Thái độ của học sinh về việc học tiếng anh qua mạng để chuẩn bị cho kỳ thi vào các trường cấp 3

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The completion of this Master’s thesis would have been impossible without the guidance, support, and encouragement from my supervisor, colleagues, friends, and family. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to my supervisor, Dr. Dinh Thi Bao Huong. You have provided me with consistent and invaluable encouragement over my MA journey. I am profoundly grateful for your commitment, time, and expertise. Thank you for your patience whilst listening to my difficulties and your stable and substantial support during all these years. I would like to express my appreciation for Ms. Ngo Thi Thanh Huyen who gave me great advice and solutions for my research. Thank you for your support both academically and personally. I would like to extend my thanks to my students who helped me with piloting the research instruments. I am also very appreciative of all of the participants for taking part in my study and providing me with invaluable data. My thanks also go to my family and my familyinlaw for their love. My deepest love and appreciation go to my husband. I cannot thank you enough for being there for me through thick and thin. Your support and love mean the world to me.

+ BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO

TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC HÀ NỘI KHOA ĐÀO TẠO SAU ĐẠI HỌC

-& -THÁI ĐỘ CỦA HỌC SINH VỀ VIỆC HỌC TIẾNG ANH QUA MẠNG ĐỂ CHUẨN BỊ CHO KỲ THI VÀO CÁC TRƯỜNG

CẤP 3 STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS ONLINE ENGLISH LEARNING TO PREPARE FOR HIGH SCHOOLS EXAM

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

-& -THÁI ĐỘ CỦA HỌC SINH VỀ VIỆC HỌC TIẾNG ANH QUA MẠNG ĐỂ CHUẨN BỊ CHO KỲ THI VÀO CÁC TRƯỜNG

CẤP 3 STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS ONLINE ENGLISH LEARNING TO PREPARE FOR HIGH SCHOOLS EXAM

I certify that except where due acknowledgment has been made, the work is that of the author solely; and the work has not been submitted in support of another degree or qualification from this or another university or institute of learning

The study in this thesis has been approved by Hanoi University

Signature of the student

Full name of the student

Date: 08/03/2022

I would like to express my appreciation for Ms Ngo Thi Thanh Huyen who gave me greatadvice and solutions for my research Thank you for your support both academically andpersonally

I would like to extend my thanks to my students who helped me with piloting the researchinstruments I am also very appreciative of all of the participants for taking part in mystudy and providing me with invaluable data

My thanks also go to my family and my family-in-law for their love My deepest love andappreciation go to my husband I cannot thank you enough for being there for me throughthick and thin Your support and love mean the world to me

LIST OF ABBREVIATION

ICT: Information and Communications Technology

OSN: Online Social Networking

TAM: Technology Acceptance Model

EFL: English as Foreign Language

SPSS: Statistical Package for the Social Science

SD: Standard Deviation

1.1.1.1 Behavioral Aspect of Attitude 6

1.1.1.2 Cognitive Aspect of Attitude 6

1.1.1.3 Emotional Aspect of Attitude 7

3.2.1.2 Adapting the questionnaire items 20

3.2.1.3 Piloting the questionnaire 22

3.2.1.4 Procedure for collecting the actual questionnaire 23

4.1 Quantitative data analysis techniques 25

1.1.1 Students’ cognition of learning English online 271.1.2 Students’ emotion of learning English online 311.1.3 Students’ behavior of learning English online 34

1.2.1 Students’ cognition of learning English online 381.2.2 Students’ emotion of learning English online 411.2.3 Students’ behavior of learning English online 42

3.1 The students’ cognition of the online English learning course 443.2 The students’ emotion of the online English learning course 453.3 The students’ behavior of the online English learning course 46

Appendix 4: Original questionnaire 67

LIST OF TABLE

Table 2 Descriptive statistics of the mean score and SD for cognition

category (N=50)

28Table 3: Descriptive statistics of the mean score and SD for emotion

category (N=50)

31Table 4: Descriptive statistics of the mean score and SD for behavior

category (N=50)

34

Online learning is an international technology call and to respond to this tendency,this thesis aims at investigating students’ attitudes towards online English learning toprepare for the entrance exam into Gifted High schools The participants were 50 9thgraders who came from different secondary schools in Ha Noi, all of whom would like toenroll in foreign language specialized high schools The research methodology was mixmethods with the use of a questionnaire and an interview as data collection instruments.The main findings of this study pointed out that almost all of the students had positiveattitudes towards the online English learning course preparing for the entrance exam intoforeign language specialized high schools The learners reported various benefits of onlinecourses; however, they were not interested in online activities such as working in pairs orgroups, so they had a tendency to distract from the lessons In addition, the learners feltnervous when they could not talk to their teachers directly about the difficult exercises.Some recommendations suggested based on the main findings are that students should takethe online English learning course because of its benefits Also the learners should be moreactive in taking part in online activities and teachers should create more online space forstudents to make questions and answer all of them carefully

Key words: Online learning, student attitude, entrance exams into gifted schools

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1 Background to the research

The development of technology is increasing and it has brought a bright future formultiple sectors in our life It supports people in the way of owning the knowledge andturning them into an asset Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) enteredsociety and became its significant daily tool As a result, most people in the world use ICT

to reach the latest news, contact their friends and family or stay associated in a growingglobalized world (Masilela, 2019)

ICT in Education, which means teaching and learning by the use of ICT (Hemant,2018) has brought teachers a great deal of new pedagogies used in Education to supportlearners to study more effectively Therefore, ICT has the ability to improve and transformEducation for the better Integrating ICT in pedagogy has authorized learners to be active

in learning and interacting with their peers Students would understand the lesson betterdue to the use of ICT in pedagogies ICT has also played an important role of improvingdiscipline in the classroom, as students have been engrossed in interactive learning andthey have not had time for disruption (Anila, 2017) ICT has also enabled teachers totransform the approach in which they use to teach and it is also meaningful to supportenvironments with student-centered approaches

The importance of ICT in teaching and learning is recognized clearly, so many countries

in the world have provided training courses on ICT for teachers (Ndlovu, 2016) The use ofICTs in language teaching has countless benefits The development in the use of ICT, likelanguage lab, videos, satellite broadcast, videoconferencing and web seminars hassupported the richness and quality of Education both on and off campus (Jayanthi &Kumar, 2016)

In Viet Nam, many efforts have been made to bring technology into variousclassroom modules For example, PowerPoint is being considered as one of the mostpopular current teaching tools in every corners of schools, teachers are prone to changewritten syllabus into online ones Students are allowed to submit their assignmentsthroughout some online apps which are used by their teachers

Moreover, the outbreak of Covid-19 Pandemic across the world has profoundlyaltered every aspects of life since 2020, including Education The pandemic has disruptedface-to-face Education and thus online instruction using ICT is the best solution for thissituation in Vietnam

2 Research context

The contagious Coronavirus disease (also COVID-19) has changed many lifeactivities and the sheer magnitude of the issue causes so much trouble to people andsocieties at large According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and CulturalOrganization (2020), approximately 1,186,127,211 learners were affected across globe, orabout 67.7% of the total enrolled leaners from 144 country-wide closures, and most of thenations had to change their learning systems due to COVID-19

