MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ NGO THI QUYNH PHUONG AN INVESTIGATION INTO PERCEPTIONS AND USE OF SOCIAL SOFTWARE TO SELF-STUDY ENGLISH OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM BY THIRD YEAR EFL STUDENTS AT HUE UNIVERSITY, COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, Hue University of Foreign Languages HUE, 2015 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ NGO THI QUYNH PHUONG AN INVESTIGATION INTO PERCEPTIONS AND USE OF SOCIAL SOFTWARE TO SELF-STUDY ENGLISH OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM BY THIRD YEAR EFL STUDENTS AT HUE UNIVERSITY, COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CODE: 60. LE PHAM HOAI HUONG HUE, 2015 i BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ -------- NGÔ THỊ QUỲNH PHƯƠNG ĐIỀU TRA VỀ SỰ NHẬN THỨC VÀ VIỆC ỨNG DỤNG PHẦN MỀM XÃ HỘI ĐỂ TỰ HỌC TIẾNG ANH Ở NGOÀI LỚP HỌC CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ BA CHUYÊN NGÀNH TIẾNG ANH TẠI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ, ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ LÝ LUẬN VÀ PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC BỘ MÔN TIẾNG ANH MÃ SỐ: 60.11 NGƯỜI HƯỚNG DẪN KHOA HỌC: PGS. LÊ PHẠM HOÀI HƯƠNG HUẾ, 2015 ii STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY This work has not previously been submitted for a degree or diploma in any university. To the best of my knowledge and belief, the thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made in the thesis itself.
Date: 20/ 6/ 2015 Signature Ngo Thi Quynh Phuong iii ABSTRACT Social software is now more and more popular to EFL learners. It is an effective tool for language learners to improve their English. This study investigated perceptions and use of social software to self-study English outside the classroom by third year ELF students at Hue University, College of Foreign Languages. To collect the data, the questionnaire, interview and diary were used.
100 students responded the questionnaires, 10 students out of the 100 group were invited for the interviews and 10 other students were requested to keep ten-day diaries. The findings revealed that the students were highly aware of the necessity of using social software to self- study English outside the classroom. Most of them agreed that social software is an effective learning tool to support English learning. The research also investigated how the students used social software tools to self-study English and some problems and difficulties that they encountered when using social software to self-study English.
On the basis of the findings, some suggestions for learners and teachers as well as educational administrators were recommended in order to use social software in self- studying English outside the classroom more effectively. iv ACKNOWLEGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Assoc. Le Pham Hoai Huong for her whole-hearted guidance, valuable comments and sincere encouragement she has given to me throughout the entire development of the study. Without her experienced instructions and critical comments, my research would be far from being completed.
I would like to express my thanks to my lovely good friend, Doan Ngoc Ai Phuong, for her available help in piloting the questionnaires and collecting the needed data. Special words of thanks also go to all the informants who spent time responding to the questionnaires, interviews and diaries which contributed as an essential part to the success of the research. In addition, many thanks go to my close friends, my classmates in the Master of Arts class and my colleagues at Bui Thi Xuan High School for their available help and warm support during the time I conducted the study. Finally, my deepest gratitude and appreciation go to my family members.
Their love, support and constant encouragement gave me a great deal of strength and determination that helped me during the stressful time of writing this thesis. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Pages SUB COVER PAGE. i STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY. v TABLE OF CONTENTS.
vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. ix LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES .4 Significance of the study .5 Scope of the study .6 Organization of the study. 5 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW .1 Terms related to social software .1 What is Web 2.2 What is social software? .1 Definitions of social software.2 Types of social software .3 How to use social software .4 Advantages and disadvantages of social software in education .1 Advantages of social software in education .2 Disadvantages of social software in education .2 What is self-study? .3 Social software as a learning tool to self-study English outside the classroom.3 Review of previous studies .1 Review of studies worldwide .2 Review of studies in Vietnam.3 Gaps in the literature. 20 CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .4 Data collection instruments .1 The pilot study .2 The main study.
