skkn cấp tỉnh using online platforms to assign homework to 11th grade students at lam son high school for the gifted

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationales for the study

In recent decades, English has been playing an increasingly important role inVietnam The importance of English stems from the fact that the vast number ofpeople in the world use it as the main language of communication The languageis also used in many fields of the society, such as international commerce andbusiness, science and technology Thus, people with good English proficiencyare at an advantage As a result, there has been a positive trend of teaching andlearning English in many educational institutions in Vietnam

Although doing homework is an integral part of every student ‘s learning, manystudents complain about the difficulties they face in completing their homework.It is mainly attributed to the fact that teachers are not good at guiding andmonitoring them how to finish their tasks at home Therefore, one of the majorresponsibilities of any teacher working with English language learners is toenable their students to fulfill their homework effectively, thereby improvingtheir English profiency

To assign and supervise students’ homework, there are a wide range of tools forteachers to employ Notably, online platforms stand out as one of the mostdesirable tools, because digital environment offers both students incomparablebenefits including developing effective self-directed learning skills, orsharpening critical thinking skills and collaboration skills

From my own observation when teaching students in English majored class atLam Son high school for the gifted, I notice remarkable improvements in mystudents’ performance when I use various online platforms to assign them

homework That is the motive for me to conduct the research named “Usingonline platforms to assign homework to 11th-grade students at Lam Son highschool for the gifted”

1.2 Aims of the study and research questions

This study aims to find out whether online platforms can be used effectively in assigning homework to high school students Moreover, it investigates the attitude of high school students towards using online platforms in assigning homework.

In order to achieve the aforementioned aims, the following research questions are raised:

1 To what extent do these online platforms make assigning students'homework more effective?

2 What are students' attitudes towards these online platforms?

1.3 Scope of the study

Due to the limitation of time and human resources, this paper attempts to doresearch on a small group of participants, namely 11th graders at Lam Son highschool for the gifted Moreover, the study does not try to cover all the online

platforms, but focuses merely on some of them namely Canva, Flipgrid, Padlet,Azota, and Reading Progress.

1.4 Research Methodology

1.4.1 Rationale of using Quasi- Experimental research

Johnson and Christensen (2000, p.319) state that “A quasi- experimentalresearch design is an experimental research design that does not provide for fullcontrol of potential confounding variables.” Since random assignment ofsubjects to the experimental and control groups is not always possible,particularly in field studies, quasi-experiments become appropriate foraccomplishing the subject assignment in particular contexts In thesecircumstances, the researcher should pay attention to the specific issues that mayarise when subjects are not randomly assigned Indeed, in a quasi-experiment,the researcher can still examine the cause-effect relationships by observing whathappens, when, and to whom; and by deciding what and when to measure Dueto the fact that the researcher could not have enough conditions to choosesubjects of the research at random, the researcher used intact groups of subjects.

That is the reason why the researcher carried out a Quasi-experimentalresearch about using online platforms to assign homework to high school

students The experiment lasted 10 weeks, and then the researcher collecteddata, analyzed the findings, and drew out some conclusions from it Thequantitative data involved students’ test results and the results of thequestionnaire

1.4.2 Variables

As mentioned above, this quasi-experimental design was used in the study as anappropriate approach to establish the cause and effect relationship between theuse of online platforms and grade 11 students’ doing homework The study wasdesigned to examine the relationship between the independent variable (the useof online platforms) and the dependent variable (students’ test score).

1.4.3 Subjects

The subjects of the study included 210 students of the six 11th-grade classes atLam Son high school for the gifted The students were divided into two groups,105 students in 3 classes who represented the experimental group were taught byusing online platforms 105 students in other intact classes representing the control groupwere taught by a traditional method The following table presents main backgroundinformation about the subjects of the research

Control groupTotal numberof participants

In order to collect information about the students’ English competencies andattitudes toward the treatment given through the experiment, the researchersused a pretest, a posttest, and an attitude questionnaire.