Schools are forced to apply e-learning to respond to the changes in learningsystems According to a report from the World Bank (2020), as offline classes were closed,many countries had implemented different learning systems For example, China applied

an online learning system by holding simultaneous online learning exercises to make surethat the learning of students was not interrupted In Bulgaria, in early April 2020, theMinistry of Education and Science launched an e-learning system

Vietnam fell into the same situation as other countries, so ICT based Education hasbeen implemented for students in all levels (United Nations Children’s Fund [UNICEF],2020) and grade 9 students who are going to take the entrance exam into foreign languagespecialized high schools are not an exception They are going to cope with an importantexam which is going to create the turning-point of their life This exam is a big challengefor them, but the students could not have offline-classes to prepare for their upcoming testbecause of the Covid-19 Therefore, online learning has been their best choice in thisurgent situation

Those who would like to enter gifted foreign language high schools need to masterEnglish language in both grammar and language practicing skills as well In addition, thechallenge of tests in those schools is quite high because students have to handle an Englishtest including 80 difficult questions about grammar, vocabulary and a 250-word essay Theadvanced demand of this test takes students much time to study and practice day by day,which might be overwhelming for many learners

Online English learning could be the effective solution for those obstacles, becausethe learners could protect themselves and others from COVID-19 by sitting at home tostudy and approach numerous online learning apps that help learners and teachers haveinteractive studying environments and save them time and energy However, to the best of

my knowledge, there seems to be a lack of studies in Vietnam on students’ attitude towardsonline learning to prepare for high school exams

This study aims to investigate grade 9 students’ attitude towards online learningEnglish to prepare for high school exams in Ha Noi Based on three components of

attitudes (Weden, 1991), the study examines the learners’ cognition, behavior and emotiontowards online English courses The study will help the 9th graders who have a desire forenrolling in foreign language specialized high schools and the teachers who have beenteaching English for these students to improve the effectiveness of their online Englishcourses

3 Research aim

The use of ICT in teaching and learning is constantly increasing and the spread ofCOVID-19 also speeds up dramatically Not to interrupt students’ learning, online learninghas been used in Vietnam to deal with the situation This study was conducted with an aim

to have a deeper understanding about the learners’ attitudes towards online English courses

to prepare for the entrance exam into foreign language specialized High Schools in Hanoi

As a teacher, who has been involved in teaching online English courses with practicalexperience, the writer’s investigation into these issues is crucial to generate reliableanswers leading to the effectiveness in online teaching and learning courses regarding thisfield This study is believed to contribute to the current literature about this emerging topic

by presenting one example in Vietnam

4 Key research question(s)

What are student’s attitudes towards online English learning in terms of cognitive,behavioral, emotional aspects?

5 Research significance

English learning should be boosted by integrating ICT to make teaching andlearning better The learners, especially those who would like to enter foreign languagespecialized High Schools, could use online English learning apps to save their time andhave an active learning environment Most of them and these gifted schools are located inbig cities and the learners could afford their own private computer or smartphone tosupport their learning Moreover, the COVID-19 did not allow teachers and students topresent in the offline classes, which could interrupt the students’ learning and the teachers’teaching as well

It captured the writer’s interest when the technology began trending and schools allaround the country were also integrated with ICT in the context of the COVID-19pandemic The researcher became very passionate about how online learning Englishwould improve the teaching and learning’s results

The study contains values in finding out the grade 9 students’ attitudes to onlineEnglish learning to prepare for entrance exams into foreign language specialized High

teaching and learning English to prepare for the entrance exam into those schoolsunderstand more about learning English online Also the study supports teachers whowould like to know how to utilize the strong points of this learning module to help betterprepare them for the entrance exam into gifted schools.

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter presents the literature related to the study The terms used in this study areprovided The second part deals with previous studies, which highlights the literaturereview about online English learning, students’ attitudes towards online learning andonline learning in COVID-19 pandemic The third part is about the gaps in previousstudies

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Chapter Three describes the methodology employed in this study including researchdesign, research setting and participants After that, the data collection (samplingstrategies, data collecting instruments, data collection procedures) and data analysistechniques are presented in this chapter Finally, ethical considerations are also stated CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter shows the findings from the questionnaire and the interview in turn Throughsummary of main findings and the discussion of them in details, the research question isanswered

CHAPTER V: RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION

This chapter summarizes the main findings, gives recommendations based on mainfindings and limitations of the study, and gives some suggestions for future research andconclusions

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter reviews relevant literature relating to aspects contributing to the

learner’s attitudes This chapter includes four main parts: Related concepts; defining terms,previous studies about online learning, ICT in teaching and learning and online learning in COVID-19 pandemic; and gaps in previous studies

1 Related concepts

1.1 Definition of Attitudes

Several definitions of attitude were considered by many researchers in the field ofPsychology and Education, Language Learning According to Montano and Kasprzyk(2008, p.71): “Attitude is determined by the individual’s beliefs about outcomes orattributes of performing the behaviors (behavioral beliefs), weighted by evaluations ofthose outcomes or attributes Thus, a person who holds strong beliefs that positively valuedoutcomes will result from performing the behaviors will have positive attitudes towardsthe behaviors Conversely, a person who holds strong beliefs that negatively valuedoutcomes will result from the behaviors will have a negative attitude”

Gardner (1985) also pointed out that attitude is thus linked to a person’s values andbeliefs and promotes or discourages the choices made in all realms of activity, whetheracademic or informal

Weden (1991) presents a comprehensive definition of the attitude concept, thisresearcher separates the term “attitude” into three components: cognitive, affective andbehavioral The cognitive elements include the belief, thoughts or viewpoints about theobject of the attitude The affective one refers to the individual’s feelings and emotionstowards an object The behavioral component involves the tendency to adopt particularlearning behaviors

In this study, the researcher uses Weden’s definition of attitude to conduct theresearch and explore the learners’ attitudes towards online English learning based on threecomponents: cognitive, affective and behavioral which were mentioned in Weden’sdefinition In Weden’s definition, three aspects of attitude provide the educators an idea ofhow one’s attitudes towards something is built up and set up a clear foundation foreducators to explore learners’ attitudes towards learning activities

1.1.1 Aspects of Language Attitude

Learning result is changed positively in the individual’s personality in terms of theemotional, behavioral and cognitive aspects When the learners start learning any subjects,

are definitely different If the researcher would like to investigate the learner’s attitudes toany type of language learning, we had better measure of the dimensions of cognitive,affective and behavioral aspects These three attitudinal aspects are based on the threetheoretical approaches of behaviorism, cognitivism and humanism respectively (Mohamad,2012).

1.1.1.1 Behavioral Aspect of Attitude

In terms of behavioral of attitude, the learners behave and react in particularcircumstances That is, the way students deal with learning subjects or styles that lead them

to different learning results

According to Kara (2009): “Positive attitudes lead to the exhibition of positivebehaviors toward courses of study, with participants absorbing themselves in courses andstriving to learn more Such students are also observed to be more eager to solve problems,

to acquire the information and skills useful for daily life and to engage themselvesemotionally.”

