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 NỘIKHOA 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 ENGLISHLEARNING TO PREPARE FOR HIGH SCHOOLS EXAM

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAININGHANOI 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 ENGLISHLEARNING 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

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 family-in-law 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

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 27 1.1.2 Students’ emotion of learning English online 31 1.1.3 Students’ behavior of learning English online 34

1.2.1 Students’ cognition of learning English online 38 1.2.2 Students’ emotion of learning English online 41 1.2.3 Students’ behavior of learning English online 42

3.1 The students’ cognition of the online English learning course 44 3.2 The students’ emotion of the online English learning course 45 3.3 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

Online learning is an international technology call and to respond to this tendency, this thesis aims at investigating students’ attitudes towards online English learning to prepare for the entrance exam into Gifted High schools The participants were 50 9th graders who came from different secondary schools in Ha Noi, all of whom would like to enroll in foreign language specialized high schools The research methodology was mix methods 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 positive attitudes towards the online English learning course preparing for the entrance exam into foreign language specialized high schools The learners reported various benefits of online courses; however, they were not interested in online activities such as working in pairs or groups, so they had a tendency to distract from the lessons In addition, the learners felt nervous 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 take the online English learning course because of its benefits Also the learners should be more active in taking part in online activities and teachers should create more online space for students to make questions and answer all of them carefully.

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

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION1 Background to the research

The development of technology is increasing and it has brought a bright future for multiple sectors in our life It supports people in the way of owning the knowledge and turning them into an asset Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) entered society 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 growing globalized 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 support learners to study more effectively Therefore, ICT has the ability to improve and transform Education 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 better due to the use of ICT in pedagogies ICT has also played an important role of improving discipline in the classroom, as students have been engrossed in interactive learning and they have not had time for disruption (Anila, 2017) ICT has also enabled teachers to transform the approach in which they use to teach and it is also meaningful to support environments 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 of ICTs in language teaching has countless benefits The development in the use of ICT, like language lab, videos, satellite broadcast, videoconferencing and web seminars has supported 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 various classroom modules For example, PowerPoint is being considered as one of the most popular current teaching tools in every corners of schools, teachers are prone to change written syllabus into online ones Students are allowed to submit their assignments throughout some online apps which are used by their teachers

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

2 Research context

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

Schools are forced to apply e-learning to respond to the changes in learning systems 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 sure that the learning of students was not interrupted In Bulgaria, in early April 2020, the Ministry of Education and Science launched an e-learning system

Vietnam fell into the same situation as other countries, so ICT based Education has been 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 language specialized high schools are not an exception They are going to cope with an important exam which is going to create the turning-point of their life This exam is a big challenge for them, but the students could not have offline-classes to prepare for their upcoming test because of the Covid-19 Therefore, online learning has been their best choice in this urgent situation.

Those who would like to enter gifted foreign language high schools need to master English language in both grammar and language practicing skills as well In addition, the challenge of tests in those schools is quite high because students have to handle an English test including 80 difficult questions about grammar, vocabulary and a 250-word essay The advanced 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, because the learners could protect themselves and others from COVID-19 by sitting at home to study and approach numerous online learning apps that help learners and teachers have interactive 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 towards online learning to prepare for high school exams.

This study aims to investigate grade 9 students’ attitude towards online learning English 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 emotion towards online English courses The study will help the 9th graders who have a desire for enrolling in foreign language specialized high schools and the teachers who have been teaching English for these students to improve the effectiveness of their online English courses

3 Research aim

The use of ICT in teaching and learning is constantly increasing and the spread of COVID-19 also speeds up dramatically Not to interrupt students’ learning, online learning has 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 practical experience, the writer’s investigation into these issues is crucial to generate reliable answers leading to the effectiveness in online teaching and learning courses regarding this field 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 and learning better The learners, especially those who would like to enter foreign language specialized High Schools, could use online English learning apps to save their time and have an active learning environment Most of them and these gifted schools are located in big cities and the learners could afford their own private computer or smartphone to support their learning Moreover, the COVID-19 did not allow teachers and students to present 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 all around the country were also integrated with ICT in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic The researcher became very passionate about how online learning English would improve the teaching and learning’s results

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

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

6 Research organization

The study consists of five main chapters: CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

In this chapter, the writer introduces the study including the background to the research, research context, the research aims of the study The research questions and the research significance are also discussed in this chapter together with the methods of the study Finally, thesis organization is introduced.