A pretest (Appendix 1) was given to the six classes right at the beginning of theexperiment (week 1) The test was done on the same day with the supervision ofthe researchers The purpose of this test as mentioned before was to measure theEnglish competencies of the six classes at the beginning of the experiment The pretest has 4 parts:

Part I: Speaking Part II: ListeningPart III: Reading Part IV: Writing

The posttest (Appendix 2) was given to the students of the six classes in the 11thweek, one week after the experiment finished The purpose of the posttest was tomeasure English competencies of the six classes after the experiment, fromwhich the researchers could see whether there were any significant differencesamong the classes due to the different treatment given

The posttest had four parts:Part I: Speaking

Part II: ListeningPart III: Reading Part IV: Writing

Attitude Questionnaire

According to Li (2004), questionnaires are often used in educational researchbecause questionnaires do not take time and cost much money to prepare andadminister Besides, the collected data are standard and accurate since the samequestionnaire is given to all the subjects at the same time Moreover, Brown(2000) also states that questionnaires can be used with a large number ofsubjects and the information collected is not very difficult to tabulate andanalyze

Although the main aim of this study was to find out if the use of onlineplatforms improved English competencies of 11th graders at Lam Son highschool for the gifted through the experiment, the researchers also wanted todiscover the experimental students’ attitude toward the use of online tools inteaching and learning English Investigating the students’ attitudes toward thetreatments was a way to verify the results found from the study and could help

the researchers know whether the methods used were suitable or not In order tocollect data on their attitudes, an attitude questionnaire was used All thequestions were related to students’ feedback to the effects of digital platforms inassigning and supervising students’ doing homework at home The steps ofadministering the questionnaire were also well prepared Before answering thequestions, all the experimental students were made to feel safe and easy toexpress their true responses to all the questions because their own ideas werejust for study, not for any other reasons The attitude questionnaire used in thisresearch consisted of five closed questions They were designed on a five-pointLikert scale (5 = strongly agree, 4 = agree, 3 = not sure, 2 = disagree, 1 =strongly disagree).

The attitude Questionnaire (Appendix 3) was administered to the students in theexperimental group All of the items were simple enough for the students tounderstand Therefore, the questionnaire given to them was in English, not inVietnamese.

1.4.5 Data analysis

To carry out this study, the researchers used quantitative data Quantitative datawere gathered from pretest and posttest and questionnaire The results of the testsprovided the researchers with the relationship between the two variables: the useof online platforms (the independent variable) and the test scores (the dependentvariable).

For the statements in the questionnaire, percentage count was calculated Thepercentage of the participants who chose number 4 or 5 to the statements werecalculated and added up to represent the percentage of agreement to thestatements Any participants who chose number 3 were considered having noideas about the statements Besides, any students choosing numbers 1 or 2 wereadded up to represent the percentage of disagreement to the statements

1.4.6 Research procedures

The pretest was administered to the students of the control group as well as theexperimental group one week before the experiment The implementation ofonline platforms in assigning students’ homework for the experimental grouplasted 10 weeks After that the posttest was given in the 11th week after theimplementation

The pretest was administered to students in October 2023 105 students in thethree classes were asked to participate in the test The researcher had to work asthe examiner to mark the students’ performances based on a marking scheme Then the use of digital platforms in assigning homework started in theexperimental group in October 2023 The experiment lasted 10 weeks While thestudents of the control group were still assigned homework through paperwork.The whole timeline of the data collection procedure is shown in the figurebelow:

(Timeline of the study)

Finally, the researcher analyzed the data collected one week after the

experiment The analysis was done to show how effective the use of digitalplatforms was More importantly, analyzing the post data helps to find out howthe researcher could monitor students’ doing homework and improve theEnglish competencies of students

CHAPTER II: CONTENT

2.1 Literature Review

2.1.1 Definitions of online platforms

Digital platforms have become a major mode for organizing a wide range ofhuman activities, including economic, social, and political interactions,especially education

Digital technology is the branch of scientific or engineering knowledge thatdeals with the creation and practical use of digital or computerized devices,methods, or systems

2.1.2 Advantages and disadvantages of using online learning tools 2.1.2.1 Advantages

It is a fact that online teaching and internet technology in education should beused in classroom learning activities Of course, the online learning systemrequires educators' adaptive and collaborative attitudes (Rajhans et al., 2020) Itis believed that online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic should not beconsidered an emergency condition that can impact learning outcomes Onlinelearning activities should be carried out in a standardized system like in face-to-face learning (Patricia Aguilera-Hermida, 2020) By that way, students can get alearning experience that can provide the best learning outcomes There arecertain advantages that online learning can offer

Efficiency

Online learning offers teachers an efficient way to deliver lessons, tasks tostudents quickly and easily

Accessibility

Another advantage of online learning tools is that they allow students to get theirassignments and homework from any location of their choice Additionally, theirperformances can be recorded, archived, and shared for future reference Thus,online learning offers students the accessibility of time and place in education.

