Education 4.0 : an evaluation of students’ attitudes towards using mobile applications for english language learning

Abstract

The study entitled “Education 4.0: An Evaluation of Students’ Attitudes towards Using Mobile Applications for English Language Learning”, a mixed-method research, aims to find out what are the students’ attitudes towards the use of mobile assisted in language learning, what factors result in the acceptance and the use of mobile applications for English language learning, and what are the application features responding to the students’ needs. The participants in this study were selected based on the convenience sampling method. They were undergraduate students studying at the tertiary level from the first-year to the fourth-year in the Faculty of Liberal Arts, Rajamangala University of Technology Phra Nakhon, in the academic year of 2020. The total number of participants was 131 university students. The research instruments used for data collection was questionnaire which can be divided into four parts as follows: Part 1 general information, Part 2 mobile applications used for English language learning, Part 3 factors affecting the acceptance and the use of mobile applications for English language learning, and Part 4 open-ended questions for additional information and suggestions so as to develop the features of mobile assisted in English language learning responding to the students’ needs. The data obtained from the questionnaire were divided into two types. The quantitative data, such as the scores from 4-point Likert scale, were analyzed by using descriptive statistics, for example, frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation. In addition to the qualitative data, the students’ written opinions were analyzed by using textual analysis, word clouds and sentiment analysis of users’ attitudes towards the use of mobile applications for English language learning. Most participants in this study were female university students whose age ranged from 18 to 22 years old. These participants filled in the four rating scale questionnaire: 4 strongly agree, 3 agree, 2 disagree and 1 strongly disagree to report their attitudes towards the use of mobile applications for English language learning. The results of the study showed that most participants frequently used Youtube and Facebook to develop their vocabulary. The individual factors such as gender, age, and English language proficiency were not correlated with the acceptance and the use of mobile application for English language learning. The participants also reported that they strongly agreed on the performance expectancy and the perceived usefulness with a low to moderate correlation in each factor. According to the descriptive analysis and textual analysis, the results reported that these university students showed positive attitudes towards the use of mobile applications for English language learning because it was easy, fast and could access information quickly. One possible explanation for this was their age group. These participants were the members of generation Z, who were born with innate digital literacy and the advancement of technology. They were also familiar with social media. However, one of the limitations in the study was data analysis since the results of sentimental analysis and textual analysis might be influenced by word segmentation approach. For the content of English, the differences between general English and English for Specific Purposes did not result in any decisions on using the mobile application for English language learning.