The summary of the course (Japan side).</caption><thead><tr><td>No</td><td>Dates</td><td>Activities</td><td>Contents</td></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1</td><td>20 Oct</td><td>Preparation</td><td>Overall description of the course. Practice using ICT</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>17 Nov</td><td>Preparation</td><td>Lecture on Malaysian culture and education system</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>24 Nov</td><td>Preparation</td><td>Mock collaboration, with practice using ICT</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>1 Dec</td><td>Collaboration</td><td>Topic: Self-introduction</td></tr><tr><td>5</td><td>8 Dec</td><td>Preparation</td><td>Discussions to decide the topic of the third collaboration</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>15 Dec</td><td>Collaboration</td><td>Topic: Japanese and Malaysian culture</td></tr><tr><td>7</td><td>22 Dec</td><td>Collaboration</td><td>Topic: Varies among groups</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>12 Jan</td><td>Wrap-up</td><td>Discussion on what they found in the collaboration classes</td></tr><tr><td>9</td><td>19 Jan</td><td>Data analysis</td><td>Discussion on how to analyze the video-recorded data</td></tr></tbody></table>

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /><figcaption>**Fig. 1.** (a): Communication via WhatsApp. The second last message is in Japanese, saying, “Re-lieved to hear that all from Malaysia can join.” (b): An image from one of the collaboration classes. This student is communicating in a group of four students using Webex.</figcaption></figure>

## 4.2 Tools for Preparing and Reviewing the Classroom and Out-of-Class Activities

Dialogbook ver.2 is a software application developed by the second author and was used here as a one-stop platform. The main page of each student site (Fig. 2a) has a space for interaction between the instructor and student (left), sharing URLs for Webex meeting rooms (center), and for answering the rubric question (right). The questions appear when the blue button “update your evaluation” on the main page, as in Fig. 2b.

The teacher page is similar to the student one but differs in that responding to student comments and uploading the rubric descriptions and self-scoring results are available. All operations are recorded and can be read afterward by downloading from the teacher account in the form of a Microsoft Excel file for rubric questions and JSON files for the student-instructor correspondence.
<figure><img src="image_4.png" /><figcaption>**Fig. 2.** (a): The main student page of Dialogbook ver.2: The left column is to write comments/reviews of the class to be shared with the teacher; the middle column is to share the URL of the meeting room with peers; and the right column is to answer rubric questions. (b): When one of the yellow cells is clicked, the rubric questions for the class appear.</figcaption></figure>

The advantages of using Dialogbook are three-fold. One is that all data, except video recording, are stored in and retrievable from the application. Reviewing what a student has done during and after the course is important to evaluate individual learners and the whole course (see Sect. 4), so keeping records must be easy enough for those without intensive training with ICT tools or programs. Second, Dialogbook operates independently of other LMS, SNS, and file-sharing systems so that instructors and students do not get lost in the massive number of files and tools on the internet.

Dialogbook is also user-friendly on other points. For example, the URLs for Webex meetings on the screen are automatically replaced by the next one 2 h after the preceding session, and consequently, the list of URLs on the site are always relevant for the next class. This simple and user-friendly appearance helped the first author immensely because he tends to get lost, especially during the last couple of years when dealing with several courses online became a necessity. As shown in Sect. 4, the students who participated in the course from the Japan side were not very well accustomed to using a new ICT tool; a streamlined system like this one is also necessary and quite helpful to them.

The last and most important feature is the ease of sharing information between two institutions. Sharing information may cause no problems among non-educational companies, but when it comes to educational institutions in Japan, protecting students’ privacy is at the top of the list for security. Sharing information is generally dealt with among instructors. Of course, students and instructors should be careful when sharing any information with others but meeting other people with different cultural and linguistic backgrounds is highly valuable and cannot be replaced by any other means, hence establishing this kind of simple and safe one-stop service for sharing information between institutions is extremely valuable. (An earlier version of Dialogbook did not have this function [4]).
When the first author carried out a collaborative project similar to the current one from
2015 to 2018 between his institute and a university in Australia, sharing the URLs for
Zoom sessions was carried out through a platform provided by the Australian university
(and by email), but to log into the platform, the instructors at that university had to make
special arrangements so that students and the instructor from the Japanese institute could
receive login credentials as visitors. Thanks to Dialogbook, the students and instructors
did not have to tackle such obstacles in this project.