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

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

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Chapter Three describes the methodology employed in this study including research design, research setting and participants After that, the data collection (sampling strategies, data collecting instruments, data collection procedures) and data analysis techniques 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 Through summary of main findings and the discussion of them in details, the research question is answered.

CHAPTER V: RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION

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

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 of Psychology and Education, Language Learning According to Montano and Kasprzyk (2008, p.71): “Attitude is determined by the individual’s beliefs about outcomes or attributes of performing the behaviors (behavioral beliefs), weighted by evaluations of those outcomes or attributes Thus, a person who holds strong beliefs that positively valued outcomes will result from performing the behaviors will have positive attitudes towards the behaviors Conversely, a person who holds strong beliefs that negatively valued outcomes 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 and beliefs and promotes or discourages the choices made in all realms of activity, whether academic or informal.

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

In this study, the researcher uses Weden’s definition of attitude to conduct the research and explore the learners’ attitudes towards online English learning based on three components: cognitive, affective and behavioral which were mentioned in Weden’s definition In Weden’s definition, three aspects of attitude provide the educators an idea of how one’s attitudes towards something is built up and set up a clear foundation for educators 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 the emotional, 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 to any 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 three theoretical 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 particular circumstances 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 positive behaviors toward courses of study, with participants absorbing themselves in courses and striving 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 themselves emotionally.”

Attitudes were assumed to be causally linked to behavior, as they were “always seen as precursors of behavior, as determinants of how a person will actually behave in his daily 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 a general attitudes’ measures For example, attitudes towards foreign languages, attitudes towards French and attitudes towards speaking French in the classroom have different levels 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 his willingness to engage in various behaviors with respect to or in the presence of a given person or object The subject indicates his willingness to perform the behavior(s) on scales such as: “would-would not,” “willing-unwilling,” “intend-not intend,” “will try-will not try,” 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 that they 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 connection with the subject or not.

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

Cognitive aspect is the subject’s perception that an object or person has certain characteristics, qualities, or attributes, or is related to some other concept, object, or person 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 other outcomes (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1972).

The cognitive attitude is characterized by the beliefs an individual has about a social 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 various emotional activities in it and varied fruits of emotions are yielded.” It means that this aspect makes the learners reveal whether they enjoy or hate the objects or surrounding situations

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

Summers (1977) emphasizes the key role of evaluative beliefs within the cognitive component 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 is desirable 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, e-learning, online learning and web-based learning are terms interchangeably used These terms are synonyms due to their multiple commonalities referring to the way the instruction is carried out In this kind of instruction, two agents are involved (a learner and an instructor), it occurs at different times and/or places, and it uses multiple instructional materials.

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

Similarly, different authors defined online learning as “access to learning experiences 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 that online learning materials must be designed properly, with the learners and learning in focus, 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) It means that technological tools characterized this modality of instruction Meanwhile Tavangarian, 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 also evidence of the transformation of the individuals following constructing knowledge

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

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

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

A series of benefits and drawbacks regarding web-based distance education was found by King (2002) and Hannay and Newvine (2006) and they affirm that the main reason that people choose these courses is the personal convenience they offer and that participation 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 and whether 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 in the world These studies revolve around students’ perception, awareness, attitudes towards online learning.

Firstly, Admed (1989) conducted the study “The role of attitudes and motivation in teaching and learning foreign languages: A theoretical and empirical investigation into the teaching and learning of English in IRQI preparatory schools” In this study, the researcher pointed out that attitudes and motivation have been accounted for as crucial determinative factors 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 Information Communication Technology (ICT) is reshaping the form and mode of delivery of Higher Education worldwide Some of the main challenges in Education are access issues, and costs ICT is the key to solve those challenges and their study aims to investigate what determines university students’ acceptance of e-learning by applying the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) The research was conducted at a Swedish University among business students The results demonstrate that Perceived Usefulness is the main determinant of a student’s acceptance of e-learning

