Abstract:

The main purpose of the present study was to examine Turkish undergraduate students' perceptions about the use of mobile applications for language purposes (MALPs) in learning German as a foreign language (GFL). Moreover, it was investigated whether there were significant differences in their perceptions according to gender and their majors and whether students used MALPs as an educational tool to improve their German language knowledge. A total of 225 third-year students who were doing BA program at a state technical university in Türkiye participated in the study. They were from four different academic majors: aviation management, gastronomy and culinary arts, tourism management and tourist guiding. Quantitative data were used to achieve the research objectives. To that end, a personal information form presented by the author was used to explore students' general experiences of using MALPs in learning German. To measure students' perceptions of using MALPs, the Mobile Learning Perception Scale (MLPS) developed by Uzunboylu and Özdamlı (2011) were used. The findings revealed that their perceptions of using MALPs in improving their German language knowledge were moderate. In addition, female students had higher perceptions of using MALPs for learning German than male students. However, no significant differences regarding their perceptions about MALPs according to their majors were detected. Finally, it was revealed that Google Translate was the most preferred MALP, and almost all the students regularly practiced it to perform translation activities.