A Grounded Theory Exploration of Language Massive Open Online Courses (LMOOCs): Understanding Students’ Viewpoints

Abstract

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have been called the biggest innovation in education in 200 years for their unique attribute of being open and free to any individual with Internet access; however, their high dropout rate has led many people to be concerned or dubious about their effectiveness and applicability. The applicability of MOOCs in English for specific purposes (ESP) courses (in this case, hospitality English) needs more empirical evidence; the present study intends to help fill this gap and extend our current understanding of this issue. This study followed a grounded theory methodology to develop a theoretical model based on a constant dialogue between collected data and the literature. The results suggest that most participants had positive perceptions of language MOOCs (LMOOCs) in general, but some doubted their applicability. Most participants said they would continue to use LMOOCs for learning, depending on the attributes of specific courses. Based on the extracted data, a conceptual model for the applicability of LMOOCs is proposed.