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Relational and contextual dynamics in online teaching Turkish as a foreign language: toward a relationally mediated
1Police Academy, Ankara, Türkiye.
Frontiers in Psychology
|July 28, 2026
Summary
Online language learning is deeply relational, emphasizing family and identity connections over technology. This approach highlights how social interactions shape the learning process for second and heritage language acquisition.
Area of Science:
- * Second Language Acquisition
- * Heritage Language Education
- * Digital Learning Environments
Background:
- * Existing models of online language learning often overlook the crucial role of social and relational dynamics.
- * There's a need to understand language learning as a context-dependent process, especially in transnational settings.
- * Current approaches tend to be individualistic and technologically focused, neglecting the constitutive nature of relationships.
Purpose of the Study:
- * To reconceptualize online second and heritage language learning as relationally mediated and context-dependent.
- * To examine how students, parents, and teachers perceive and experience learning Turkish in transnational online contexts.
- * To develop a theoretical framework that integrates relational mechanisms into language learning models.
Main Methods:
- * A multi-stakeholder qualitative research design.
- * Semi-structured interviews conducted with 27 participants (students, parents, teachers).
- * Thematic analysis used to analyze qualitative data.
Main Results:
- * Language learning is fundamentally driven by relational and identity-based meanings, with family interaction and cultural continuity as key engagement factors.
- * Learning is a dynamic system influenced by learner characteristics, instructional mediation, and context, with relationships regulating these experiences.
- * Online learning environments are interactionally constructed, with engagement and connection shaping participation, rather than being neutral technological platforms.
Conclusions:
- * A relationally mediated learning system is proposed, integrating meaning, processes, and engagement.
- * Relational mechanisms are constitutive elements of language learning in complex, digital, and transnational environments.
- * This study provides a theoretically robust and context-sensitive account of online language acquisition.
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