CAN THO UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
ENGLISH EDUCATION DEPARTMENT
----------------
AN INVESTIGATION
INTO GRADE-11 STUDENTS’ AUTONOMY IN ENGLISH
AT CHAU VAN LIEM HIGH SCHOOL
B.A Thesis
Field of study: ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING
Supervisor: Chung Thi Thanh Hang
Researcher: Luong Thi Ngoc Diem
Student code: 7062897
Class: NN0652A1
Can Tho, May 2010
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Table of contents ........................................................................Page 2
Acknowledgements ............................................................................. 4
Abstract (English) ............................................................................... 5
Abstract (Vietnamese) ....................................................................... 6
List of Tables ....................................................................................... 7
Chapter I: INTRODUCTION…………………………………... …8
1.1 General statement of the problem………………………………………..8
1.2 Research aims……………………………………….…………………...9
1.3 General organization and coverage of the study………….……………...9
Chapter II: LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................... 10
2.1 Related literature ..................................................................................... 10
2.1.1 The definition of self-study ............................................................. 10
2.1.2 The reasons why learner autonomy ................................................. 10
2.1.3 Ways to help language learners to become autonomous ................ 11
2.1.4 Common problems of language learners ......................................... 12
2.2 Related studies …………………………………………………………13
2.3 Justification of the present study …………..………………………......14
Chapter III: METHODOLOGY………………………………….15
3.1
3.2
3.3
3.4
3.5
Research questions.…………………………………………….………15
Research design …………………………………...…..………………15
Participants………………………………………...…..………………15
Instruments………………………………………...…..………………15
Research procedure...…………………………………………….….....17
Chapter IV: RESULTS……………………………………...….....17
4.1 Overview of statistical procedure………………………………………18
4.1.1 Collecting data……………………...……...……………..………18
4.1.2 Coding students‟ responses………...…….……………………....18
4.1.3 Computing data .............................................................................. 18
4.2 Descriptive statistic for the whole questionnaire…………….....……....19
4.3 Descriptive statistic for each research question……………..….……....19
4.3.1 Research question 1………………...………………….…………19
4.3.2 Research question 2………………...……..…………..…………20
4.3.3 Research question 3………………...…………………..………...20
2
4.3.4 Research question 4………………...……………...…..…………21
Chapter V: SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION...…...…………….21
5.1 Discussion…………..……………………………….…………….……22
5.2 Implication………………………………………...………………..…..22
5.3 Limitations and recommendation for further research…………………24
5.3.1 Limitation……...……...…………...…………………..…………24
5.3.1.1 Participants.………………..…………………..…………24
5.3.1.2 Methodology...……………...…...……………..…………24
5.3.2 Recommendation for further research ………...………………....24
5.4 Conclusions……………………………………………………………..24
References .......................................................................................... 26
Appendices ........................................................................................ 27
3
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
During the process of carrying out this research, I have received a lot of
contribution and support from many people to all of whom I would like to
acknowledge.
First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my
supervisor, Ms Chung Thi Thanh Hang, who has provided me with valuable sources
of material. Without their helpful instructions and insightful comments, my research
would not be accomplished.
Second, I extend my special thanks to the English Education Department for
offering me a chance to conduct this research, and to the teaching staff for their
assistances and support, especially, Ms Ngo Thi Trang Thao, who gave me invaluable
support to analyze the data with SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Science).
Third, I also would like to thanks truthfully to my counselor, Mrs. Bui Minh
Chau who encouraged my classmates and me to determine on doing research.
My special thanks are sincerely sent to all students of class 11A2 at Chau Van
Liem High School who helped me a lot with data collections to conduct the research.
Last but not least, I wish to acknowledge my parents, my little sister and
brother who brought me a great source of motivation. Also, I would like to thank my
friends who give me a lot of useful advice as well as encouragement when I met some
problems during the time of doing this research.