Attitudes were assumed to be causally linked to behavior, as they were “alwaysseen as precursors of behavior, as determinants of how a person will actually behave in hisdaily affairs” Cohen (1964)

Fishbein and Ajzen (1974) showed that the consequences of using different levels

of specificity in measuring attitudes and behaviors indicates the relatively low correlations.many researchers employed a single highly specific behavioral measure and related it to ageneral attitudes’ measures For example, attitudes towards foreign languages, attitudestowards French and attitudes towards speaking French in the classroom have differentlevels of specificity

Behavioral component of attitude is related to behavioral reaction toward the object

of the attitude (Damianus et al, 2019)

Behavioral aspect is assessed by the subject’s indication of his intention or hiswillingness to engage in various behaviors with respect to or in the presence of a givenperson or object The subject indicates his willingness to perform the behavior(s) on scalessuch as: “would-would not,” “willing-unwilling,” “intend-not intend,” “will try-will nottry,” etc (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1972)

1.1.1.2 Cognitive Aspect of Attitude

In terms of cognitive of attitude, the belief of the learners about the knowledge thatthey could acquire from other language learning styles or their understanding in the

learning process is the significant factor to decide whether they achieve a good connectionwith the subject or not.

Cognitive component of attitude refers to the thought, perception or ideas of theperson towards the object of the attitude (Damianus et al, 2019)

Cognitive aspect is the subject’s perception that an object or person has certaincharacteristics, qualities, or attributes, or is related to some other concept, object, orperson Similar to these are measures of the subject’s judgment that a given behavior,policy, or strategy has certain characteristics or leads to certain goals, values, or otheroutcomes (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1972)

The cognitive attitude is characterized by the beliefs an individual has about asocial object or phenomenon These beliefs vary in number from one individual to another(Triandis, 1971)

1.1.1.3 Emotional Aspect of Attitude

According to Feng and Chen (2009): “Learning process is an emotional process It

is affected by different emotional factors The teacher and his students engage in variousemotional activities in it and varied fruits of emotions are yielded.” It means that thisaspect makes the learners reveal whether they enjoy or hate the objects or surroundingsituations

Emotional component is about emotional reaction or feeling of the person towardsthe object of the attitudes such as like or dislike (Damianus et al, 2019)

Summers (1977) emphasizes the key role of evaluative beliefs within the cognitivecomponent of attitudes She further states that such beliefs usually precede the feeling of

“for or against” an object, the emotional component Thus, the latter has been designated

as the second component of attitudes It establishes the extent to which an object isdesirable and good or just the opposite In other words, the emotional subsumes all the “for

or against” emotion or feeling attached to the attitude object

2 Term definitions

Online learning, E-learning, Web-based education, distance education

According to Moore, Dickson-Deane and Galyen (2011), distance learning, learning, online learning and web-based learning are terms interchangeably used Theseterms are synonyms due to their multiple commonalities referring to the way theinstruction is carried out In this kind of instruction, two agents are involved (a learner and

e-an instructor), it occurs at different times e-and/or places, e-and it uses multiple instructionalmaterials

Online learning is a well-established learning paradigm which has both theoreticaland practical appeals (Shwartz, 2012) and this researcher also pointed out the goal ofonline learning is to make a sequence of accurate prediction tasks and possibly additionalavailable information

Similarly, different authors defined online learning as “access to learningexperiences via the use of some technology” (Benson, 2002: Carliner, 2004: Conrad, 2002,

as cited in Moore et al., 2011)

In addition, Rossett (2002) mentioned that online learning has many promises, but

it takes commitment and resources, and must be done right Doing it right means thatonline learning materials must be designed properly, with the learners and learning infocus, and that adequate support must be provided

E-learning not only bases instruction on internet, intranet, web-sites and CD-Rom,but also on audio, video and TV (Ellis, 2004, as cited in Moore et al., 2011, P130) Itmeans that technological tools characterized this modality of instruction MeanwhileTavangarian, Leypold, Nolting, Roser, and Voigt (2004, cited in Moore et al., 2011)explained that e-leaning cannot be characterized as only procedural but that there is alsoevidence of the transformation of the individuals following constructing knowledge

Distance learning is an excellent method of teaching adult learners because ofcompeting priorities of work, home, and school, adult learners desire a high degree offlexibility (Galusha, 1998)

Keegan (1998) defined that distance learning is a valued component of manyeducation systems and has proved its worth in areas where traditional schools, colleges anduniversities have difficulties in meeting demand

According to Sampson (2003), web-based education is a mode of delivery whichincludes learning independently by using self-study texts and asynchronouscommunication

A series of benefits and drawbacks regarding web-based distance education wasfound by King (2002) and Hannay and Newvine (2006) and they affirm that the mainreason that people choose these courses is the personal convenience they offer and thatparticipation in the course can take place anytime/anywhere

Although these above terms have similarities and are related to each other

somehow, the term “online learning” seems to be the most appropriate to this study

because the learners in this study can use different online apps to learn English andwhether they are far away or close to their teachers, they have the right to use them

3 Previous studies

In the international context

This part presents some studies related to using ICT in teaching and learning inthe world These studies revolve around students’ perception, awareness, attitudestowards online learning

Firstly, Admed (1989) conducted the study “The role of attitudes and motivation inteaching and learning foreign languages: A theoretical and empirical investigation into theteaching and learning of English in IRQI preparatory schools” In this study, the researcherpointed out that attitudes and motivation have been accounted for as crucial determinativefactors of the efforts exerted in carrying out daily tasks

Secondly, Saha and et al (2008) mentioned in their study called “E-learning:Investigating university student’s acceptance of technology” that InformationCommunication Technology (ICT) is reshaping the form and mode of delivery of HigherEducation worldwide Some of the main challenges in Education are access issues, andcosts ICT is the key to solve those challenges and their study aims to investigate whatdetermines university students’ acceptance of e-learning by applying the TechnologyAcceptance Model (TAM) The research was conducted at a Swedish University amongbusiness students The results demonstrate that Perceived Usefulness is the maindeterminant of a student’s acceptance of e-learning

Thirdly, Yacob and his partners (2011) conducted the study “Student awarenesstowards e-learning in Education” and it aims to examine the awareness of e-learning thatinvolves students from TATI University College in Malaysia as a respondent The resultshows that males and females have a significant awareness towards e-learning in Education

at TATIUC

One more study, Farahat (2012) conducted the study “Applying TechnologyAcceptance Model (TAM) to online learning in the Egyptian Universities” to identify thedeterminants that can shape students’ intention to use online learning based on the TAMmodel The results reveal that students’ perception of ease of use, usefulness, attitudestowards online learning, and the social influence of the student’s referent group wasidentified as significant determinants of students’ intention to practice online learning Thepossibility of using the social influence of students’ referent group, students’ perceivedease of use, students’ perceived ease of use, students’ perceived usefulness and theirattitudes towards online learning to predict their behavioral intention to use online learningwas also confirmed

Beside, Baclay and Bryson (2012) presents preliminary work on the perception ofstudents to the use of an e-learning system in a top Jamaican university in their study called