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

One more study, Farahat (2012) conducted the study “Applying Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to online learning in the Egyptian Universities” to identify the determinants that can shape students’ intention to use online learning based on the TAM model The results reveal that students’ perception of ease of use, usefulness, attitudes towards online learning, and the social influence of the student’s referent group was identified as significant determinants of students’ intention to practice online learning The possibility of using the social influence of students’ referent group, students’ perceived ease of use, students’ perceived ease of use, students’ perceived usefulness and their attitudes towards online learning to predict their behavioral intention to use online learning was also confirmed

Beside, Baclay and Bryson (2012) presents preliminary work on the perception of students 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 Higher Education in Jamaica: An extension of TAM” This investigation has shown that while this University has not officially launched its e-learning systems it has been available for over five years where instructors across faculties have implemented their classroom with varying 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 Higher Education” to include social, institutional and individual factors in the general structural module to empirically investigate and study whether students are willing to adopt and use e-learning systems The findings have shown that perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, social norms, quality of work life, computer self-efficacy and facilitating conditions are all having a significant positive influence on the adoption and usage of the Blackboard 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 of Saudi Arabian high school students towards the use of computer technologies in learning English The result of this study revealed gender differences in attitudes towards the use of computer technologies in learning English Female students showed higher and more positive attitudes towards the use of computer technologies in learning English than males Both male and female participants demonstrated high and positive perception of usefulness and perceived ease of use of computer technologies in learning English

In addition, Hamid and his partners (2015) studied the research “Understanding students’ perceptions of the benefits of online social networking use for teaching and learning” The aim of this research is to concentrate on students’ experiences with using Online 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 in the online discussion environment” focused on investigating asynchronous online discussion efficacy in the learning process The study proved that e-learning technologies enable new unique opportunities for students Online courses offer engaging and highly

motivating activities that positively affect students’ performance and promote their progress 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 Secondary students of Pabna, Bagladesh” The aim of this study is to examine higher secondary level students’ attitudes and perceptions towards their technology skill, usage patterns, perceived benefits of and challenges to using technology in learning English The findings indicate that technology tools like computer software, social networking websites, online videos, mp3 podcasts, smartphone and tablet apps have positive impacts and can be very much effective in improving students’ language skills.

Moreover, Nwana, Egbe and Ugwuda (2017) studied the research “Awareness and usage of e-learning materials among students of National Open University of Nigeria” The result points out that the students are aware of the majority of the e-learning materials The students 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 the aim of having an insight into the possible effect of online courses on students’ success in English In this study, 47 students were given a questionnaire to understand their attitudes towards online Education, and their online scores were analyzed in comparison to their midterm and quiz scores The researchers found that the students have partly positive attitudes towards online courses; However, online courses do not help students in terms of their 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 which would help in a newer learning experience on the campus The study shows that e-learning has its benefits from a student’s perspective and it will have a positive influence on their performance with better understanding of their courses Thus for at least the following few years, the university needs to come out with e-learning tools and modules for a better teaching-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 all from other countries, not Vietnam.

In Vietnam the Vietnamese context

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

Firstly, Nguyen Viet Ky and Nguyen Thi Cam Linh, (2013) mentioned in their study “Applying E-learning in teaching and the final year’s students’ learning of translation course, faculty of English Language Teacher Education-University of Languages & International Studies” that the development of technical science in general and university’s facilities in particular which encourage teachers and learners to use ICT in teaching 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 Teacher Education-University of Languages & International Studies The study comes to the conclusion that: From the teacher’s side, the use of ICT is spontaneous, not mentioned specifically in the learning schedules, does not contain unity among subjects From the student’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 to support on-class studying, not to the long term target of professional knowledge and skills development

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

Thirdly, Nguyen Thi Thang (2019) mentioned in her study called “Enhancing students’ engagement in learning English online” that the learner’s motivation is the key point to have successful online English learning course, so the teachers should create more supporting activities for their students and it would be the key for the success of online course The researcher emphasizes enhancing the interaction between the teachers and learners The support of teachers and students’ helps are indispensable which would make students more confident in various learning activities The design and preparation of the lectures as well as students’ references are the significant step to create the motivation for the learners If the teachers know how to utilize these above elements effectively, the teachers 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 “The sophomore’s attitudes towards English learning: A study at Thai Nguyen university of Information and Communication Technology.” The aim of this study is finding out the attitudes of non-professional English students towards English learning focusing on three factors 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 is performed well by students but their emotion and behavior in learning English are shown negatively Moreover, Their attitudes towards English teaching differ with various opinions