26 CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION .2 Third year EFL students’ perceptions of using social software to self-study English outside the classroom .3 How third year EFL students use social software to self-study English outside the classroom .4 Problems and difficulties of using social software to self-study English. 51 CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSIONS, IMPLICATIONS, LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE STUDIES .1 Summary of the findings .3 For educational administrators .3 Contribution of the study .4 Limitations of the study .5 Suggestions for further research. 66 viii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL : English as a Foreign Language HUCFL : Hue University, College of Foreign Languages ix LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES Pages List of figures Figure 4.1: Students’ perceptions of the necessity of using social software to self-study English outside the classroom .2: Students’ perceptions of the usefulness of using social software to self-study English .3: Social software as an effective learning tool to support English learning .4: Frequency of using social software to self-study English per week .5: The convenience of social software tools .6: Where to use social software to self-study English .7: Who to connect when using social software to self-study English .8: Who to seek help when using social software to self-study English .9: Disadvantages of learning English from social software .10: Problems with Internet connection .11: Unreliable contents and authorship copyrights .12: Difficulties with finding a suitable device .13: Difficulties with the cost of accessing social software .14: Lack of teachers’ instruction. 50 List of tables Table 4.1: Students’ perceptions of using social software to self-study English.2: Time to self-study English on social software .3: Devices students use to access social software .4: Students’ favourite social software tools for self-studying English .5: What students learn when self-studying English on social software .6: Students’ interest activities when self-studying English on social software.
40 xi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Nowadays, information technology has played an important role in our life. It has an influence on many fields of our society from businesses, companies to organizations. One of the areas getting a large number of benefits from the development of information technology is education. Teaching and learning in general and teaching and learning English in particular are more and more convenient and effective with the support of information technology.
In this context, applying information technology and technology in teaching and learning English is highly encouraged. 1) stated: As we enter the 21st century, everyday language use is so tied to technology that learning language through technology has become a fact of life with important implications for all applied linguists, particularly for those concerned with facets of second language acquisition. In fact, advances in information technology have dramatically altered the way students are engaged in learning activities and processes. As mentioned by Yaşar and Karadeniz (2011, p.
1), “Since learning is a lifelong process, all language learners tend to learn consciously or unconsciously at anywhere and anytime”. Especially in the era of connection and collaboration, with the advancement of social software, a new way of learning English has been created in a way that language learners have more chances to self-study English beyond the classroom. Basically, it can happen by opening a social networking site, by asking a question to a friend online, by writing a blog to share knowledge, by watching video tutorials to learn how to pronounce an English word and by joining online multimedia sharing sites to get information about a specific field. Although social software tools are not created for educational purposes, Dalsggaard (2005) argued that they can be used to support learning.
Indeed, 1 social software has relatively affected the use of technology in education in the last decade (Yaşar & Karadeniz, 2011). In the world, the rapid growth of research on technologies related to social software has aroused an interest in the area of education, particularly in the area of student’s educational use (Minocha, 2009; Hurn, 2012; Hooper, 2014). Giving his statement on the future of this issue, Bryant (2007, p. 9) asserted, “The adoption of social software tools, techniques and ideas will be the most important and visible example of the use of emerging technology in education over the next few years.” In Vietnam, with the modern technology, using social software in the daily life of Vietnamese people is not new when a lot of surveys are clear indications of this development.
According to the latest statistics reported by a survey of Kemp (2012) on wearesocial.net website, in 2012 there were 140 mobile phones for every 100 Vietnamese, 75% of Vietnamese households had a desktop computer, and particularly 86% of Vietnamese internet users visited social software programs. Another survey of 3.300 Vietnamese people in Vietnam NetCitizens Report (2011) of CimigoLive survey company showed that 36% of Internet users were members of social networking sites and 20% kept their own blogs. More importantly, social networking sites, forums and blogs are mainly used by young age group from 15 to 24 years old, which is the age to go to school and university. Hence, the numbers above reflect the needs of using social software of young people in general and students in particular in Vietnam.
Social software is on the rise and Vietnamese students are taking to it. As what Dang, Nicholas and Lewis (2013) stated, in this digital era when technological devices such as computers, laptops, phones and tablet computers have become available to everyone, integration innovative technology into learning and teaching English is dramatically applied at all levels in Vietnam. Together with it, applying social software for educational purpose is getting more important in the context of Vietnamese universities. Thanks to the development of technology, social software 2 is offering EFL learners a chance to learn English not only inside the class but also outside the classroom.
To the case of the third-year English major students at Hue University, College of Foreign Languages (HUCFL), recently they have had to face many challenges in English learning process. Firstly, since Hue University College of Foreign Languages has moved its training mode to a credit-based training system, the roles of teachers and students in class have changed when teachers are only instructors and students themselves have to find their own way to accumulate knowledge successfully. Secondly, as shown in the curriculum of the third year in the 2014-2015 student’s handbook, only eight periods (50 minutes each period) per week are for English skills and eight periods more for subjects related to English language; it can be seen that time for English learning in class is not enough for the students to practice their English. Last but not least, according to Vietnam’s National Foreign Language 2020 Project (a national project to carry out Vietnamese government’s Decision 1400), each student must reach level 5 of Vietnam’s language proficiency framework before they graduate (Nguyen, 2011).
This leads to the fact that students must learn more at home to acquire the specific level so that they can graduate with their bachelor diploma.