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The attitudes of secondary school students towards learning english through project based learning
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Transcript of The attitudes of secondary school students towards learning english through project based learning
T H E A T T I T U D E S O F S E C O N D A R Y S C H O O L S T U D E N T S T O W A R D S L E A R N I N G E N G L I S H T H R O U G H P R O J E C T - B A S E D L E A R N I N G
M.YAVUZ KONCA & KÜBRA OKUMUŞ
RATIONALE
ELT needs new methods as the old ones are
inadequate in Turkey. Reasons such as the great
difference between Turkish and English, the
difficulty of learning a new language and culture
cause English teaching to be a problematic area.
INTRODUCTION
PBL is one of the new techniques that engages
students in exploring important and meaningful
questions through a series of investigations and
collaborations (Krajcik, Czerniak & Berger 1999)
PBL can be defined briefly as “a model that
organizes learning around projects” (Thomas, 2000,
p. 1). It is built upon authentic learning activities
that care the students’ interests and motivation.
It integrates subject-matter goals with an authentic
learning environment [Eskrootchi, R. and Oskrochi,
2010].
It emphasizes improvement of critical thinking,
problem solving and constructing projects. The
student is autonomous and builder whereas the
teacher is a supporter and counselor in this method.
Constructing a project is considered not as a goal
but a tool for learning, so the PBL places a great
importance on the process dimension of learning
GOAL OF THE STUDY
A teaching method that is generally used in the
field of Science and Maths is suggested to be
implemented in teaching English. For this purpose,
the answers of the following questions are sought:
Is PBL an effective way of teaching English?
What are the benefits of PBL?
What are the possible problems that can be
encountered while using PBL?
METHOD
A qualitative research was conducted in this research. McMillan and
Schumacher (1993, p. 479) defined qualitative research as, “primarily
an inductive process of organizing data into categories and identifying
patterns (relationships) among categories.” From this definition it can
be inferred that qualitative research is closely related to relationships
between variables. In this study, the correlation among the attitudes
and the three variables: gender, age, class is sought.
Since this study intends to describe the attitudes of students towards
project-based learning, survey was used for this aim.
PARTİCİPANTS
Participants were the seventh and eighth grade
students aging 12 and 15 years of a public school in
Turkey. 100 students were chosen for the survey. As
the aim is to describe the attitudes of secondary
school students, a public secondary school students
were selected for the study. Hence purposive
sampling was used.
INSTRUMENTS
A Lickert scale questionnaire was used to determine the attitudes
of the students towards teaching English through Project-based
learning. The questionnaire consists of twenty questions. Each has
5 items which are “I strongly disagree”, “I disagree”, “neutral”, “I
agree” and “I strongly agree”. Questions like whether they learn
through project-based learning and whether they like group works
that are the important parts of the PBL were asked to develop an
overall opinion about the students’ attitudes towards PBL.
DATA ANALYSİS
Aritmetic average and standard deviation were used to
analyze the data. t test was used to find out whether
there were differences between answers in terms of
classroom and gender. One way analysis of variance
(ANOVA) was used to determine the differences in terms
of age. LSD Post Hoc was used in order to understand
which age group had differences for the items 3 and 18
of the questionnaire.
RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
In the survey, the response “I strongly agree” was given to items titled
"Project-based learning helped me to learn a topic I did not know.", "It was fun
to work with my friends.", "Project-based learning increased our desire to
learn", "Project-based learning made us learn by investigating.", " Project-
based learning taught us to make use of knowledge.", "project-based learning
can help us to learn important topics. "," project-based learning can develop
my interpersonal relations." And " I believe that Project-based learning will
develop my creative thinking skills.", " I think project-based learning will
contribute to our work through cooperation." " project-based learning can
accelerate my learning.", and " I want my future courses to continue with
project-based learning."
In the survey, the response “I agree” was given to
items titled "Project-based learning, developed my
communication skills.", "All members of the group
were active in the learning phase.", "We studied so
hard.", " Project-based learning can develop my
analytical thinking skills.", "Project-based learning
can improve my communication skills." "Project-
based learning can develop my group discussion
skills.", and "I believe that project-based learning
will improve my ability of problem-solving."
the response “I disagree” was given to items
titled "I was unlucky because of working with those
who disliked making research." and "I do not like
group work."
F i n d i n g s a n d r e v i e w r e g a r d i n g r e s p o n s e s t o t h e i t e m s o n t h e s u r v e y a c c o r d i n g t o g r a d e l e v e l s o f t h e s t u d e n t s
Whether there was any difference between the responses to the
items in the questionnaire in terms of students' grade level was
analyzed using the t-test.
According to the results, it may be said that the level of response
of 8th year students as compared to that of 7th year students to the
items titled "Project-based learning helped me to learn a topic I did
not know.",", " project-based learning can accelerate my learning.",
and "I believe that project-based learning will improve my ability of
problem-solving." was found to be more negative.
fi n d i n g s a n d r e v i e w r e g a r d i n g r e s p o n s e s t o t h e i t e m s o n t h e s u r v e y a c c o r d i n g t o
g e n d e r o f t h e s t u d e n t s .
Whether there was any difference between the
responses to the items in the questionnaire in terms
of students' gender was analyzed using the t-test .
The level of response of female students as
compared to that of male students to the items titled
"Project-based learning helped me to learn a topic I
did not know.", " project-based learning can
accelerate my learning.", and "I believe that project-
based learning will improve my ability of problem-
solving." was found to be more negative.
fi n d i n g s a n d r e v i e w r e g a r d i n g r e s p o n s e s t o t h e i t e m s o n t h e s u r v e y a c c o r d i n g t o a g e o f
t h e s t u d e n t s .
Whether there was any difference between the
responses to the items in the questionnaire in terms
of students' age was analyzed using the one-way
analysis of variance (ANOVA)
LSD post hoc test was applied to find out between
which age groups of students there was difference in
the responses given to items titled "Project-based
learning increased our desire to learn." and "
Project-based learning can accelerate my learning
As a result of LSD post hoc test the difference
between the students of 13-14 years and 12 years
was found significant. The 13 and 14-year age group
of students responded more negatively the item
"Project-based learning can speed up my learning."
as compared to 12-year age group.
CONCLUSION
The results of the questionnaire carried out on 100
students show that students like PBL in English
classes. The students want to learn with group works
and projects. The 12-15 years students are opinion of
that PBL will help them not only learn English but
improve the skills such as creative and analytical
thinking, problem-solving, communication and
discussion. They would like to be part of active
learning.
Hence it is suggested that PBL be used in teaching
English as incorporating the essential elements of
PBL which are colloboration, critical and creative
thinking, communication, problem-solving into
English language teaching process will provide
learning in depth.
THANK YOU