4
ABSTRACT
The purposes of this study are to investigate the reality of students’ autonomy
in English, the amount of time students spend in self-studying, difficulties students
encounter in their process of self-study. Also, this research gives some suggestions to
help students develop their abilities of autonomy to learn English effectively and to be
good at English. The subjects of the study consisted of 42 eleventh-graders at Chau
Van Liem High School. They aren’t majored English students. The main instrument
used in this research is questionnaire consisting of 43 items, adapted mostly from
Benson & Völler (1997). The results of the study show that the majority of students
participate in extra English class to learn to deal with this subject. Furthermore, students
only study before tests or exams. They don’t spend much time in self-studying at
home. It means students aren’t aware of the importance and benefits of self-learning
although they are the main factors in that process. The big problems that students
encounter in their process of their self-studying are most of students don’t know how
to self-study and pronounce English sounds correctly. Moreover, they want their
English teacher to have new teaching methods to help students understand more
easily.
5
TÓM TẮT
Mục đích của nghiên cứu này là để khảo sát tình hình tự học tiếng Anh của học
sinh, thời gian học sinh tự học, những khó khăn họ gặp phải khi tự học. Ngoài ra,
nghiên cứu cũng đưa ra những giải pháp giúp học sinh tự học tiếng Anh hiệu quả và
giỏi môn tiếng Anh. Đối tượng nghiên cứu bao gồm 42 học sinh lớp 11 trường THPT
Châu Văn Liêm. Họ không phải là học sinh chuyên môn tiếng Anh. Công cụ chính
dùng trong nghiên cứu là bảng câu hỏi gồm 43 mục, chủ yếu theo Benson và Völler
(1997). Kết quả nghiên cứu cho thấy đa số học sinh tham gia lớp học thêm tiếng Anh
là để đối phó với môn học này. Ngoài ra, học sinh chỉ học trước khi kiểm tra hoặc thi.
Họ không dành nhiều thời gian để tự học ở nhà. Điều đó có nghĩa là học sinh không
có ý thức về tầm quan trọng và lợi ích của việc tự học mặc dù họ là nhân tố chính
trong quá trình đó. Khó khăn lớn mà học sinh gặp phải khi tự học tiếng Anh là họ
không biết cách tự học và không biết cách phát âm những âm tiếng Anh thế nào cho
đúng. Ngoài ra, họ muốn giáo viên tiếng Anh thay đổi phương pháp dạy để giúp họ dễ
hiểu hơn.
6
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Questionnaire‟s items in sections .................................................................. 16
Table 2: Descriptive statistics for the mean score of the whole questionnaire ............ 19
Table 3: Descriptive statistics of the reasons why students participate in extra English
...................................................................................................................................... 19
Table 4: Descriptive statistics of the amount of the time students spend in selfstudying English ........................................................................................................... 20
Table 5: Descriptive statistics of the obstacles students have when they learn English
by themselves ............................................................................................................... 20
Table 6: Descriptive statistics of the expectations students have to help them learn
English by themselves effectively ............................................................................... 21
7
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
This chapter begins with (1) general statement of the problem. It introduces the
importance of learner autonomy as the rationale of this research and the context of
leaner autonomy in Viet Nam. (2) The research aims and (3) the organization of the
study are presented, too.
1.1. General statement of the problem
According to a large body of empirical research in social psychology, autonomy
– “feeling free and volitional in one‟s actions” (Deci 1995, p.2) – is a basic human
need. It is nourished by, and in turn nourishes, our intrinsic motivation, our proactive
interest in the world around us. This explains how learner autonomy solves the
problem of learner motivation: autonomous learners draw on their intrinsic motivation
when they accept responsibility for their own learning and commit themselves to
develop the skills of reflective self-management in learning; and success in learning
strengthens their intrinsic motivation. Precisely because autonomous learners are
motivated and reflective learners, their learning is efficient and effective (conversely,
all learning is likely to succeed to the extent that the learner is autonomous). And the
efficiency and effectiveness of the autonomous learner means that the knowledge and
skills acquired in the classroom can be applied to situations that arise outside the
classroom.