4.3 Tools for Carrying Out, Recording, and Analyzing Collaboration Classes

Webex was used for collaboration classes. Japanese students hosted all group activities and recorded the meetings on their devices. The recorded videos were transcribed with the automatic subtitle generation tool available on YouTube, and then the Japanese student who hosted the session checked it. The transcription did not follow a strict format used in linguistic research, but the process of checking the texts allowed them to notice characteristics of their own and their peers’ use of English while watching the videos.

5 The Outcome of the Project

In this Section, data collected with Dialogbook will be presented, including students’ answers to rubric questions, message exchanges between students and instructors on the Japan side, and some comments sent to Malaysian instructors from his students.

**5.1 Scores of Rubric Questions**

As shown in Tables 2 and 3, no more than six questions with a scale of four levels (0–3) were set for each class so that students could evaluate themselves without much effort. These questions were aimed at revealing how much progress participants made towards the objectives of each class, including the contents of the class and homework, skills for using ICT tools, and attitudes. Since the questions covered such diverse aspects of the course, the instructor (the first author) set up the questions without referring to any specific descriptors such as CEFR. Tables 2 and 3 present the self-evaluation scores (mean and standard deviation) by eight students who answered all items, though one student failed to answer three items. Here we treat the scores from an ordinary scale as from an interval scale, similar to a Likert Scale. The data from the other four students are omitted because they skipped more than five questions. The numbers in the first column correspond to the class numbers in Table 1.

Some questions were asked repeatedly with the same or different wording, and
student responses changed. One example is the question concerning the use of ICT
tools: Answers to Question Items 1, 9, and 23 are concerned with setting up Webex
rooms, and the means for these questions are 1.88, 3.00, and 3.00, respectively. This is
naturally explained by the fact that Question Item 1 was given after the first trial of the
setting of Webex room when some students did not do well. Later, all students became
proficient at setting up Webex rooms. The same goes with the Questions concerning the
<table><caption>**Table 2.** Rubric questions and students' scores (To be continued).</caption><thead><tr><th>Cl</th><th>Item</th><th>Rubric Questions</th><th>M</th><th>SD</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1</td><td>1</td><td>Did you succeed in setting up a Webex room and recording what you discussed in that room?</td><td>1.88</td><td>1.25</td></tr><tr><td>1</td><td>2</td><td>Did you succeed in using YouTube to transcribe your video recording?</td><td>1.14</td><td>1.21</td></tr><tr><td>1</td><td>3</td><td>Did you edit the text the YouTube transcriber had created?</td><td>1.38</td><td>1.19</td></tr><tr><td>1</td><td>4</td><td>Do you think you are good at transcribing spoken data?</td><td>1.25</td><td>1.16</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>5</td><td>Do you understand what we will do during the rest of the seminar classes?</td><td>2.86</td><td>0.38</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>6</td><td>Do you think that the collaboration classes will give you good chances to improve your English?</td><td>3.00</td><td>0.00</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>7</td><td>Do you understand how general education in Malaysia is different from that in Japan?</td><td>3.00</td><td>0.00</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>8</td><td>Do you find any reasons for the differences in primary and middle educations between Japanese schools and Malaysian ones?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>9</td><td>Did you succeed in setting up a Webex meeting, having a conversation with your partner, recording the conversation and viewing what you have recorded?</td><td>3.00</td><td>0.00</td></tr><tr><td>2</td><td>10</td><td>Did you understand the purpose of the collaboration classes?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>11</td><td>Did you enjoy talking with your partner in the first session?</td><td>2.50</td><td>1.07</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>12</td><td>Did you enjoy talking with your partner in the second session?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>13</td><td>Did you check the video recording after the class?</td><td>2.75</td><td>0.71</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>14</td><td>Was your and your partner's voice clear enough to transcribe?</td><td>2.86</td><td>0.38</td></tr><tr><td>3</td><td>15</td><td>Did you understand how to transcribe your video using YouTube?</td><td>2.71</td><td>0.76</td></tr></tbody></table>