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

Moreover, Phan Thi Anh Dao and et al (2020) mentioned in the study “Student’s vision 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 the percentage of students who enjoy online learning is equal to those who are interested in face-to-face learning The ones who choose to study offline because this learning style includes many practical interactions, diverse learning activities, less distractions and a wonderful communication environment On the other hand, students who choose online learning 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 affecting students’ satisfaction on online English courses in Vietnam” The aim of this study is to define the elements affecting students’ satisfaction on English online courses in a Vietnamese university The finding showed that there are two main factor group affecting students: the first one is the groups related to science including effectiveness, rules of interaction between learners and the quality of Internet The other group related to learners including 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 the number of students who have used Facebook increased day by day; Therefore, the researcher wanted to know how they used this app to study English The participants include 32 students in the trial class and 32 students in the traditional class All of them take part in the Writing 3 course but they practice in different ways The only 10 students are chosen randomly to interview about their advantages and disadvantages when using Facebook to study English Finally, the results of the course are compared between two classes and shown that the students in the trial class got a higher result than the traditional one

In another study, Dang Hai Dang (2020) researched the study “The role of higher education institutions in developing E-learning to promote a learning society and lifelong learning in Vietnam” He emphasized that E-learning has just developed in two recent decades but this technology has been applied much in Training and Education Applying the latest scientific and technical advances in the field of Information Technology-Communication, E-learning can provide multimedia contents with high interaction and most 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 Learning appropriately, they are able to utilize the strength of both these teaching styles

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

These studies mentioned learner’s satisfaction and attitudes towards online learning and 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 into foreign language specialized High Schools

4 Gaps in the literature

Although there are a number of research studies related to the learners’ attitudes towards online English learning, the contexts of those studies were different from the context of this current study-the learners’ attitudes towards online English learning under the 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 In addition, those studies mostly focused on the learns’ attitudes towards online English learning in some skills like listening, speaking, reading or writing, they did not mention the participant as 9th graders who are going to take the entrance exam into foreign language specialized High Schools, these learners are supposed to deal with grammar and vocabulary online English courses Moreover, those previous studies were conducted in different countries all over the world or in various cities in Vietnam, not in Ha Noi secondary schools like this study Therefore, the author decided to conduct this research to make up for those gaps

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

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

Research overview restated

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

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

1 Research design

This study used a mixed-method approach that involves a quantitative survey and qualitative interviews to explore students’ attitudes towards online English learning According to Creswell (2009), mixed-method research employs the combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches, and has gained popularity This popularity is because research methodology continues to evolve and develop, and mixed-method is another 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 by manipulating pre-existing statistical data using computational techniques The qualitative method 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 interviews with students

Mix-method was chosen to conduct this study because the researcher could utilize both the strength of quantitative and qualitative methods The quantitative method was used for collecting and analyzing 9th graders’ attitudes towards online English learning correctly and effectively throughout the questionnaires which will help the researcher gather the participants’ opinions perfectly due to its ability to cover all those different standard items To get deep understanding of the answers that would be gathered in the quantitative method, the qualitative was applied in the study by interviewing the participants The mix-method was perfectly appropriate to this study, as the participants of this study were 9 graders who are young and may not think carefully and exactly when they 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 be meaningful to answer the research question.

According to Cohen et al., ( 2013) the strong point of surveys lies in the fact that it helps 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 surplus point of the survey includes its appeal to generalizability and universality, its ability to make statements which are supported by large data banks and its ability to establish the degree of confidence which can be placed in a set of findings However, there are also drawbacks to using the surveys such as their power to catch local, institutional or small scale factors and variables to illustrate the specificity of a situation, its uniqueness and particular complexity, its interpersonal dynamics, and to provide an explanation of situations, 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 “a conversation, usually between two people”, the aim of using it is to help the researcher to acquire a response for a specific purpose Gillham (2000) According to Cresswell (2007) the researcher often carried out a the face interview with participants and face-to-face interview was employed in this study due to its flexibility, higher response rate and the presence of visual or nonverbal cues

The researcher took into consideration on the following aspects that influence the design 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 of Data collection Data analysis Data collection Data analysis Entire analysis