“An analysis of students’ perceptions and attitudes to online learning use in HigherEducation in Jamaica: An extension of TAM” This investigation has shown that while thisUniversity has not officially launched its e-learning systems it has been available for overfive years where instructors across faculties have implemented their classroom withvarying results

Next, Tarhini, Hone and Liu (2013) used the Technology Acceptance Model(TAM) in their study called “User acceptance towards web-based learning systems:investigating the role of social, organizational and individual factors in European HigherEducation” to include social, institutional and individual factors in the general structuralmodule to empirically investigate and study whether students are willing to adopt and usee-learning systems The findings have shown that perceived ease of use, perceivedusefulness, social norms, quality of work life, computer self-efficacy and facilitatingconditions are all having a significant positive influence on the adoption and usage of theBlackboard system

Also, Sabti and Chaichan (2014) in their study called “Saudi Sigh school students’attitudes and barriers towards the use of computer technologies in learning English”examined the attitudes and barriers that affect and limit the actual usage of computers ofSaudi Arabian high school students towards the use of computer technologies in learningEnglish The result of this study revealed gender differences in attitudes towards the use ofcomputer technologies in learning English Female students showed higher and morepositive attitudes towards the use of computer technologies in learning English than males.Both male and female participants demonstrated high and positive perception of usefulnessand perceived ease of use of computer technologies in learning English

In addition, Hamid and his partners (2015) studied the research “Understandingstudents’ perceptions of the benefits of online social networking use for teaching andlearning” The aim of this research is to concentrate on students’ experiences with usingOnline Social Networking (OSN) for students-students and students-teacher interactions.The findings show that students identified a number of positive outcomes from using OSN

to interact with each other and with their lecturers

Likewise, Krasnova (2015), in his study called “Students’ perception of learning inthe online discussion environment” focused on investigating asynchronous onlinediscussion efficacy in the learning process The study proved that e-learning technologiesenable new unique opportunities for students Online courses offer engaging and highly

motivating activities that positively affect students’ performance and promote theirprogress Online discussion is students’ favorite activity

Also, Milon and Iqbal (2017) conducted the study “Students’ perception towards

technology in learning English as a foreign language: A case study of Higher Secondarystudents of Pabna, Bagladesh” The aim of this study is to examine higher secondary levelstudents’ attitudes and perceptions towards their technology skill, usage patterns, perceivedbenefits of and challenges to using technology in learning English The findings indicatethat technology tools like computer software, social networking websites, online videos,mp3 podcasts, smartphone and tablet apps have positive impacts and can be very mucheffective in improving students’ language skills

Moreover, Nwana, Egbe and Ugwuda (2017) studied the research “Awareness andusage of e-learning materials among students of National Open University of Nigeria” Theresult points out that the students are aware of the majority of the e-learning materials Thestudents do not use the majority of the e-learning materials There was general low usage

of the e-learning materials as revealed by the findings

Furthermore, Erarslan and Topkaya (2017) conducted the study “EFL students’towards e-learning and effect of an online course on students’ success in English” with theaim of having an insight into the possible effect of online courses on students’ success inEnglish In this study, 47 students were given a questionnaire to understand their attitudestowards online Education, and their online scores were analyzed in comparison to theirmidterm and quiz scores The researchers found that the students have partly positiveattitudes towards online courses; However, online courses do not help students in terms oftheir overall success at preparatory class

Finally, Mahajan and Kalpana (2018) in their research called “A study of students’perception about e-learning” examining students’ perceptions about e-learning whichwould help in a newer learning experience on the campus The study shows that e-learninghas its benefits from a student’s perspective and it will have a positive influence on theirperformance with better understanding of their courses Thus for at least the following fewyears, the university needs to come out with e-learning tools and modules for a betterteaching-learning experience to make a positive impact on the student’s career

In short, these above studies mentioned some issues regarding learners’ perception,awareness, attitudes towards online learning but the participants of these studies were allfrom other countries, not Vietnam

In Vietnam the Vietnamese context

This part shows some studies related to learner’s satisfaction, attitudes towardsonline learning and online learning in Covid-19 pandemic which conducted in Vietnam

Firstly, Nguyen Viet Ky and Nguyen Thi Cam Linh, (2013) mentioned in theirstudy “Applying E-learning in teaching and the final year’s students’ learning oftranslation course, faculty of English Language Teacher Education-University ofLanguages & International Studies” that the development of technical science in generaland university’s facilities in particular which encourage teachers and learners to use ICT inteaching and learning and this study conducted with the aim of finding out the real process

of applying E-learning in teaching and learning at the faculty of English Language TeacherEducation-University of Languages & International Studies The study comes to theconclusion that: From the teacher’s side, the use of ICT is spontaneous, not mentionedspecifically in the learning schedules, does not contain unity among subjects From thestudent’s side, the knowledge and skills achieved from E-learning are useful; However,they have not thoroughly utilized online apps because most students use E-learning tosupport on-class studying, not to the long term target of professional knowledge and skillsdevelopment

Secondly, the study “Trends in Information Technology application in foreignlanguage teaching in Vietnam” was conducted by Bao Kham and et al (2016) The aim ofthis research is to present the trends in in Information Technology application in foreignlanguage teaching in Vietnam The results pointed out that there are three main trends inInformation Technology application: teaching and learning based on computers, teachingand learning based on websites and online teaching Besides, there are also various trendsbut all of them related to these trends including the update of the apps and the scales ofthem

Thirdly, Nguyen Thi Thang (2019) mentioned in her study called “Enhancingstudents’ engagement in learning English online” that the learner’s motivation is the keypoint to have successful online English learning course, so the teachers should create moresupporting activities for their students and it would be the key for the success of onlinecourse The researcher emphasizes enhancing the interaction between the teachers andlearners The support of teachers and students’ helps are indispensable which would makestudents more confident in various learning activities The design and preparation of thelectures as well as students’ references are the significant step to create the motivation forthe learners If the teachers know how to utilize these above elements effectively, theteachers would certainly attract the learners’ focus and promote the effect of the lessons

One more study, Tran Minh Thanh and et al (2020) conducted the study “Thesophomore’s attitudes towards English learning: A study at Thai Nguyen university ofInformation and Communication Technology.” The aim of this study is finding out theattitudes of non-professional English students towards English learning focusing on threefactors of attitudes (Cognitive, Emotional and Behavioral) and English teaching as well.The results of the study showed that among three factors of attitudes, the cognitive isperformed well by students but their emotion and behavior in learning English are shownnegatively Moreover, Their attitudes towards English teaching differ with variousopinions

Also, In the research “Survey interest of students and awareness of methodinnovation teaching of English subtitles teachers in Thang Long-Da Lat Specialized HighSchool” conducted by Huynh Quang Minh (2020) The finding of this research pointed outthat teachers own many teaching methods to boost students’ learning ability However, theteachers just use technology to assure the effect of tests, not for the learning procedures ofthe students Those factors explain the degree of application of active teaching methodsand approaches is limited The level of program execution covers only surface identifierslike learning projects, technology application teaching products…., which do not contain aprofound change in the awareness of education philosophy