(continued)
<table><caption>**Table 2.** (continued)</caption><thead><tr><td>Cl</td><td>Item</td><td>Rubric Questions</td><td>M</td><td>SD</td></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>3</td><td>16</td><td>Are you looking forward to talking with XXX students?</td><td>2.86</td><td>0.38</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>17</td><td>Do you think your talk was interesting to the members of your group?</td><td>2.25</td><td>0.71</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>18</td><td>Did you prepare the materials for your talk?</td><td>2.75</td><td>0.46</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>19</td><td>Did you ask any good questions in the group activities?</td><td>2.13</td><td>0.83</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>20</td><td>Did you understand the members of your group well?</td><td>2.38</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>21</td><td>Did you enjoy the group activities?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr><tr><td>4</td><td>22</td><td>Did you learn anything new in the group activities?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>5</td><td>23</td><td>Did you set up a meeting room for the next collaboration class?</td><td>3.00</td><td>0.00</td></tr><tr><td>5</td><td>24</td><td>Do you understand how to get the transcription of the recorded data using YouTube?</td><td>2.13</td><td>0.99</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>25</td><td>Did you understand what Malaysian students talked about their culture?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>26</td><td>Did you set up the topics of the next and last collaboration class?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>27</td><td>Did you prepare well for presenting Japanese culture in this collaboration class?</td><td>2.38</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>28</td><td>Did you enjoy talking during the first and second sessions?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>29</td><td>Did you find out anything that you had not been aware of in Malaysian culture?</td><td>2.75</td><td>0.46</td></tr><tr><td>6</td><td>30</td><td>Did you find out anything that you had not been aware of in Japanese culture?</td><td>2.38</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>7</td><td>31</td><td>Did you prepare well for presenting Japanese culture in this collaboration class?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>7</td><td>32</td><td>Did you enjoy talking during the first and second sessions?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr></tbody></table>

use of YouTube and its subtitle generator (items 2, 3, 4, 15, and 24). The mean scores for the first three are below 1.4, but those for the last two are above 2.1.
<table><caption>**Table 3.** Rubric questions and students' scores (Continued).</caption><thead><tr><td>Cl</td><td>Item</td><td>Rubric Questions</td><td>M</td><td>SD</td></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>7</td><td>33</td><td>Did you understand what Malaysian students talked about?</td><td>2.38</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>7</td><td>34</td><td>Did you contribute to your discussion?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.74</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>35</td><td>How do you evaluate yourself through the three collaboration classes?</td><td>2.13</td><td>0.83</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>36</td><td>How do you evaluate Chuo University students, including yourself, through the three collaboration classes?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>37</td><td>How do you evaluate your group in the first session through the three collaboration classes?</td><td>2.38</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>38</td><td>How do you evaluate your group in the second session through the three collaboration classes?</td><td>2.63</td><td>0.52</td></tr><tr><td>8</td><td>39</td><td>Did you find the collaboration classes interesting?</td><td>2.88</td><td>0.35</td></tr></tbody></table>

In other questions, obvious changes were not observed. Question Items 27 and 31 are identical, asking whether they were prepared for presenting Japanese culture, but two participants answered differently, which resulted in a small increase of the mean score from 2.38 to 2.64. Question Items 25 and 33 are almost identical, asking whether they understood Malaysian students, and two participants answered differently, which resulted in a small decrease in the mean score from 2.64 to 2.38.