In fact, autonomy is one of the most important factors which helps students not
only get a good result of learning but also have wide and deep knowledge. If students
only study in class without self-studying at home, it can be hard for them to get good
results. Therefore, they need to know how to self-study. However, nowadays in stead
of self-studying, students in Viet Nam often join extra English classes for better score
and they don‟t spend much time in studying at home by themselves. There are too
many extra English classes. This causes a lot of controversy. Although extra English
classes are too many, the students‟ quality of studying is not high. In contrast, the
students‟ quality of studying depends on teacher. This reality should be noticed
because students won‟t have ability to solve their problems by themselves and take
responsibility for their own decisions; especially grade-11 students are going to have
the most important exam in the following year. This is graduation exam.
8
1.2. Research aims
The aims of this study are to investigate the reality of students‟ autonomy in
English, the amount of time students spend in self-studying, difficulties students
encounter in their process of self-study. Also, this research gives some suggestions to
help students develop their abilities of autonomy to learn English effectively and to be
good at English.
1.3. General organization and coverage of the study
The thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter I mentions the general statement of
the problem. Then it presents research aims. Lastly, the general organization and
coverage of the study is introduced in this chapter.
The literature review in chapter II discusses related literature, related studies and
justification of the present study. The related literature presents the definition of the
term “Learner autonomy”, the reasons why learner autonomy, ways to help language
learners to become autonomous and common problems of language learners. There
are six related studies mentioned in this chapter. Lastly, the justification of the present
study states the motivation of the researcher to conduct this study.
Chapter III describes the research questions, the research design, participants of
the study, instruments and research procedure.
Chapter IV reveals the results of the study answering the four research questions.
It includes the overview of the statistical procedures, descriptive statistics for the
whole questionnaire and descriptive statistics for each research question.
Chapter V includes discussions about the results. The implications are discussed
in this chapter, too. It also presents the limitations so as to withdraw recommendations
for further research. Last, the conclusion is presented.
9
CHAPTER II
LITERATURE REVIEW
The related literature, related studies and the justification of the present study
will be introduced in this chapter. The definition of the term “Learner autonomy” will
be firstly introduced. The reasons why learner autonomy, ways to help language
learners to become autonomous and common problems of language learners will be
introduced then. Some related studies are presented in this chapter, too. The last part
in this chapter is the justification of the present study.
2.1. Related literature
2.1.1. The definition of autonomy
The concept of autonomy has been much defined as many different angles
by scholars and educational researchers (Holec, 1981; Wenden, 1987; Little, 1991;
Crookall, 1995; Benson, 2001; Cotterall, 1995; Dam, 1995; Cough & Benson, 1996;
Le, 2000; Chan, 2001; Vanijdee, 2003). One of the most common definitions of selflearning ability is of Benson 2001).
Learner autonomy is a problematic term because it is widely confused
with self-instruction. It is also a slippery concept because it is notoriously
difficult to define precisely. The rapidly expanding literature has debated, for
example, whether learner autonomy should be thought of as capacity or
behaviour; whether it is characterised by learner responsibility or learner
control; whether it is a psychological phenomenon with political implications or
a political right with psychological implications; and whether the development
of learner autonomy depends on a complementary teacher autonomy.
2.1.2. The reasons why learner autonomy
According to David Little, there are two general arguments in favour of
trying to make learners autonomous. First, if they are reflectively engaged with their
learning, it is likely to be more efficient and effective, because more personal and
focused, than otherwise; in particular, what is learned in educational contexts is more
likely to serve learners' wider agendas. Second, if learners are proactively committed
to their learning, the problem of motivation is by definition solved; although they may
not always feel entirely positive about all aspects of their learning, autonomous
learners have developed the reflective and attitudinal resources to overcome
10
temporary motivational setbacks. In the particular case of second and foreign
languages there is a third argument. Effective communication depends on a complex
of procedural skills that develop only through use; and if language learning depends
crucially on language use, learners who enjoy a high degree of social autonomy in
their learning environment should find it easier than otherwise to master the full range
of discourse roles on which effective spontaneous communication depends.