Moreover, Phan Thi Anh Dao and et al (2020) mentioned in the study “Student’svision in covid-19 period on learning online and face to face” Throughout the survey of

180 students and applying qualitative methods, the researchers pointed out that thepercentage of students who enjoy online learning is equal to those who are interested inface-to-face learning The ones who choose to study offline because this learning styleincludes many practical interactions, diverse learning activities, less distractions and awonderful communication environment On the other hand, students who choose onlinelearning suppose that online learning brings about many good points such as: the flexibility

of time and places, an easy approach to learning materials

In addition, Pham Ngoc Thach (2020) conducted the study: “Factors affectingstudents’ satisfaction on online English courses in Vietnam” The aim of this study is todefine the elements affecting students’ satisfaction on English online courses in aVietnamese university The finding showed that there are two main factor group affectingstudents: the first one is the groups related to science including effectiveness, rules ofinteraction between learners and the quality of Internet The other group related to learnersincluding self-awareness of studying and their English abilities

Furthermore, Bui Thi Ngoc Oanh (2020) in her study called “How do the students

of Nha Trang use Facebook to study Specialized English?” She pointed out that thenumber of students who have used Facebook increased day by day; Therefore, theresearcher wanted to know how they used this app to study English The participantsinclude 32 students in the trial class and 32 students in the traditional class All of themtake part in the Writing 3 course but they practice in different ways The only 10 studentsare chosen randomly to interview about their advantages and disadvantages when usingFacebook to study English Finally, the results of the course are compared between twoclasses and shown that the students in the trial class got a higher result than the traditionalone

In another study, Dang Hai Dang (2020) researched the study “The role of highereducation institutions in developing E-learning to promote a learning society and lifelonglearning in Vietnam” He emphasized that E-learning has just developed in two recentdecades but this technology has been applied much in Training and Education Applyingthe latest scientific and technical advances in the field of Information Technology-Communication, E-learning can provide multimedia contents with high interaction andmost importantly it can approach a large number of learners regardless of space or time.When teachers use both E-learning and traditional education to create Blended Learningappropriately, they are able to utilize the strength of both these teaching styles

Finally, Nguyen Thuy Linh (2021) conducted “A study on the relationship betweenstudents’ reading attitudes and their reading comprehension performance” with the aim ofdetermining the students’ reading attitudes and to find the relationship between students’reading attitudes and their reading comprehension performance The finding showed thatthe students’ reading attitudes played an important role when learning reading skill and it isalso stated that there was a significant relationship between students’ reading attitudes andtheir reading comprehension performance

These studies mentioned learner’s satisfaction and attitudes towards online learningand online learning in Covid-19 pandemic but not one of them researched 9th graders’attitudes towards online English learning courses preparing for the entrance exam intoforeign language specialized High Schools

4 Gaps in the literature

Although there are a number of research studies related to the learners’ attitudestowards online English learning, the contexts of those studies were different from thecontext of this current study-the learners’ attitudes towards online English learning underthe COVID-19 pandemic when nobody could come to face-to-face classes as before and all

of the teachers and learners have to exchange the knowledge through online apps Inaddition, those studies mostly focused on the learns’ attitudes towards online Englishlearning in some skills like listening, speaking, reading or writing, they did not mention theparticipant as 9th graders who are going to take the entrance exam into foreign languagespecialized High Schools, these learners are supposed to deal with grammar andvocabulary online English courses Moreover, those previous studies were conducted indifferent countries all over the world or in various cities in Vietnam, not in Ha Noisecondary schools like this study Therefore, the author decided to conduct this research tomake up for those gaps

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter describes the methodology and procedures that the researcher used toconduct this study The following parts are shown in this research: research design,research setting, participants, sampling strategies, data collection techniques, and dataanalysis procedures

Research overview restated

This research aims to explore the 9th graders’ attitudes towards online English learningcourses preparing for the entrance exam into foreign language specialized High Schools inHanoi The study has attempted to answer the research question as follows:

- What are the 9th graders’ attitudes towards online English learning in terms of theircognitive, behavioral, and emotional aspects?

1 Research design

This study used a mixed-method approach that involves a quantitative survey andqualitative interviews to explore students’ attitudes towards online English learning.According to Creswell (2009), mixed-method research employs the combination ofquantitative and qualitative approaches, and has gained popularity This popularity isbecause research methodology continues to evolve and develop, and mixed-method isanother step forward, utilizing the strengths of both qualitative and quantitative research.The quantitative method is used to emphasize objective measurements and the statistical,mathematical, or numerical analysis of data collected through questionnaires or bymanipulating pre-existing statistical data using computational techniques The qualitativemethod is used to answer questions about why and how people behave in the way that they

do It provides in-depth information about human behavior through in-depth interviewswith students

Mix-method was chosen to conduct this study because the researcher could utilizeboth the strength of quantitative and qualitative methods The quantitative method wasused for collecting and analyzing 9th graders’ attitudes towards online English learningcorrectly and effectively throughout the questionnaires which will help the researchergather the participants’ opinions perfectly due to its ability to cover all those differentstandard items To get deep understanding of the answers that would be gathered in thequantitative method, the qualitative was applied in the study by interviewing theparticipants The mix-method was perfectly appropriate to this study, as the participants ofthis study were 9 graders who are young and may not think carefully and exactly whenthey answer the items in the questionnaire Therefore, the interview would be the best

choice to help the author make their answer in the questionnaire clearer which would bemeaningful to answer the research question.

According to Cohen et al., ( 2013) the strong point of surveys lies in the fact that ithelps researchers save time and energy as researchers can collect data on a one-shot basis;surveys yield reliable descriptive, inferential and explanatory information based on large-scale data gathering, and the implementation of various kinds of the instrument; the surpluspoint of the survey includes its appeal to generalizability and universality, its ability tomake statements which are supported by large data banks and its ability to establish thedegree of confidence which can be placed in a set of findings However, there are alsodrawbacks to using the surveys such as their power to catch local, institutional or smallscale factors and variables to illustrate the specificity of a situation, its uniqueness andparticular complexity, its interpersonal dynamics, and to provide an explanation ofsituations, then survey approach is probably not a good choice (Cohen et al., 2013)

An interview is one of the most popular methods in qualitative data collection;therefore, it is chosen as the central approach in this research An interview is “aconversation, usually between two people”, the aim of using it is to help the researcher toacquire a response for a specific purpose Gillham (2000) According to Cresswell (2007)the researcher often carried out a the face-to-face interview with participants and face-to-face interview was employed in this study due to its flexibility, higher response rate andthe presence of visual or nonverbal cues

The researcher took into consideration on the following aspects that influence thedesign of procedures for a mixed method study: Timing, weighting, mixing and theorizing

Sequential Explanatory Design

According to Creswell et al (2009)

Quantitative Quantitative Qualitative Qualitative Interpretation ofData collection Data analysis Data collection Data analysis Entire analysis