Sequential explanatory strategy

The researcher used sequential explanatory strategy based on sequential explanatory design According to this strategy, researchers collected and analyzed the quantitative data in the first phase and the qualitative data was built on the result of the initial 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 online English learning courses After being analyzed and interpreted, the findings of the first phase 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, which helps to provide a deeper understanding of the current problems The findings of two phases would be later integrated for interpreting the findings of the entire study

2 Research setting and participants2.1 Research setting

This study was conducted in Hanoi, Viet Nam and students came from different secondary schools in this city Hanoi is a big and crowded city in the Northern part of Vietnam which is the center of economy, political and entertainment in our country The demand 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 been aware of the importance of studying in general and learning English in particular Especially, Hanoi city has many specialized High Schools which contained gifted English classes such as Foreign Language Specialized High School, Amsterdam High School, Chu Van An High School, High School for Gifted Students, HNUE…and so on, the majority of students who have been in love with English want to enroll in those schools and that would be the big challenges for them because the entrance exam test into those Specialized High Schools requires students to own the deep understanding of English grammars and vocabularies.

The students who would like to enroll in foreign language specialized High School need to pass the entrance exam including Math, Literature and English tests The English test 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 is not enough for them to pass the test Then, they must take extra English classes to improve their learning result To meet the students’ demand, many extra English classes have been opened 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 of those who run these classes

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the extra English course employed all the physical teaching and learning Students were accustomed to moving to the extra classes after school 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 periods every week throughout those 10 months except national holidays However, the Covid-19 changed the situation, all offline activities transformed into online ones Education environment 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 from different secondary schools in Ha Noi such as Nam Tu Liem, Luong The Vinh, Doan Thi Diem, VinSchool, Marie Curie Secondary Schools and some others All of their families settled in Ha Noi There were 25 male and 25 female students but all of them had the same goal: taking an extra English class to prepare for the high school entrance exam into foreign language class in Specialized High Schools in Ha Noi At the time the learners were chosen to be participants in the study, they started the first semester of grade 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 two periods lasting 120 minutes for each All of the participants took the online course which was designed by the researcher The materials of the course were specifically prepared for the entrance test into foreign language specialized high schools Therefore, most of exercises were related to grammar and vocabulary aspects

3 Data collection3.1 Sampling strategies

According to Lussier (2011) a sample is a selection of participants that is used to describe and make inferences about population Lussier mentioned that “ Random samples use controlled procedure, assuring that each population participant is given a known probability of selection Nonrandom samples use subjective procedures without a known probability of selection Keeping it basic, with simple random samples all members of the population have an equal chance of being selected, but with nonrandom samples some members 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 costly energy 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-scale studies, 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 needed information and be willing to share it The researcher chose the students of the class which the researcher was in charge of teaching them the English course preparing for the entrance exam into foreign language specialized High School to be the population in this study This extra class included 50 students who came from Nam Tu Liem, Luong The Vinh, Doan Thi Diem, 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 from them represented the students who took the online extra English class to prepare for the upcoming exam into gifted schools The researcher delivered the link of the survey in google form to all participants through the Zalo’s group in the first phase In the next phase, the researcher invited 5 participants who were willing to take part in a 20 minute interview

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), the questionnaire is a widely used and useful instrument for collecting survey information, providing structured, often numerical data, being able to be administered without the presence of the researcher, and often being comparatively straightforward to analyze So to analyze the attitudes of the respondents, the questionnaire had high potential to reach the objectives of the study because it brought participants different appropriate choices with the 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’ attitudes towards 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 The researcher also adapted the questionnaire of the study “A study on the relationship between students’ reading attitudes and their reading comprehension performance” conducted by Linh (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 the participants of the research were Vietnamese students; Therefore, adapting the questionnaire of this study utilized the special features of the participants like their learning and living conditions

In Erarslan and Topkaya’s study, they designed 22 questions with 5 Likert scales and the researcher adapted them into 20 questions also with 5 Likert scales In Nguyen Thuy Linh’s study, the questionnaire was designed with 9 questions with 5 Likert scales and focused on students’ reading attitudes, so the researcher adapted them into 3 questions which were changed to agree with the aim of this study The questions adapted from both these two research were mostly concentrated on two elements of attitudes: cognition and behavior, so 7 questions designed by the researcher based on the motivation factors were added to the questionnaire.

