Payung Cedar, Ph.D.
Department of Western Languages
at
Naresuan University,
Phitsanulok,
Thailand

Classroom vs. E-Learning English for Nursing Purposes

One of the most debated issues on the use of the Internet for foreign language learning is whether it is more efficient than classroom teaching, and how certain students perceive or react on it. This study is an attempt to demonstrate the use of the Internet for teaching 30 sets of professional English conversation to a class of nursing students at a university in northern Thailand, compared with the routine techniques used in classroom settings. The students were divided into two groups (15:16) with similar proficiency levels and English study experience, based on their pretest score taken three weeks prior to the lessons (Mean = 21.9 : 21.56). Students in both groups were informed that they would have a posttest after their study and the score would be included in the evaluation for their achievement. One group studied the conversation sets in a classroom where face-to-face interactions such as explanations, drills, simulated situations and discussion were provided. It took three sessions, two hours each, one session per week. During the three full weeks, students in the other group were given a username and a password in order to study the same conversation sets on their own via the Internet. The same recordings and written explanations were given.

Based on the achievement scores obtained from the pretest and posttest, the results showed that students in both groups did better in the posttest than in the pretest (16 % difference in the E-learning group and 21% difference in the classroom group). T-tests also showed the statistically significant difference between the pretest scores and posttest scores in the two groups (t = 7.956 , p <.001 for the classroom learning group, and t = 7.491 , p <.001 for the E-learning group). Interestingly, there was no significant difference between the posttest scores of the control group and the experiment group. Additionally, the study investigated the attitudes of students in both groups to the teaching methods used.

The crucial results indicated that most students (93.33%) found that E-learning was convenient for their study-time management. To conclude, the study showed that while students in the E-learning group did not generally score better than those in the traditional study group, they do not do worse. In addition, many students enjoyed and recommended this method, indicating that it could be motivational and enhance traditional methods of instruction. The presentation will demonstrate how the classroom was organized, and how the program was designed and utilized, together with the results and discussion in detail.

Presenter
Payung Cedar is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Western Languages at Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, Thailand. Her research interest is in the fields of English, TESOL, TEFL, Linguistics and Applied Linguistics. She has been teaching English and Linguistics for 10 years.