Sequential explanatory strategy

The researcher used sequential explanatory strategy based on sequentialexplanatory design According to this strategy, researchers collected and analyzed thequantitative data in the first phase and the qualitative data was built on the result of theinitial quantitative results This model allowed the author to get the data and analyze them

researcher employed a questionnaire which was adapted from Erarslan and Topkaya (2017)

to collect and analyze the quantitative (numeric) data on students’ attitudes towards onlineEnglish learning courses After being analyzed and interpreted, the findings of the firstphase would be used to help refocus and designate the interview questions of phase two.Hence, the second stage consisted of qualitative (text) data collection and analysis, whichhelps to provide a deeper understanding of the current problems The findings of twophases would be later integrated for interpreting the findings of the entire study

2 Research setting and participants

2.1 Research setting

This study was conducted in Hanoi, Viet Nam and students came from differentsecondary schools in this city Hanoi is a big and crowded city in the Northern part ofVietnam which is the center of economy, political and entertainment in our country Thedemand for learning English in big cities like Hanoi is the first priority Parents are willing

to prepare the needy requirements of the subjects for their kids because they have beenaware of the importance of studying in general and learning English in particular.Especially, Hanoi city has many specialized High Schools which contained gifted Englishclasses such as Foreign Language Specialized High School, Amsterdam High School, ChuVan An High School, High School for Gifted Students, HNUE…and so on, the majority ofstudents who have been in love with English want to enroll in those schools and thatwould be the big challenges for them because the entrance exam test into those SpecializedHigh Schools requires students to own the deep understanding of English grammars andvocabularies

The students who would like to enroll in foreign language specialized High Schoolneed to pass the entrance exam including Math, Literature and English tests The Englishtest requires a wide range of knowledge of English grammar, vocabulary and writing skill.Normally, the knowledge which students achieve when taking their official schools class isnot enough for them to pass the test Then, they must take extra English classes to improvetheir learning result To meet the students’ demand, many extra English classes have beenopened and most of them are prone to choosing one to prepare for their upcoming exam.The extra English classes are often active after school hours and the writer is also one ofthose who run these classes

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the extra English course employed all the physicalteaching and learning Students were accustomed to moving to the extra classes afterschool Each lesson lasts 2 hours and the materials used in the course are mostly grammar,vocabulary and writing exercises collected from different prestigious sources by teachers

The course takes students 10 months from September to June and there are two periodsevery week throughout those 10 months except national holidays However, the Covid-19changed the situation, all offline activities transformed into online ones Educationenvironment is viewed through some apps like Google Meet, Zoom Cloud Meeting,Microsoft Teams, Google Classroom and so on The writer chose Zoom Cloud Meeting to

be the app used in the online English course

2.2 Participants

The researcher conducted the study on 50 students of grade 9 who came fromdifferent secondary schools in Ha Noi such as Nam Tu Liem, Luong The Vinh, DoanThi Diem, VinSchool, Marie Curie Secondary Schools and some others All of theirfamilies settled in Ha Noi There were 25 male and 25 female students but all of themhad the same goal: taking an extra English class to prepare for the high school entranceexam into foreign language class in Specialized High Schools in Ha Noi At the time thelearners were chosen to be participants in the study, they started the first semester ofgrade 9 and they were going to take the entrance exam after finishing the second one.That means the English extra class was opened for 10 months and every weeks had twoperiods lasting 120 minutes for each All of the participants took the online coursewhich was designed by the researcher The materials of the course were specificallyprepared for the entrance test into foreign language specialized high schools Therefore,most of exercises were related to grammar and vocabulary aspects

3 Data collection

3.1 Sampling strategies

According to Lussier (2011) a sample is a selection of participants that is used todescribe and make inferences about population Lussier mentioned that “ Random samplesuse controlled procedure, assuring that each population participant is given a knownprobability of selection Nonrandom samples use subjective procedures without a knownprobability of selection Keeping it basic, with simple random samples all members of thepopulation have an equal chance of being selected, but with nonrandom samples somemembers of the population have a greater chance of being selected and others, no chance”(p.124)

Random sampling owns the freedom from bias but time-consuming and costlyenergy are its drawbacks for a given level of sampling error Brown (1947) This kind of

wider participants On the other hand, nonrandom sampling is chosen for small-scalestudies, researchers with limited sources as it is easy to conduct

This study reported in this thesis employed convenience sampling The researcher

is supposed to concentrate on those participants with the same opinion to have the neededinformation and be willing to share it The researcher chose the students of the class whichthe researcher was in charge of teaching them the English course preparing for the entranceexam into foreign language specialized High School to be the population in this study Thisextra class included 50 students who came from Nam Tu Liem, Luong The Vinh, Doan ThiDiem, VinSchool, Marie Curie Secondary Schools and some others in Hanoi Accordingly,all of the students in this class joined the first phase of this study The result acquired fromthem represented the students who took the online extra English class to prepare for theupcoming exam into gifted schools The researcher delivered the link of the survey ingoogle form to all participants through the Zalo’s group in the first phase In the nextphase, the researcher invited 5 participants who were willing to take part in a 20 minuteinterview

3.2 Data collection instrument

3.2.1 Questionnaires

3.2.1.1 Rationale

According to Wilson and McLean (1994 cited in Cohen et al., 2007, p.317), thequestionnaire is a widely used and useful instrument for collecting survey information,providing structured, often numerical data, being able to be administered without thepresence of the researcher, and often being comparatively straightforward to analyze So toanalyze the attitudes of the respondents, the questionnaire had high potential to reach theobjectives of the study because it brought participants different appropriate choices withthe hope of answering the research question “What are student’s attitudes towards the use

of online English learning they are exposed to?

3.2.1.2 Adapting the questionnaire items

The researcher adapted the questionnaire of the study “EFL students’ attitudestowards e-learning and effect of an online course on students’ success in English”conducted by Erarslan and Topkaya (2017) because they also investigated students’attitudes towards e-learning and online course which related to their success in English.The researcher based on the constructs of attitudes included cognition, behavior and

motivation to find out grade 9 students’ attitude in online English learning to prepare for

the entrance exam into foreign language class of Specialized High Schools in Ha Noi Theresearcher also adapted the questionnaire of the study “A study on the relationship betweenstudents’ reading attitudes and their reading comprehension performance” conducted byLinh (2020) This research had the same characteristics as the researcher’s study such as:it’s research aim was to determine the students’ attitudes towards learning English and theparticipants of the research were Vietnamese students; Therefore, adapting thequestionnaire of this study utilized the special features of the participants like their learningand living conditions

In Erarslan and Topkaya’s study, they designed 22 questions with 5 Likert scalesand the researcher adapted them into 20 questions also with 5 Likert scales In NguyenThuy Linh’s study, the questionnaire was designed with 9 questions with 5 Likert scalesand focused on students’ reading attitudes, so the researcher adapted them into 3 questionswhich were changed to agree with the aim of this study The questions adapted from boththese two research were mostly concentrated on two elements of attitudes: cognition andbehavior, so 7 questions designed by the researcher based on the motivation factors wereadded to the questionnaire

All these 30 questions in the questionnaire were also designed to checkparticipants’ opinion according to 5 Likert scale (see Appendix 1): “Strongly agree = 1”,

“Agree = 2”, “Neutral = 3”, “Disagree = 4”, “Strongly disagree = 5” with the followingfunctions:

The first question group (from 1 to 9) was drawn in order to assess the participants’cognition towards online English learning courses Based on the result of these 9 questions,the students expressed their point of view whether online English learning courses wereuseful or not

The second group (from question 10 to 16) were set with the aim of finding outhow students feel about online English learning courses and whether it interests them ornot

The last group (from question 17 to 30) aimed to investigate students’ behaviortowards online English learning courses, so the researcher could explore the difficultieswhich students met in the online learning process

3.2.1.3 Piloting the questionnaire

This stage consisted of three steps: Getting feedback from experts, colleagues, andfive students

● Step 1: Getting feedback from supervisor

For the purpose of obtaining feedback from the supervisor, the researcher andsupervisor were holding a face-to-face discussion We read through every questions whichhelped the researcher improve the questionnaire considerably

Firstly, the validity of each item was taken up and adjusted carefully The structure

of attitudes like cognition, emotion and behavior was reflected in the questionnaire Then,the researcher was consulted to make the meaning of the questions clearer In the first draft

of the questionnaire, the questions were quite ambiguous and described in complicatedwords However, the supervisor pointed out these mistakes and helped the researchercorrect them Also, some irrelevant items were suggested to remove, for example, the item

“I have difficulty in listening activities in the online course” which should not be existed inthe questionnaire because these kinds of activity was not included in the mentioned course

● Step 2: Getting feedback from two native English-speaking teachers and two

Vietnamese teachers of English

After finishing the first step with the supervisor’s comments, the questions wererefined by two native English-speaking teachers who have been teaching English toVietnamese students both online and offline After that, the researcher asked one of twoVietnamese teachers of English to translate the questionnaire into Vietnamese, then givethe Vietnamese version to the other teacher to translate into English These activities wouldhelp to validate the instrument and affirm that it was appropriate for its use aim in thisresearch

● Step 3: Getting feedback from Vietnamese students who were intended

participants of this research

To make sure that all of the items in the questionnaire could be understood byparticipants, the researcher chose randomly five students who were taking part in theonline English learning course to complete it and provide comments on both the Englishand Vietnamese versions After finishing those missions, students said that all of the items

in the questionnaire were easily understandable and they did not encounter any trouble inreading and answering them

The last step involved incorporating all of the comments and suggestions into thefinal version of the questionnaire The English version was added into google form andthen distributed to 10 students who were attending the online course to check its reliability;that is, to check the correlation between each items on a scale with the other items and withthe total scale score Cronbach alpha ( ) which is the most commonly used to measure of

internal consistency reliability in questionnaire research was applied The reliability of thequestionnaire was 0.82 which was an acceptable degree of internal consistency reliability

3.2.1.4 Procedure for collecting the actual questionnaire

The questionnaire was administered by google form and without the presence of theresearcher According to Cohen and et al (2007), the absence of the researcher is helpful inthat it enables respondents to complete the questionnaire in private, to devote as much time

as they wish to its completion, to be in familiar surroundings, and to avoid the potentialthreat or pressure to participate caused by the researcher’s presence Before distributing thequestionnaire, the researcher made sure to check that the participants understood theresearch and how they had to complete the questionnaire After that, 50 participantsreached the link sent by email to access the questionnaire on the google form, then it tookthem about 15 minutes to complete it and send it back to the researcher

3.2.2 Interview

3.2.2.1 Rationale

The study employed interviews as another source of data According to Creswell(2009), in qualitative interviews, the researcher conducts face-to-face interviewsparticipants by telephone, or engages in focus group interviews, with six to eightinterviewees in each group which allow the participant to express and justify their ownpoint of view

According to Cohen and el al, (2007): As a distinctive research technique, theinterview may serve three purposes: Firstly, it may be used as the principal means ofgathering information having direct bearing on the research Secondly, it may be used totest hypotheses or to suggest new ones or as an explanatory device to help identifyvariables and relationships Thirdly, the interview may be used in conjunction with othermethods in a research undertaking The researcher conducted the individual interview with

20 participants to be used in conjunction with quantitative methods in this studyundertaking

There are four main kinds of interviews: the structured interview, the unstructuredinterview, the non-directive interview and focused interview (Cohen and et al, 2007) Thisstudy involved unstructured interview and generally open-ended questions which is anopen situation, having greater freedom The researcher used this instrument to get a deeperunderstanding of the quantitative data in the first phase The participants were interviewed

by the researcher and the interview questions were designed after finishing the survey of

of online English learning was both positive and negative For example, many studentsappreciated the flexibility of online courses and the materials used in the course, but themajority of them did not think that the online work was more easily understandable thanlearning face-to-face Secondly, the learners’ emotion towards online English learning wasnot really positive somehow For instance, many students did not think that online learningactivities were more interesting than offline ones Thirdly, the learner’s behaviors of theonline course were both positive and negative but there are some items needed moreexplanation such as: many students feel nervous when they cannot talk to their teacherdirectly when coming across difficult exercises, the number of students who did not showtheir opinion clearly about the confidence achieved from the course was quite high.Therefore, the researcher decided to design 10 interview questions based on questionnairefindings When designing the questions, the researcher discussed with the supervisor andgot comments in terms of content, question types and wording in order to devise questionsthat were open-ended, focused, and moved from the general to the specific After theinterview questions had been built and adjusted by the supervisor, they were sent to twonative English-speaking teachers who were asked to check the wording Also Vietnameseinterview questions version which was translated by the researcher were sent to twoteachers of English who translated it into English Then, the researcher compared it withthe original one to make sure the interview questions were understandable The interviewconsisted of 10 questions that focused on explaining the students’ answers to thequestionnaire.

3.2.2.2.2 Piloting interview questions

Before the actual interview, the questions were piloted with a student whoanswered the questionnaire before The purpose was to check the phrasing, sequence ofquestions, procedure, and to identify any problems During the pilot interview theconfusing questions were noted down by the researcher to adjust with the aim of eliciting

the students’ answers Then, the wording of the questions was changed to beunderstandable easily The final version was drawn after this pilot procedure

3.2.2.2.3 Conducting the interview

5 students who answered the questionnaire were willing to participate in the to-face unstructured interviews All of the interviews were conducted at the end of June

face-2021 and the length of the interviews lasted 20 minutes The participants had the right tochoose the specific language to use during the interviews and all of them used Vietnamese

In the interview process, the researcher did not show the personal bias completely to makesure of the objectiveness of the interview The participants felt free to voice their opinions

in a friendly atmosphere The interviews were recorded for later analysis

4 Data analysis techniques

4.1 Quantitative data analysis techniques

Descriptive statistics including percentage, mean score and SD were used to analyze thedata collected from the questionnaire because it is used to describe the basic features of thedata in a study They provide simple summaries of the sample and the measures and letlarge amounts of data be simplified sensibly; Therefore, this technique helped theresearcher summarize the data and found patterns easily Especially, this study wasespecially limited to the sample and did not need to be generalized to a larger population,

so descriptive statistics were most helpful in this case

Data from the questionnaire were collected, then entered item-by-item for eachparticipant into the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS) 20 for analysis.Cronbach’s alpha which is the most likely reported internal consistency reliability measurewas used The Cronbach’s alpha results are presented in Table 1