Lastly, the scores on some questions are very high. Japanese learners looked forward to the collaboration classes at the early stage of collaboration: Answers to Question Items 6 and 16 are 3.00 and 2.86 (one answered 2 and one failed to answer), respectively. They enjoyed the collaboration classes: Answers to Question Items 11, 12, 21, 28, 32, and 39 were 2.50 or 2.88: One student answered 2, but the rest answered 3 (and one failed to answer Question 11). This is consistent with Japanese and Malaysian students' comments, some examples of which we will describe in the next subsection.

## 5.2 Student Comments

Student comments collected on the Japan side with Dialogbook are analyzed at a linguistic level, and the results are given in Table 4 and Fig. 3 below. Although a previous study of collaboration classes between Japanese and Taiwanese high schools reported an increase of words and lemmas across three collaboration classes [5], such development was not observed in this project; probably because students had well-developed writing skills and high motivation even before starting the collaboration classes, and their attitudes toward the activities remained positive throughout the course.
The quantitative descriptions of words with Wordclouds are given in Fig. 3. The font sizes reflect the frequency of words in the messages. Those large words are closely related to the topics in each session, i.e., self-introduction, culture, education, and others, respectively. Therefore, quantitatively no change seemed to occur in the performance. However, qualitative differences are reflected in the answers.

<table><caption>**Table 4.** The summary of lexical use in message exchanges.</caption><thead><tr><th>Classes</th><th>Numbers of words</th><th>Numbers of lemmas</th><th>Numbers of sentences</th><th>Words per sentences</th><th>Lemmas per sentences</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Before the collaboration classes</td><td>2476</td><td>1802</td><td>172</td><td>14.40</td><td>10.48</td></tr><tr><td>After 1st collaboration class</td><td>669</td><td>522</td><td>52</td><td>12.87</td><td>10.04</td></tr><tr><td>After 2nd collaboration class</td><td>936</td><td>672</td><td>78</td><td>12.00</td><td>8.62</td></tr><tr><td>After 3rd collaboration class</td><td>939</td><td>615</td><td>69</td><td>13.61</td><td>8.91</td></tr><tr><td>Total</td><td>5020</td><td>3611</td><td>371</td><td>13.53</td><td>9.73</td></tr></tbody></table>

<figure><img src="image_5.png" /><figcaption>**Fig. 3.** From left to right: After the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd collaboration classes.</figcaption></figure>

Now let us examine the student comments qualitatively. Some examples are given in Table 5, where spelling errors were corrected, but grammatical errors were left in the original. The comments in the bottom line were sent to the Malaysian instructor from his students. Before the first collaboration, all the participants said that they were looking forward to the collaboration class. A few students were also worried about their English skills (s4, s11). After the first collaboration class, they said they had enjoyed themselves (s2). Some commented about their English skills (s5). Other comments revealed that learners were motivated to study more because of this experience (s10). Student comments after the second collaboration class, whose topic was 'cultures,' referred to the
contents more often than those after the first one, where the students introduced themselves. Through the three collaboration classes, the number of mentions regarding the contents in their interaction increased. After the third and final session, they expressed their enjoyment of the class as well as their interest in the contents they had dealt with. They also referred to their proficiency in English. Some mentioned networking among students and all Japanese students appeared interested in keeping contact with Malaysian friends. After the three collaboration classes, Malaysian students commented to the Malaysian instructor. The examples are given in the last row of Table 5. They show that the Malaysian students also appreciated the course.

