ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING ISSUES IN MALAYSIA : LEARNERS PERCEPTIONS VIA

FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

ARTICLE REVIEW

1. FULL BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCE

English Language Teaching and Learning Issues in Malaysia : Learners Perceptions via

Facebook Dialogue Journal.

Wendy Hiew

Centre for the Promotion of Knowledge and Language Learning, Universiti Malaysia

Sabah, Malaysia

Journal of Arts Science & Commerce

ISSN 2231-4172 E-ISSN 2229-4686

Published by International Refereed Research Journal Vol.- III, Issues-1 Jan.2012[11]

Online Published: January 23, 2013

2. INTRODUCTION

2.1. Objectives

The main objective of this article is to examine the issues in English

language teaching and learning in Malaysia. In this context, this article

highlighted the learners perceptions via Facebook dialogue journal. There

are three objectives as follows :

I. To gather learners experience and views pertaining to issues

on English Language Learning problems in secondary

school, college or university;

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ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING ISSUES IN MALAYSIA : LEARNERS PERCEPTIONS VIA
FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

II. To gather learners views on English language teaching and

learning in secondary , college and university;

III. To gather learners suggestions on ways to enhance teaching

and learning.

2.2. Article Domain

There are three keywords provided in the article. The keywords are dialogue

response journal, language proficiency and language skills. Dialogue response journal

is a written communication between teacher and students, which provide natural

context for language development and a new channel of communication outside the

classroom. In this article, it is focusing on Learners language proficiency to acquire

English as a second language. In order to master English language, learners must obtain

four language skills i.e. speaking, listening, reading and writing.

Audience

The audience for this article are teachers and lecturers in secondary school,

colleges and local universities. Teachers and lecturers need to know and understand the

impediments that learners experience in learning English language.

2.3. Empirical Classification

This article can be concluded and classify as an empirical article because it

offers numerical data of respondents provided by author.

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 ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING ISSUES IN MALAYSIA : LEARNERS PERCEPTIONS VIA
FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

3. SUMMARY

Basically, this article is about collecting learners perception pertaining to their

experience in learning English Language as second language (ESL) in secondary school,

colleges and local universities. The author used dialogue journal using Facebook to generate

results. 46 respondents from public and private colleges and universities. The research

questions in this article are as follow;

I. What are the language learning problems did ESL learning problems did ESL learners

encounter in secondary school, college or university namely speaking, listening, reading,

and writing?

II. What are ESL learners views on the issues of English Language Teaching and Learning?

III. What are ESL learners suggestions to enhance the teaching and learning of English?

The finding of the research namely i.) the respondents views pertaining to the problems

they experienced in learning the four language skills, ii.) respondents general views,

comments and observations on classroom teaching and learning experience; and iii.)

respondents suggestions for teachers to enhance their teaching effectiveness and for other

learners to improve their language skills based on the respondents personal approaches.

In table 1, speaking problems and reasons among ESL learners. 18 respondents

hesitated to speak English with their teachers and friends in and/or outside the classroom

because they worried about making grammatical mistakes, felt embarrassed of their low

language proficiency, received negative physical response(smirk).

In table 2, listening problems and reasons and effects among ESL learners. 15

respondents are unable to fully understand their teachers and lecturers because of the teachers

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 ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING ISSUES IN MALAYSIA : LEARNERS PERCEPTIONS VIA
FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

and lecturers spoke too fast. Then it will lead to misunderstood their teachers and lecturers

intended meaning and instructions. They also unsure the meaning of the words so they replied

or responded inaccurately.

In table 3, reading problems, reason and effects among ESL learners. 25 respondents

are unable to fully comprehend passages and articles because encountered many unfamiliar

words so they hampered reading comprehension and fluency.

In table 4, writing problems and reasons among ESL learners. 32 respondents are

required longer period to write an essay and they are not familiar with the topics. The reasons

are because they having difficulty in pre-writing stages, writing stages and revising stages;

difficulty procuring ideas to write essay outline, constantly referring to English and bilingual

dictionaries, and online translator, difficulty to ensure sentences were grammatically correct

and sentences were arranged coherently and cohesively.

In table 5, 6 and 7 are regarding learners general views,comments, suggestion on teaching

approach and classroom activities and also reasons for learners negative perception towards

learning English.

4. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This article used a qualitative method to conduct the research by utilizing the content

analysis of journal entries written by 46 private and public college and university students.

The author created a close-group in Facebook to gather the 46 samples. the note feature

on the Facebook account was used as an alternative form of a journal. The respondents are

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 ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING ISSUES IN MALAYSIA : LEARNERS PERCEPTIONS VIA
FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

freely to share their opinion of views and suggestions pertaining to a question posted by the

author.

In the dialogue journals, the author posted three questions on the groups wall message

and the respondents wrote their views and suggestion on their personal Note. Then, the other

respondents are allowed to contribute their views and suggestions on their groups member

journal entries. This eventually evolved into a dialogue.

Subsequently, the journal entries were analysed using content analysis and categorised

according to the learners problems in learning the four language skills, learners classroom

observations, and learners suggestions to teachers and other learners on the teaching and

learning of English. Frequency count was used to score the responses.

5. FOUNDATION

The author built upon theories that learners perception towards the teaching and

learning of English is a two-way process involving teacher and learners.

6.CONTRIBUTIONS

In this article, the author provides new issues for future research in term of

teaching methodology and students behaviouristic or learning skills in acquire language

proficiency.

6. ISSUES

The author hopes to enlighten educators of arduous challenges that students faced in

learning the English language so that they may strive to improve and consolidate their teaching

skills, thus making language teaching and learning more effective and meaningful for both

teachers and students. This issues are very important as for teachers and lectures to develop

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FACEBOOK DIALOGUE JOURNAL

their teaching method and also for upgrading themselves to meet todays standard. Further

research should be done as well to figure out solutions to improve ESL learners proficiency.