2.1.3. Ways to help language learners to become autonomous
Attempts to theorise the process of 'autonomisation' (e.g., Little 1999,
2000a, 2000b) have been strongly influenced by neo-Vygotskian psychology, which
sees learning as a matter of supported performance and emphasises the
interdependence of the cognitive and social-interactive dimensions of the learning
process. According to this model, the teacher's role is to create and maintain a learning
environment in which learners can be autonomous in order to become more
autonomous. The development of their learning skills is never entirely separable from
the content of their learning, since learning how to learn a second or foreign language
is in some important respects different from learning how to learn maths or history or
biology.
Dam's (1995) account of the gradual 'autonomisation' of teenage learners
of English in a Danish middle school provides a classic illustration. Her key
techniques are: use of the target language as the preferred medium of teaching and
learning from the very beginning; the gradual development by the learners of a
repertoire of useful learning activities; and ongoing evaluation of the learning process,
achieved by a combination of teacher, peer and self-assessment. Posters and learner
logbooks play a central role in three ways: they help learners to capture much of the
content of learning, support the development of speaking, and provide a focus for
assessment. How to support the development of learner autonomy is also a key issue
for self-access language learning schemes. Where self-access learning is not
embedded in a taught course, it is usually necessary to provide learners with some
kind of advisory service: learner counselling is central to the self-access literature. The
most successful self-access projects tend to be those that find effective and flexible
ways of supporting learners; particularly worthy of note is the approach developed at
the University of Helsinki (Karlsson et al. 1997).
Hunt, Gow & Barnes (1989) also offer guidelines for the "enhancement of
self-management skills":
11
Encourage the students to decide their own goals.
Intervene only when necessary.
Teach general rules and principles and when to apply them.
Invite students to take responsibility in the key areas of their
learning.
Enhance motivation by:
Selecting topics of intrinsic interest
Minimising external rewards
Ensuring active participation
Ensure ecological validity of tasks and settings
Give explicit feedback on the purpose and usefulness of cognitive
strategies (1989, p.212).
2.1.4. Common problems of language learners
Learning a foreign language is a attractive task, so many students spend
their entire lives trying to achieve native-like fluency. They spend much time studying
vocabulary, phrases, pronunciation, structure, and so on from textbooks. However,
despite their efforts, they still can not speak the language fluently.
NACOS began to analyze the reasons for this and found some typical
problems:
Students have only a vague goal or reason for learning the language,
which inevitably leads to a lack of motivation to study it. Also, even if
students do have a clear goal, but they study from a textbook, they will
have these same results. They lack motivation because the topics and
situations are focused on the textbook, not on the individual students. (It is
interesting to note that even many advanced language learners are not
confident about what to say or how to react in some cultural situations).
Therefore, NACOS works together with individual students to help them
find a clear direction for their studies and express themselves in their own
personal style. This creates the necessary motivation for a life-long
language experience.
Students do not realize the difficulties of learning a foreign language.
At first glance, it looks attractive and easy to obtain, but actually the
language world stretches very far. There seems to be an endless amount of
information to be learned. When language students see all of this
12
information, they become overwhelmed and feel that they can gain
confidence only after learning all of it. So, NACOS chooses a small piece
of that information which is related to the student in some way and uses it
as a focus to study the new language.
Also, many students can not organize their notes and want to acquire
new information quickly. Because of this, their valuable experiences and
hard work disappear with time. So, NACOS organizes the activities of
each student into a text booklet and advises them how to use it in their
daily lives.
2.2. Related studies
Importance of self-study has been mentioned by many research projects as well
as books and magazines. According to Boud (1988), Kohonen (1992) and Knowles
(1975), people who may be able to promote their self-study is always held the
initiative in their studies, can offer many useful ideas for the learners. Similarly, in the
opinion of Rathbone (1971), people having the ability to self-study is a positive factor
in the process of their learning and is a person deciding what happens in that process
as their subjective desire. Omaggio (1978) also made the seven attributes describing
the man having ability to self-study and many other factors contribute to the
development of this process as the learner‟s desire, motivation, learning strategies and
the perception of language is also mentioned.