<table><caption>**Table 5.** Comments from Japanese students. The numbers in ( ) are the student IDs.</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Examples</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Before 1<sup>st</sup> Collaboration class</td><td>“I’m looking forward to my first class with UTM next week. (s3)” “I can’t wait to talk with the students of UTM. (s9)” “I’m looking forward to learning about the culture of Malaysia, but I’m worried about my English. (s4)” “I am worried about my English skill, but I will do my best in the next lesson. (s11)”</td></tr><tr><td>After the 1<sup>st</sup> collaboration class</td><td>“I enjoyed talking with UTM students. It was a lot of fun.... Anyway, it was a good opportunity to speak in English. (s2)” “I enjoyed talking Malaysian, but I felt a lack of my English power. (s5)” “It was lots of fun! I have realized what I forgot; you can communicate and be friends with people without advanced English command. I found Malaysian friends tended to talk about their hometown, probably because they were proud of their hometown. I should emulate them and know about my own hometown. If only we had had more time! (s10)”</td></tr><tr><td>After the 2<sup>nd</sup> collaboration class</td><td>“We had second times collaborations with UTM students. I introduced them to Japanese Wagashi. It seems that they were enjoying my presentation, and they asked me some questions. It was happy for me to answer the question. (s2)” “I introduced the Japanese language to Malaysian students. They were especially interested in kanji. This experience helped me to rediscover my own culture. (s8)” “On 15 December, we could enjoy talking with UTM students. We talked about Japanese culture and Malaysian culture. Also, we talked about how to spend in winter. In Malaysia, they spend 31 December hanging out and going night market. We talked about many things, and it was very wonderful. (s9)”</td></tr></tbody></table>

(continued)
<table><caption>**Table 5. (continued)**</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Examples</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>After the 3<sup>rd</sup> collaboration class</td><td>“Today, we talked about the education system and school events. It was interesting to know the difference between these schools, but I realized there is a lot of the same things. Especially, I was surprised at the school uniform. Some students who belong to a school representative or librarian wear different uniforms. This was fresh information for me. Through this session, I could talk with Malaysian students. This experience is rare and interesting. In one day, I want to talk about them face to face. (s2)” “At first, I was worried about if I could talk with Malaysian students in English. So, I got ready for UTM. Then, I enjoyed talking with them, and we exchanged cultures of each other’s countries. This project became a good experience for me. (s8)” “22 Dec: I enjoyed the sessions again, and I miss the students who I talked to in this class. We exchanged our Instagram accounts with each other. I hope we can meet someday. In the three collaboration classes, I understood my level of speaking English. I need to keep studying English in the future. (s11)”</td></tr><tr><td>Message from Malaysian students after the 3<sup>rd</sup> collaboration class</td><td>“Tq so much, sensei, for giving us this golden opportunity to join the program.” “Thank you, sensei, for the amazing opportunity. I would be so glad to participate in this program again in the future (hopefully physically).”</td></tr></tbody></table>

All students enjoyed the collaboration classes. Japanese students probably spent more time preparing for this project than they did in other classes, but no complaints was found in their comments. All in all, the project achieved considerable success.

## 6 Conclusion

This paper describes an international collaboration course between Japanese and Malaysian universities. The international relations among the individuals involved and the ICT tools used made it possible to carry out this course, where students were given occasions to use English as a genuine means of communication. The answers to rubric questions and student comments collected through the course showed that they became aware of the skills needed for communication, increased their motivation to study the language, and became more curious about the world and themselves.

Further studies should be carried out in at least two directions. First, participants’ real interaction during the collaboration classes should be analyzed to reveal what takes place in group works. Second, how this type of international project-based study could be implemented with different course subjects (e.g., science) and schools (e.g., primary schools) should be examined. Although, in practice, some other practical issues (e.g., finding a class to pair with) need to be resolved to carry out a SMILE, we believe that any teacher with enthusiasm will be able overcome them with support from WILL [3].
**Acknowledgments.** This project was supported by Grant for Establishing Interdisciplinary Research Cluster (PI Jun Iio), Chuo University. We would like to thank John Matthews for his comments on the English and Loh Khai Xian for his support in administrating the participation of Malaysian students in the project. This study is supported by KAKENHI 22K00689.

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3. WILL Homepage: https://kotoba-kobo.jp/e. Last accessed 24 Jan 2022

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