Affordability

Another advantage of online learning is reduced financial costs Onlineeducation is far more affordable as compared to physical learning This isbecause online learning eliminates the cost of student transportation, studentmeals, and most importantly, real estate Additionally, all tasks or studymaterials are available online, thus creating a paperless learning environmentwhich is more affordable, while also being beneficial to the environment.

Improved Student Attendance

Since online classes can be taken from home or location of choice, there arefewer chances of students missing out on their homework.

Adapabitity to different learning styles

Every student has a different learning journey and a different learning style.Some students are visual learners, while some students prefer to learn throughaudio Similarly, some students thrive in the classroom, and other students aresolo learners who get distracted by large groups.

The online learning system, with its range of options and resources, can bepersonalized in many ways It is the best way to create a perfect learningenvironment suited to the needs of each student.

2.1.2.2 Disadvantages

Inability To Focus On Screens

For many students, one of the biggest challenges of online learning is thestruggle with focusing on the screen for long periods of time With onlinelearning, there is also a greater chance for students to be easily distracted bysocial media or other sites Therefore, it is imperative for the teachers to designhomework suitably to keep students engaged

Technology Issues

Another key challenge of online classes is internet connectivity While internetpenetration has grown in leaps and bounds over the past few years, in smallercities and towns, a stable connection with decent speed is a problem Without astable internet connection for students or teachers, there can be a lack ofcontinuity in learning for the child This is detrimental to the education process.

Sense Of Isolation

Students can learn a lot from being in the company of their peers When doingonline homework, there are minimal physical interactions between students andteachers This often results in a sense of isolation for the students In thissituation, it is imperative that the school allow for other forms of communicationbetween the students, peers, and teachers This can include online messages,

emails and video conferencing that will allow for face-to-face interaction andreduce the sense of isolation.

Teacher Training

Online learning requires teachers to have a basic understanding of using digitalforms of learning However, this is not the case always Very often, teachershave a very basic understanding of technology Sometimes, they don’t evenhave the necessary resources and tools to conducts online classes.

To combat this, it is important for schools to invest in training teachers with thelatest technology updates so that they can conduct their online classesseamlessly.

Manage Screen Time

Many parents are concerned about the health hazards of having their childrenspend so many hours staring at a screen This increase in screen time is one ofthe biggest concerns and disadvantages of online learning Sometimes studentsalso develop bad posture and other physical problems due to staying hunched infront of a screen A good solution to this would be to give the students plenty ofbreaks from the screen to refresh their mind and their body.

2.1.3 Some types of digital platforms 2.1.3.1 Canva

Benefits: Teachers can use Canva to assign homework for all 4 skills and

language focus Students can create PowerPoint/ poster/video presentations,insert/ modify pictures/ videos, and submit assignments easily andprofessionally Students and Teachers can edit and feedback directly on students'assignments Canva is user-friendly as it is incorporated in Microsoft Teams andsocial media.

How to use: Teachers create classes, invite students, create groups of students,

create folders of assignments and share with the suggested groups Thenstudents either do assignments on Canva (adding design -> create new) orupload their assignments and submit them Additionally, teachers and otherfriends are able to edit, feedback students’ assignments directly on Canva

Notes: To get a free account with more professional designs, teachers should

guide students to sign up for Canva for education To check students' homeworkeasily, it is advisable for teachers to ask students to put their ordinal numberincluded in the class list before the name

How to use:

1 After each speaking lesson, teachers create a topic related to the lesson 2 Teachers need to set up some features for the task (time limit, topic status,comments, views, deadline )

3 Teachers copy the link and send it to students

4 Students record a video of their speaking tasks directly or import theirvideos

5 Both teachers and students can view and remarks on students' speakingclips.

Notes: Remind students to download the app if they use smartphones Students

must have email accounts

2.1.3.3 Reading Progress

Benefits: Reading progress is incorporated in Microsoft Teams, so it is

user-friendly By giving Reading aloud assignments, teachers can provide fluencypractice opportunities more often It is easy for teachers to assign and supervisestudents' homework with A.I assisted review Whether teachers use the auto-detect feature for quick review or manually code errors, valuable data arecollected into Education Insights dashboards, helping identify trends and planfor effective teaching.