It is sometimes assumed that the central research question to be answered is:
'Does learner autonomy work?' But this is to confuse 'autonomy', which works by
definition, with attempts at 'autonomisation', which can take many different forms and
may or may not succeed. Similarly misguided are attempts to measure the
development of autonomy in learners as if it could be detached from the goals and
content of learning.
For more than a decade Leni Dam and Lienhard Legenhausen have studied the
linguistic development of Dam's learners using empirical techniques derived from
second language acquisition research. They have provided a wealth of evidence to
show how and why Dam's approach is more successful than mainstream teacher-led
approaches (see, e.g., Dam and Legenhausen 1996, Legenhausen 1999a, 1999b,
1999c). Approaches that equate the process of 'autonomisation' with 'strategy training'
have been less successful: the benefits of teaching learners strategies have still to be
demonstrated.
13
Another important research question has been whether learner autonomy is an
exclusively Western cultural construct and thus alien to learners in other cultures.
There is convincing evidence to support the view that learner autonomy is a
psychological phenomenon that can transcend cultural difference, though learning
behaviour is always and inevitably culturally conditioned (see, e.g., Aoki and Smith
1999, Littlewood 2001).
2.3. Justification of the present study
The similarity between my study and the studies of the researchers above is to
investigate autonomy in language learning. The differences between my study and the
studies of the researchers above are participants. I investigated eleventh-graders at the
high school and I based on the context of learner autonomy in Viet Nam to conduct
this study.
In fact, autonomy is one of the most important factors which helps students not
only get a good result of learning but also have wide and deep knowledge. If students
only study in class without self-studying at home, it can be hard for them to get good
results. Therefore, they need to know how to self-study. However, nowadays in stead
of self-studying, students in Viet Nam often join extra English classes for better score
and they don‟t spend much time in studying at home by themselves. There are too
many extra English classes. This causes a lot of controversy. Although extra English
classes are too many, the students‟ quality of studying is not high. In contrast, the
students‟ quality of studying depends on teacher. This reality should be noticed
because students won‟t have ability to solve their problems by themselves and take
responsibility for their own decisions; especially grade-11 students are going to have
the most important exam in the following year. This is graduation exam.
Therefore, the researcher conducted this study to investigate the reality of
students‟ autonomy in English, the amount of time students spend in self-studying,
difficulties students encounter in their process of self-study. Also, this research gives
some suggestions to help students develop their abilities of autonomy to learn English
effectively and to be good at English.
14
CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY
The aim of this chapter is to describe the method of doing research. In this
chapter, I will present (1) the research questions, (2) the research design, (3) the
participants, (4) the research instruments, and (5) the procedure of the study.
3.1. Research questions
Although autonomy has become an interesting topic for many researchers during
previous years, there are few studies on high school participants. This is the reason
why the present study aims to investigate autonomy in English of high school
students. The present research aims to answer four following questions:
(1) Why do students participate in extra English class?
(2) How much time do students spend in self-studying English or when do
students self-study English?
(3) What obstacles/ difficulties do students have when they learn English by
themselves?
(4) What solutions help students promote their abilities to learn by themselves?
3.2. Research design
This study followed a qualitative approach. Wiersma (1995, in Kim, 2003)
defined the qualitative approach as an implementation for researchers that investigate
phenomena in descriptive way. The present study used the descriptive survey method
to investigate autonomy in English of high school students.
3.3. Participants
My participants include one class of grade eleven at the high school. From
results of 1st semester, I see that most 42 students are good at English because their
scores of English subject are from 7.0 to 9.3. These participants were randomly
chosen among 4 classes (2 eleventh-grade classes, 2 tenth-grade classes) I was
permitted to teach English during the time I did my practicum at the high school.
