Research of problems for English Learners

Categories: English Language

Based on the explanation of the table above about problem, challenge and how English Learners solve it, the researcher found varieties from the answers. Despite the fact that those problems and challenges are different, the researcher still identifies some of the same problems. For instance, P5, P2 and P7 state that their biggest problem is the signal. Nowadays, it is so easy to get free Wi-Fi as what they say to cope with that problem. Yet, in some particular places the internet is not that good.

Another problem of English Learners for Digital Natives is the negatives side that we can get from internet. As P.6 states that some people misused technology for cybercrime, as well as P.4 always tries to avoid many negative things that appear on the internet such as hoax because many people will not filter or have willingness to check it out more before believing the truthiness of the news. P11 also says that internet is very open for everyone.

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In addition, for P8, P9 and P10 the technology that supposed to help people can be troublesome. P8 likes to learn things on the internet, such as e-learning but it also can be tiring for him because he has to look at the screen all the time which is not good for our health. P9 and P10 agree say that people rely on smartphone too often. P9 assumes that sometimes it disturbs her to do her job because she often gets distraction from smartphone, and P10 believes that smartphone quite often makes people forget the surrounding because too focus in their own world.

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One more problem for P11 and P12 is the language. Although they are from English Education Department, yet most technology uses English and it is quite difficult for them to comprehend. Some solve this problem by simply looking up the meaning of the words on the internet. Similarly, for the most part those English Learners' challenges are lack of vocabulary that they need to enrich. Almost all of the participants can solve their problem and difficulties by looking up on the internet or ask some friends to help.

B. Research Findings

The researcher presents the research finding based on the discussion of data analysis above. In this research, the researcher carries the objectives of the research those are to find out the problem which are encountered by English learners for Digital Natives and how Digital Natives overcome the problems and challenge.

In the beginning of this research, the researcher gave the questionnaire to the students. This questionnaire aimed to know the highest level of Digital Natives for English Learners. There were fifty-three students that followed in this research. Based on the table 4.2 in this research, there are thirteen findings of Digital Natives students' highest in English Education Department batch 2017 of IAIN Salatiga.

1. Engage with Technology

In this point, the researcher delivers English learners experience dealing with technology. Based on the participants' answer in questionnaire mostly English learners' answer yes and the rest is maybe. None of them says no. In the interview, there are thirteen participants that divided into three groups. The first group is the earliest ones who get in touch with technology since they were in the elementary school. The second one is start from junior high school and the last one is senior high school. On the whole, the majority of them start to have their own gadget, computer, and social networking account since they were in the junior high school. These findings fit to the definition of Digital Natives as proposed by Prensky (2001:1- see chapter 2).

2. Frequency of Using Digital tools and Connecting to online world

In the form questionnaire and interview, the participants answer that they use digital tools and connect to online world more often instead of discussing about the use of technology itself.

3. Experiences with Technology to learn English

Based on the result of the interview, the participants likewise express the variation that they use to learn English. The most familiar features from the participants are look up English difficult words on digital dictionary, according to Sulistyo (2016:4) English in Indonesia is more likely to be taught and learnt only as a foreign language different from neighbouring countries such as Singapore, Hong Kong, and Malaysia because English is widely spoken as a second language. It also means that learning English in Indonesia takes place mostly in classrooms, rather than during daily communication. So obviously, they vary in English language proficiency as well. Besides, P3 and P10 learn English with English songs from the internet, and P9 and P10 also learning English through games. In addition, the only participant is P4 who has experienced joining online course to learn TOEFL.

4. Problems and Challenge of English Learners For Digital Natives

To response this research question, the researcher carries out the answer into several points. How problem and challenge of English Learners can be seen from the participants' result of questionnaire and interview, and how the participants solve their own problem during their learning English with technology. Besides that, the researcher also presents about how technology can improve their English skill.

a. Problem of English Learners For Digital Natives

The major problem of the participants is the internet connection. Based on the interview of the problem, answered by P5

"My biggest problem dealing with technology in this era is the signal; it is so difficult to get a fast signal in some places"

Another participants P2 said

"I got slow internet connection".