All these 30 questions in the questionnaire were also designed to check participants’ opinion according to 5 Likert scale (see Appendix 1): “Strongly agree = 1”, “Agree = 2”, “Neutral = 3”, “Disagree = 4”, “Strongly disagree = 5” with the following functions:

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 were useful or not.

The second group (from question 10 to 16) were set with the aim of finding out how students feel about online English learning courses and whether it interests them or not.

The last group (from question 17 to 30) aimed to investigate students’ behavior towards online English learning courses, so the researcher could explore the difficulties which 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, and five students

● Step 1: Getting feedback from supervisor

For the purpose of obtaining feedback from the supervisor, the researcher and supervisor were holding a face-to-face discussion We read through every questions which helped 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 complicated words However, the supervisor pointed out these mistakes and helped the researcher correct 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 in the 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 were refined by two native English-speaking teachers who have been teaching English to Vietnamese students both online and offline After that, the researcher asked one of two Vietnamese teachers of English to translate the questionnaire into Vietnamese, then give the Vietnamese version to the other teacher to translate into English These activities would help to validate the instrument and affirm that it was appropriate for its use aim in this research

● 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 by participants, the researcher chose randomly five students who were taking part in the online English learning course to complete it and provide comments on both the English and 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 in reading and answering them

The last step involved incorporating all of the comments and suggestions into the final version of the questionnaire The English version was added into google form and then 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 with the 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 the questionnaire 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 the researcher According to Cohen and et al (2007), the absence of the researcher is helpful in that 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 potential threat or pressure to participate caused by the researcher’s presence Before distributing the questionnaire, the researcher made sure to check that the participants understood the research and how they had to complete the questionnaire After that, 50 participants reached the link sent by email to access the questionnaire on the google form, then it took them 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 interviews participants by telephone, or engages in focus group interviews, with six to eight interviewees in each group which allow the participant to express and justify their own point of view

According to Cohen and el al, (2007): As a distinctive research technique, the interview may serve three purposes: Firstly, it may be used as the principal means of gathering information having direct bearing on the research Secondly, it may be used to test hypotheses or to suggest new ones or as an explanatory device to help identify variables and relationships Thirdly, the interview may be used in conjunction with other methods in a research undertaking The researcher conducted the individual interview with 20 participants to be used in conjunction with quantitative methods in this study undertaking

There are four main kinds of interviews: the structured interview, the unstructured interview, the non-directive interview and focused interview (Cohen and et al, 2007) This study involved unstructured interview and generally open-ended questions which is an open situation, having greater freedom The researcher used this instrument to get a deeper understanding 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

3.2.2.2 Procedure

Dornyei (2007) suggested that individual interviews include three steps: preparing for the interview, piloting the interview guide, and conducting the interview

3.2.2.2.1 Interview preparation

In light of the sequential explanatory mixed methods research methods, the interview was conducted in the second phase of the study with the purpose of explaining the questionnaire findings In more detail, after the questionnaire data was collected and analyzed, there were 3 outstanding questionnaire findings Firstly, the learner’s cognition of online English learning was both positive and negative For example, many students appreciated the flexibility of online courses and the materials used in the course, but the majority of them did not think that the online work was more easily understandable than learning face-to-face Secondly, the learners’ emotion towards online English learning was not really positive somehow For instance, many students did not think that online learning activities were more interesting than offline ones Thirdly, the learner’s behaviors of the online course were both positive and negative but there are some items needed more explanation such as: many students feel nervous when they cannot talk to their teacher directly when coming across difficult exercises, the number of students who did not show their opinion clearly about the confidence achieved from the course was quite high Therefore, the researcher decided to design 10 interview questions based on questionnaire findings When designing the questions, the researcher discussed with the supervisor and got comments in terms of content, question types and wording in order to devise questions that were open-ended, focused, and moved from the general to the specific After the interview questions had been built and adjusted by the supervisor, they were sent to two native English-speaking teachers who were asked to check the wording Also Vietnamese interview questions version which was translated by the researcher were sent to two teachers of English who translated it into English Then, the researcher compared it with the original one to make sure the interview questions were understandable The interview consisted of 10 questions that focused on explaining the students’ answers to the questionnaire.