3.4. Instruments
According to McDonough and McDonough‟s (1997, p.53, cited in Kim, 2003), a
“qualitative research usually gathers observations, interviews, field data records,
questionnaires, transcripts, and so on”. Following the descriptive approach to collect
data, we take McDonough and McDonough‟s (1997) description of the qualitative
15
research as a guideline in selecting the instruments. Therefore, in the study, the
employed instrument is the questionnaire on grade-11 students‟ autonomy in English
at Chau Van Liem high school. The questionnaire was divided into 4 sections:
o (Section 1) The first eight items are used to investigate the reasons why
students participate in extra English class. Each item in part 1 includes a twopoint checklist items as follows: 1-„Yes‟, 2-„No‟.
o (Section 2) The next eight items are used to investigate the amount of time
students spend in self-studying.
o (Section 3) The next fourteen items are used to investigate the obstacles
students have when they learn English by themselves.
o (Section 4) The rest items are used to investigate the expectations students
have to help them learn English by themselves effectively.
Each item in section 2, 3 and 4 includes a five-point checklist items as
follows: 1-„Strongly disagree‟, 2-„Disagree‟, 3-„Neutral‟, 4-„Agree‟, 5-„Strongly
agree‟. However, item 16 and item 30 include a five-point checklist items as
follows: 5-„Strongly disagree‟, 4-„Disagree‟, 3-„Neutral‟, 2-„Agree‟, 1-„Strongly
agree‟ because item 16 and item 30 are different from other items.
In conclusion, the questionnaire was designed in form of a two-point scale
checklist and a five-point scale checklist for students to check () in their choices
(See Appendix 1).
Table 1 displays the items with the aim(s) underlying each item or group of
items:
Table 1: Questionnaire’s items in sections
Sections
Items
Aims
1
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
The reasons why students participate
(REASON)
in extra English class
2
9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15,
The amount of time students spend in
(TIME)
16
self-studying.
3
17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22,
The obstacles students have when they
(OBSTACLES)
23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28,
learn English by themselves.
29, 30
4
31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36,
(SUGGESTIONS) 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43
The expectations students have to help
them learn English by themselves
effectively.
16
The questionnaire was first designed in English (adapted from Benson & Völler
(1997)). However, I created the Vietnamese version of the questionnaire when
delivering to high school students to make sure that the students understand the items
of the questionnaire correctly. See Appendix 2 for this Vietnamese version. The
reliability value of the questionnaire for pilot data was computed to be .710 so it was
reliable to use on the study.
3.5. Research procedures
First, a questionnaire was designed on the background information from
literature review. Second, the questionnaire was piloted at Chau Van Liem High
school with the participants of 4 students in grade 11A2 to find out the problems of
the questionnaire. After piloting the questionnaire, I edited the questionnaire and
translated it into Vietnamese to help them understand more deeply about the items in
the questionnaire because they aren‟t English majored students. Then, the Vietnamese
version of questionnaire was handed out to 42 students in grade 11A2 at Chau Van
Liem High school. Before the students completed the questionnaire, I had given
careful instructions to them. After they had finished the questionnaire, I collected the
completed 42 questionnaires. Finally, I used SPSS 14.0 software as a tool to analyze
the data. Descriptive statistics were computed to summarize the students‟ responses in
the questionnaire.
This chapter has presented the research methodology of the study. In the
following chapter, I will present the results of this study.
17
CHAPTER IV
RESULTS
The research methodology of the study reported in this thesis was introduced in
the previous chapter. I will present overview of statistical procedure and the results of
the collected data in this chapter.
4.1. Overview of statistical procedure
4.1.1. Collecting data
The questionnaire was first given to 4 students in grade 11A2 at Chau
Van Liem High school as a pilot study. After piloting, the researcher discussed the
questionnaire with these students to improve the questionnaire. Then, the main data
was collected from 42 students in grade 11A2 at Chau Van Liem High school from
Vietnamese version of questionnaire to help them understand more deeply about the
items in the questionnaire because they aren‟t English majored students. I let students
one day to complete the questionnaire. After they had finished the questionnaire, I
collected the completed 42 questionnaires.