It means that some places in Indonesia, especially in Java island though many kinds of facilities are already provided, the internet connection is still the problem for some people.

A different problem stated by P1,P3, and P4 that the negatives side that we can get from internet. As P6 states that some people misused technology for cybercrime, as well as P.4 always tries to avoid many negative things that appear on the internet such as hoax because many people will not filter or have willingness to check it out more before believing the truthiness of the news. P11 also says that internet is very open for everyone. These finding fit with (Livingstone, 2009) explained that the use of technology among young people is often far more passive, solitary, sporadic and unspectacular than expected. Largely restricted to very specific passive uses for most people (e.g. game playing, messaging, social media, retrieval of online content) (Crook and Harrison, 2008; Luckin et al., 2009; Lenhart et al., 2007). Undoubtedly, if the use of technology only passive and not as it is expected, it can be dangerous.

Furthermore, P9 explained

"My biggest problem in dealing with technology in this era is the dependence with a smartphone. When using a smartphone will not forget and cannot be separated with a Smartphone for a while if you don't have a smartphone then my mind will be focused on smartphones and it lead to my dependency."

Then, P10 also stated

"My biggest problem in dealing with technology is much people who like play with the gadget and forget with our Environment and that is not good".

It lined with the learning styles of digital native are limited to the learning style related to the use of technology information and communication in their learning process. The development of technology with many kind of gadgets makes us worry that digital native generation are not being able to learn productive because of the existence of some communication tools these days. For instance, when they study at home their smartphones will always be around them and frequently, they access it (Unpad Press, 2016).

b. Challenge of English Learners For Digital Natives and How to Encounter

Based on the research that has been done by the researcher from interviewing the participants, generally those English Learners' challenges are lack of vocabulary that they need to enrich. P4 said

"Some challenge learning English with technology: I get new vocab, less self-confidence to express in front of other people, and limited time for studying English."

While P12 explained

"For this time I just feel sometimes can't understand some vocabularies at all, so I have to open dictionary to understand it well."

At that point, P8 learns more about digital literacy, he stated

"The challenges are, it would be so curious to learn more about English. When I've one source, it doesn't enough, then I curious to learn from other sources, looking for many sources, many e-teacher, e-excersise, etc. Another challenge is when my friends has something in English e-learning, it makes me challenged to have many things in e-learning then I don't want to lose by my friend."

It related to Bennett & Kervin (2008) argue this suggests that students' everyday technology practices may not be directly applicable to academic tasks, and so education has a vitally important role in fostering information literacies that will support learning. However, Selwyn (2009) claims as such the digital native are often portrayed as autonomous and highly sociable. Much has been written, for example, about the importance in young people's lives of digital cultures of communal creativity via Web 2.0 tools such as social networking sites, wikis and virtual worlds.

In addition, P11 said

"Kesulitan dalam pengoperasiannya, karena kurangnya pelajaran tentang teknologi, lingkungan sekitar yang memang kurang akan penggunaan teknologi modern (gaptek)

"The difficulty is how to operate because there is no lesson about technology, surrounding environment that lack of the use modern technology."

It bonds, as noted by Lorenzo & Dzuiban (2006:2), concerns over students' lack of critical thinking when using Internet based information sources imply that "students are not as net savvy as we might have assumed"

Almost all of the participants can solve their problem and difficulties by looking up on the internet or ask some friends to help. P1 as the representative of the other participants who had the most likely answer said

"I'm not certain, if the problem about my homework, I think, i can solve that problem, currently I can use Google translate for search many word is don't known,, and if the problem about our activities that we should to communicate with English, I think..I'll try to ask someone to guides the sentence that I don't know."

It attaches to Digital Literacy which means as the skill required to achieve digital competence (The Government of Malta, 2015:8) is a must have skill for Digital Natives. For the reason that as ALA (2011) explains the types for digitally literate person are possess the variety of skill, able to use divers technologies, and understand the relationship between the technology and lifelong learning.

Updated: Nov 01, 2022
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Research of problems for English Learners. (2019, Nov 17). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/research-of-problems-for-english-learners-essay

Research of problems for English Learners essay
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