3.2.2.2.2 Piloting interview questions

Before the actual interview, the questions were piloted with a student who answered the questionnaire before The purpose was to check the phrasing, sequence of questions, procedure, and to identify any problems During the pilot interview the confusing 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 be understandable 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 face-to-face unstructured interviews All of the interviews were conducted at the end of June 2021 and the length of the interviews lasted 20 minutes The participants had the right to choose 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 make sure 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 the data collected from the questionnaire because it is used to describe the basic features of the data in a study They provide simple summaries of the sample and the measures and let large amounts of data be simplified sensibly; Therefore, this technique helped the researcher summarize the data and found patterns easily Especially, this study was especially 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 each participant into the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS) 20 for analysis Cronbach’s alpha which is the most likely reported internal consistency reliability measure was used The Cronbach’s alpha results are presented in Table 1.

Table 1: Reliability of the questionnaire

Table 1 shows that reliability values of each category and the whole questionnaire were > 0.70, which means that the questionnaire had a high degree of internal consistency reliability An item analysis was also computed to examine the consistency of the correlation between items in the cognition, emotion and behavior groups The results revealed that all items in three categories correlated at values above 0.30 The overall alpha

level did not change significantly when any items were deleted, so that all of the items in the 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 this technique is often used to analyze documented information in the form of text, media, or even physical items The researcher recorded the interview and transferred the result into the written text which would be appropriate for using this analysis techniques.

According to Creswell (2007), the process of data analysis involves (1) preparing the data for analysis, (2) conducting different analyses, (3) moving deeper and deeper into understanding the data, (4) describing the data, (5) representing the data, and (6) making an interpretation of the larger meaning of the data

5 Ethical considerations

The process of data collection, analysis, and interpretation was underpinned by ethical implications Anonymity and confidentiality were strictly followed during the process 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 their participation and contribution The potential participants had been provided a copy of the participant 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 all participants

Chapter summary

This chapter has conveyed detailed information about how the study was carried out In the first part, information on the research methodology was provided The research design was focused 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 collection and 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 The findings 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 out students’ attitude towards learning English online; Therefore, the results of questionnaire and interview which cover the aspects of attitudes such as cognition, behavior and emotion are shown in this chapter The research question is “What are student’s attitudes towards online English learning in terms of their cognitive, behavioral, emotional aspects?”

1 The findings of the research1.1 Quantitative findings

This section presents the findings collected from the questionnaire with three main aspects of attitudes towards online English learning: cognition, behavior and emotion

1.1.1 Students’ cognition of learning English online.

All the questions were designed to investigate the participants’ cognition towards online 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 the students’ answers are shown in the following table.

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

(N=50).

NoItemMean scoreSD

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 online English learning course Overall, the learners have positive cognition about their current online course All the mean scores of the answers are smaller than 3 and the percent of the participants who chose “agree” in each question are almost the highest percent that indicate the high online English course’s effects on the learners’ cognition The SD fluctuates from 0.38 to 1.28 which means that the learners’ cognition of online learning is not different from each other much

When being asked about whether spending a certain amount of time in an online course 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 certain amount 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 learners who 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 to focus 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 disagreed with the statement The SD of this item was 0.83 and the mean score was 2.14 showing that the vast majority of students had a positive idea about this item There were more learners who tried their best to reach the target in the online English course than those who did not

With regard to the statement “I did achieve my targets in an online English learning course step by step”, there was a noticeable surge in its statistics The number of participants choosing “agree” opinion was extremely high There were only some of the participants 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 in the questionnaire result One remarkable point was that the SD of this item was just 0.38 and the mean score of it was 2.18 That means the vast majority of the learners achieved their 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 huge number of participant choosing “neutral” opinion that means many students did not show their point of view clearly about the statement “I realize that my desire for coming to gifted school 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 in table 2 showed the learners’ positive point of view about this problem.

Collecting data of the participants’ answers about the work dealing with in the online 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 fell significantly There were not many students choosing “disagree” opinion and no one strongly disagreed with this statement However, the mean score of 2.52 and the SD of 1.05 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 the question “why did many participants not think that the online work is more easily understandable than the offline one?”

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

The point worth noting is the flexibility of the online course, the percent of the learners who strongly agreed and agreed that the flexibility of the online course helped them reduce stress on their time management reached the top That made the researcher impressed by this strong point of the online course The number of “disagree” opinions reduced 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 the online class was of interest to almost all learners.