4.1.2. Coding students’ responses
The first eight items used a two-point scale to decode students‟ responses:
1-„Yes‟, 2-„No‟. The rest items used a five-point scale to decode students‟ responses:
1-„Strongly disagree‟, 2-„Disagree‟, 3-„Neutral‟, 4-„Agree‟, 5-„Strongly agree‟, but
item 16 and item 30 included a five-point checklist items as follows: 5-„Strongly
disagree‟, 4-„Disagree‟, 3-„Neutral‟, 2-„Agree‟, 1-„Strongly agree‟. These points were
used on SPSS analysis.
4.1.3. Computing data
After collecting data and decoding students‟ responses, SPSS (Statistical
Package for Social Science) software was used to estimate the reliability of the
questionnaire. Next, descriptive statistics for mean score of the whole questionnaire
were analyzed. Then, descriptive statistics for mean score of each part were analyzed.
Finally, descriptive statistics of each cluster of each part was used to illustrate related
issues.
18
4.2. Descriptive statistics for the whole questionnaire
Reliability analysis of the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software
showed a high reliability ( = .841). This reliable statistic affirmed the practicality of
the study.
Descriptive statistics of the mean score of the whole questionnaire in Table 2
show that the whole questionnaire receives a quite high mean score (M= 3.1789, SD=
.43161).
Table 2: Descriptive statistics for the mean score of the whole questionnaire
Total
N
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
42
1.74
3.94
3.1789
Std.
Deviation
.43161
4.3. Descriptive statistics for each research question
4.3.1.
Research question 1: Why do students participate in extra English
class?
Section 1 (Cluster 1) in the questionnaire consists of eight items. Descriptive
statistics for the mean score is presented to find out the main reason why students
participate in extra English class. The result is presented in Table 3.
Table 3: Descriptive statistics of the reasons why students participate in extra English
class
Cluster 1
N
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
25
1.25
1.88
1.5500
Std.
Deviation
.22535
Moreover, the mean score of each item in section 1 is presented, too (see
Appendix 3). It can be seen that item 1 receives the highest mean score (M= 1.92,
SD= .277) while item 4 receives the lowest mean score (M= 1.08, SD= .277). In other
words, most of students participate in extra English class to learn to deal with this
subject. They aren‟t aware of the importance and benefits of self-learning. In contrast,
only few students participate in extra English class to find the knowledge which may
be lost to keep up with new lesson.
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4.3.2.
Research question 2: How much time do students spend in self-
studying English or when do students self-study English?
Section 2 (Cluster 2) in the questionnaire includes eight items. Descriptive
statistics for the mean score is presented to discover the amount of the time students
spend in self-studying English. The result is presented in Table 4.
Table 4: Descriptive statistics of the amount of the time students spend in selfstudying English
Cluster 2
N
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
42
1.63
4.25
3.0476
Std.
Deviation
.51127
Furthermore, the mean score of each item in section 2 is presented, too (see
Appendix 4). Item 12 receives the highest mean score (M= 3.55, SD= 1.173). It means
most students only study before tests or exams. They don‟t spend much time selfstudying at home. In contrast, item 16 receives the lowest mean score (M= 2.00, SD=
1.169). It means only few students never spend time in learning English at home by
themselves.
4.3.3.
Research question 3: What obstacles/ difficulties do students have
when they learn English by themselves?
To help students to self-study more effectively, first I find out difficulties
students encounter in their process of their self-studying. Section 3 (Cluster 3) in the
questionnaire consists of fourteen items. Descriptive statistics for the mean score is
presented to find out the obstacles students have when they learn English by
themselves. The result is reported in Table 5.
Table 5: Descriptive statistics of the obstacles students have when they learn English
by themselves
Cluster 3
N
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
42
1.43
4.57
2.8656
Std.
Deviation
.64647
In addition, the mean score of each item in section 3 is presented, too (see
Appendix 5). For more details, the mean score of item 17 and item 25 receive the
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