How to use: After a Reading lesson in the textbook, teachers create a reading

task in Reading Progress in Microsoft Teams and ask students to do it Teachershould follow some steps including creating assignment, adding resource andreading progress (reading level, genre, number of attempts, time limit,pronunciation sensitivity) After that students open the assignment, then theyread the text and record a tape or a video Students submit their tasks Teachersuse Auto-detect to evaluate students' work.

Notes: Teachers and students need to be in the same class in Teams.

2.1.3.4 Azota

Benefits: It is easy for teachers to create assignments/ tests for students to do

either online or offline Teachers can put students into groups to give tasks/testsand supervise them It is an effective tool that teachers can use to offer studentsreview opportunities in and after class It is developed by Vietnameseprogrammers and free of charge.

How to use: Teachers put students into groups/ classes Teachers design

exercises or tests, copy and send the links to students Teachers can supervisestudents while the tests are in progress Both teachers and students can get theresults right after the tests are completed.

Notes: Students need to use their phone numbers to log in Azota For written

assignments/ tests, teachers have to remark manually.

2.2 Results of tests

2.2.1 Results of pretest and posttest of the control group

2.2.2 Results of pretest and posttest of the experimental group

As shown in the above table the grades of the two groups are different Beforethe experiment took place, students in 2 groups are relatively equal in their test

scores However, after that their levels of English showed significant changes Itcan be said that the improvement of the experimental group is significantlyclearer Thus, the scores suggested that the students of the experimental group,who were assigned homework via online platforms, studied English better thanthose of the control group, who studied in the traditional method In other words,the use online tools in teaching English improved the English competencies ofthe students of the experimental group It means that students of theexperimental group could use English better in four skills

2.3 Results of attitude questionnaire

After the experiment, the students of the experimental group were asked abouttheir perceptions of the use of online tools in their studies, their attitudes towardthis technique For the ease of comparison, strongly agree column and agreecolumn were grouped together as one category to represent the percentage ofagreement to the statements, while disagree column and strongly disagreecolumn were put together as another category to represent the percentage ofdisagreement to the statements The data were tabulated and are shown in thetable below:

Q5 The digital platforms help you speak English more fluently and

improve your reading comprehension.

N/P 53(50.4 %) 42(40 %) 7(6.7%) 3(2.9%) 0(0%)

The above table indicates that 89 (84.8%) out of 105 students of theexperimental group agreed that assigning and supervising homework isessential It means that they must complete their homework at home 8 students(7,6%) cannot share their opinions clearly They could not decide whether doing

homework is important or not While 8 students thought that finishinghomework at home is not important In short, most of the students of theexperimental group believed that they must do their homework under the controlof teachers because it is crucial.

It can be seen from the above table that 84 students (80%) felt interested in theirteachers’ assigning homework to them or in other words, most of students likeddoing homework through online platforms Meanwhile, there were only 8students (7.6%) who did not feel like doing their homework under thesupervision of their teachers

It can also be indicated that the majority of students (93 students- 88.6%) saidthat it was not difficult to perform online assignments created by the researchers.There were still 6 students (5.7%) who did not show a clear opinion about thismatter Besides, there were 6 students (5.7%) who disagreed with the question,as they may have difficulty carrying out tasks on the internet.

The figures also reveal that 93 students making up 88.6% agreed with thequestion number 4 It means that the majority of students felt more confidentand motivated once completing online tasks assigned and supervised by theirteachers on the internet Nonetheless, only 4 students (3.8%) did not think thatdoing homework on online platforms helped them learn English

Besides, the statistics represent that there were 95 out of 105 students whoreported that the use of online tools to do their homework made their fluency inspeaking better and enhanced their ability to comprehend texts in English Inother words, 90.4% of the students felt that they made progress in their Englishlearning after the experiment Meanwhile, 6.7% of the students remained neutralabout this statement What is more, there were 3 students (2.9%) who showedcontrasting idea.