Table 1: Reliability of the questionnaire

level did not change significantly when any items were deleted, so that all of the items inthe data scale of listening strategies were consistent or well correlated

4.2 Qualitative data analysis

Content analysis was used to analyze the responses from the interview because thistechnique is often used to analyze documented information in the form of text, media, oreven physical items The researcher recorded the interview and transferred the result intothe written text which would be appropriate for using this analysis techniques

According to Creswell (2007), the process of data analysis involves (1) preparingthe data for analysis, (2) conducting different analyses, (3) moving deeper and deeper intounderstanding the data, (4) describing the data, (5) representing the data, and (6) making aninterpretation of the larger meaning of the data

5 Ethical considerations

The process of data collection, analysis, and interpretation was underpinned byethical implications Anonymity and confidentiality were strictly followed during theprocess Before attending the research, the participants were informed about the purpose,process and methods of the research They also were aware of the voluntariness of theirparticipation and contribution The potential participants had been provided a copy of theparticipant information sheets and consent forms which were signed only when conditions

of the study were completely understood and agreed to In order to protect students’identities and confidentiality, the data were stored in a private place after collection.Moreover, when coding and presenting the data, pseudonyms were used for allparticipants

Chapter summary

This chapter has conveyed detailed information about how the study was carried out In thefirst part, information on the research methodology was provided The research design wasfocused on in the second part, which described the research setting, participants who joined

in each phase of the study based on the selection of sampling strategy The data collectionand data analysis were carefully explained and described in the next parts of this chapter.Finally the ethical considerations were illustrated as the final part of this chapter Thefindings of this study will be presented in the next chapter

CHAPTER IV: FINDING AND DISCUSSION

This chapter presents the main findings of the research, focusing on the finding outstudents’ attitude towards learning English online; Therefore, the results of questionnaireand interview which cover the aspects of attitudes such as cognition, behavior and emotionare shown in this chapter The research question is “What are student’s attitudes towardsonline English learning in terms of their cognitive, behavioral, emotional aspects?”

1 The findings of the research

1.1 Quantitative findings

This section presents the findings collected from the questionnaire with threemain aspects of attitudes towards online English learning: cognition, behavior andemotion

1.1.1 Students’ cognition of learning English online.

All the questions were designed to investigate the participants’ cognition towardsonline English learning with five 5 Likert scales: Strongly agree (1), agree (2), neutral (3),disagree (4) and strongly disagree (5) The Cronbach’s α of these questions was 0.813,which means that the reliability of this item is high The mean score and SD of thestudents’ answers are shown in the following table

Table 2 Descriptive statistics of the mean score and SD for cognition category

(N=50)

No Item Mean score SD

1 Q1 I know that spending a certain amount of time in online

course is important for my upcoming exam

2 Q2 I do as much as I set out to do in online courses to focus

on the target all the time

3 Q3 I did achieve my targets in an online English learning

course step by step

4 Q4 I realize that my desire for coming to gifted school is

higher when taking this course

5 Q5 I suppose that the work dealing with the online course is

more easily understandable than learning face-to-face

6 Q6 I think online English learning courses are more

productive than school hours for me

7 Q7 I know clearly that the flexibility of online course

reduces my pressure on the time management

8 Q8 I know how to use online English learning apps which

the teacher instructs me to use

9 Q9 I see that materials in online English learning courses are

appropriate to my level

The table 2 presents the mean score and SD of the 5 Likert scale of the participants’answer which included 9 first questions about the cognition category towards onlineEnglish learning course Overall, the learners have positive cognition about their currentonline course All the mean scores of the answers are smaller than 3 and the percent of theparticipants who chose “agree” in each question are almost the highest percent that indicatethe high online English course’s effects on the learners’ cognition The SD fluctuates from0.38 to 1.28 which means that the learners’ cognition of online learning is not differentfrom each other much

When being asked about whether spending a certain amount of time in an onlinecourse is important, there was a small percentage of “strongly agree” opinions and “agree”opinions increased slightly Nonetheless, the percent of “neutral” and “strongly disagree”dropped dramatically No one disagreed with the statement “I know that spending a certainamount of time in an online course is important for my upcoming exam” The mean score

of this item was 2.2 and the SD was 1.10 It also pointed out that there were more learnerswho were willing to spend their time in the online course than those who would not

Considering the statement “I do as much as set out to do in an online course tofocus on the target all the time”, the number of “strongly agree” opinions and “agree”opinions reached the top On the other hand, the number of “neutral” opinions and

“disagree” opinions went down significantly None of the participants strongly disagreedwith the statement The SD of this item was 0.83 and the mean score was 2.14 showingthat the vast majority of students had a positive idea about this item There were morelearners who tried their best to reach the target in the online English course than those whodid not

With regard to the statement “I did achieve my targets in an online English learningcourse step by step”, there was a noticeable surge in its statistics The number ofparticipants choosing “agree” opinion was extremely high There were only some of theparticipants who did not voice their opinion clearly about this problem, they chose a

“neutral” opinion In particular, there was no “disagree” and “strongly disagree” opinion inthe questionnaire result One remarkable point was that the SD of this item was just 0.38and the mean score of it was 2.18 That means the vast majority of the learners achievedtheir targets in their current online course in specific stages

Looking at desire for coming to gifted school is higher when taking this course,although nobody chose “disagree” and “strongly disagree” opinion, there was a hugenumber of participant choosing “neutral” opinion that means many students did not showtheir point of view clearly about the statement “I realize that my desire for coming to giftedschool is higher when taking this course” The number of “strongly agree” and “agree”opinions declined slightly Nevertheless, the mean score of 2.2 and the SD 0.83 reported intable 2 showed the learners’ positive point of view about this problem.

Collecting data of the participants’ answers about the work dealing with in theonline course are more easily understandable than learning face-to-face, the percent of

“agree” opinion reached the peak and the number of “strongly agree” opinion fellsignificantly There were not many students choosing “disagree” opinion and no onestrongly disagreed with this statement However, the mean score of 2.52 and the SD of1.05 show the slight difference in the participant’s opinion, even though the percentage of

“agree” opinion was higher than “disagree” opinion That is, the researcher posed thequestion “why did many participants not think that the online work is more easilyunderstandable than the offline one?”

Another factor to consider is productivity of the online course There was a smallpercent of the participants who strongly agreed that the online course was more productivethan school hours to them, and on top of that the number of “agree” opinions hit thehighest point It means that almost all the learners saw the big effectiveness of the onlineEnglish learning course compared with those of face-to-face class On the contrary, thenumber of “disagree” and “strongly disagree” opinions decreased substantially while, themean score of 2.52 and the SD of 1.28 led the researcher to question the difference of theparticipants’ answer

The point worth noting is the flexibility of the online course, the percent of thelearners who strongly agreed and agreed that the flexibility of the online course helpedthem reduce stress on their time management reached the top That made the researcherimpressed by this strong point of the online course The number of “disagree” opinionsreduced dramatically and even there was no one strongly disagreeing with this statement.Moreover, the mean score of 1.52 and the SD of 0.97 also prove that the flexibility of theonline class was of interest to almost all learners