2.4 Discussion of the results

After analyzing the results of the study, the significant findings about the use ofdigital platforms in assigning and supervising students’ homework can beidentified as followings: Firstly, the use of online tools could help studentsimprove their pronunciation, grammatical range, lexical resource and fluencyand coherence In other words, applying technology into teaching English helpsstudents make more progress in their learning Secondly, students had positiveattitudes toward the use of online platforms including Canva, Reading Progress,Flipgrid, and Azota This section will discuss the two aforementioned pointsfound from the results of the study in detail.

First, it can be seen that the mean scores of the pretest of the two groups wererelatively similar prior to the treatment However, after the experiment, it isapparent that scores of the posttest of the experimental group were higher thanthose of the control group Those students made noticeable progress in learning

English It can be claimed that the use of digital platforms in assigning andchecking students’ homework played an important role in improving students’English performance This finding supported the conclusion that the students inexperimental group benefited from the use of technology in teaching andlearning English and the students of the experimental group would study Englishmore effectively than those of the control group did This finding also answeredthe first research question.

The second research question asked about the attitudes of the students of theexperimental group towards the use of digital platforms in assigning homework.The results from the attitude questionnaire revealed very positive attitudes aboutthe effectiveness of the online studying tools They found the use of IT in theirstudies useful They also seemed to enjoy being asked to complete theirassignments via the Internet Students’ perception of the use of online platformsin acquiring English knowledge corresponded to their test scores

In summary, in this study, the use of online tools in assigning homework wasproved beneficial The experimental group outperformed the control group inthe posttest The differences between the scores of the posttest between the twogroups were found statistically significant Therefore, using online platforms toassign homework to students was regarded as an effective way in helpingstudents promote their competencies

CHAPTER III: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS

3.1 Summary of major findings

In the study, the researcher used online platforms called Canva, Flipgrid, Azota,and Reading Progress in assigning homework to students During ten-weekimplementation, 105 students in grade 11 at Lam Son high school for the giftedacted as experimental group who were assigned homework via online platformsand the other 105 students in the same grade at this school acted as controlgroup who were given homework by the traditional method The data werecollected from tests and an attitude questionnaire.

After the implementation, the study answered the two research questions:

1 To what extent do these online platforms make assigning students'homework more effective?

2 What are students' attitudes towards these online platforms?

Regarding the first question, the findings suggested that the use of onlineplatforms enhanced students’ English proficiency in terms of fluency andpronunciation, lexical resource, as well as grammatical range The experimentalgroup was found to outperform the control group in the posttest because thedifferences between the scores of the posttest between the two groups werestatistically significant.

Concerning the second question, the findings showed that almost every studentof the experimental group was interested in doing homework on onlineplatforms namely Canva, Azota, Flipgrid, and Reading Progress They also hadpositive attitudes toward the online tools In other words, online platforms weresaid to have positive impacts on students’ English performances.

3.2 Suggestions based on the study

After conducting the research, I realized that the success in teaching does notonly depend on the knowledge teachers deliver to their students, but also on howteachers employ various techniques to make students become more engaged inthe teaching and learning process I would like to make some recommendationsthat may be useful for students learning English and my colleagues as follows

For students

- Students should be aware that homework is an indispensable part in learning,

especially English study Therefore, they should pay more attention and allocatea larger proportion of their time to complete their homework assigments

- Students should be proactive in their study and enhance their computer skillsso as to be able to use various online platforms as learning tools.

- Students should be willing to complete their homework via online platformswhen their teachers assign

For teachers

- Teachers should attend training sessions about information technology to getupdated with the lattest developments in technology Thereby, they can knowabout new applications to apply in their teaching to boost the effectiveness in theteaching and learning process

- Teachers should provide clear guidance and immediate assistance to theirstudents when assigning homework via online platforms, so that students willnot face any technological problems when dealing with the assignments.

- Teachers should choose the exercises which are appropriate to the Englishlevel of students so that students will not be discouraged Moreover, they shouldchoose the kind of homework exercise according to the type of online platformthey intend to use.

3.3 Limitations of the study

The study was carried out with a small sample size of participants The smallsample size may affect the external validity of the study The results would havebeen more generalized if the experiment had been conducted with more levelsand more participants at the same time.

Moreover, the study was conducted over a relatively short period of time, onlyten weeks It is the fact that the implementation should have been longer so thatthe subjects’ knowledge could have been investigated more thoroughly and thedata collected could have been more convincing and accurate