JOURNAL ARTICLE REVIEW

TITLE:  USING COMPUTER-ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING TO IMPROVE STUDENTS'                         ENGLISH LANGUAGE ACHIEVEMENT IN UNIVERSAL BASIC EDUCATION
                    https://www.dropbox.com/s/440xu6q3m9yqw4j/ijert9.pdf

JOURNAL:  INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EDUCATION RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY,                        VOL 1[1] JUNE 2010: 66-71
                      http://www.soeagra.com/ijert/ijertjune2010.htm
                 

AUTHOR:    EYIUCHE IFEOMA OLIBIE
    Eyiuche Ifeoma Olibie is currently a professor at the Department of Educational Foundations, Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka, Anambra State, Nigeria. Olibie does a lot of research related to CALL and contributes a lot to Nigerian education system.

SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE:

  The purpose of this study is to determine whether Computer-Assisted language learning (CALL) would improve students' achievement in English grammar more than Conventional English Language Instruction (CELI). This study was a quasi-experimental study that involved four intact classes of junior secondary III students. Two of the classes were randomly assigned to the experimental group while the other two were randomly assigned to the control group. The experimental group had intact class sizes of 40 and 39 students while the control group had 41 and 40 students respectively. Thus, 160 subjects participated in this study, 79 in the experimental group and 81 in the control group. Grammar Proficiency Tests was used as a method of data collection. The tests were labelled as Form A and Form B. Form A was used as pretest while Form B was used for the post test.  The test covered three grammar aspects which include subject verb-agreement, antecedent anaphor pair and shift in tense, aspect and voice. Participants were required to fill in the blanks for all of the 60 questions with the appropriate forms in the brackets. After the pretest, the study lasted eight weeks using the normal school timetable. The same teacher taught both experimental groups and 4 regular teachers observed their classes. A basic grammar programme was used. This was programmed into CD-ROM for the experimental group and in printed form to the control group. The experimental group was taught with the aid of computer while the control group was taught using the conventional method lecturing. Throughout the study, both groups used the same text and the same subject matter was covered. At the end of the treatment, the participants were given a post test. After having to compare between both Experimental group and Control group, the analysis reveals that CALL enhance students' ability to produce grammatical sentences, to accurately transform the order of constituents in grammatical units, to effectively substitute one grammatical unit for another, and to respond freely to grammatical drills more than Conventional English Language Instruction (CELI). There are many factors that made it possible for the CALL group to demonstrate competence in generative grammar. One of the factors was the availability of help and options facility in CALL programs. The students were able to request the help or option parts of the programme to learn more. This facility is absent in CELI text. Another factor was that computer provided students with immediate feedback on their performance. This encourages students to do more exercises without delay. As a conclusion, CALL did improve students' English language.

REACTION/REFLECTION

  Yes, this study does interest me. The main reason why this article had captured my attention is because of my curiosity to know whether CALL really can improve students' English language more than CELI. As I was reading the article, I was fascinated on how technology integration in language learning can improve the language within the limited time as compared to the traditional method of teaching language. Students shows great interest in learning the language when technology is integrated in the teaching and learning process.

 In my opinion, the research is well conducted in determining whether CALL can improve students' language more than CELI. The researcher used quasi-experimental design as a method for data gathering. In my opinion, this design is very suitable to see the differences of students' performances between the group that integrated technology in language learning and the group that did not integrate technology. This is because this design offers the benefits of comparison between groups. The experimental group is exposed to the treatment and the control group receives no treatment. Hence, the performance of the two groups can then be compared, after the data is collected to determine whether there was a difference in performance of the groups, after treatment ( Katheline Bradley,2013). Thus, I think that by using this design, researcher are able to see the differences between the two groups.

  The major implication of this research in teaching and learning of ESL (in general and Malaysian contexts) is the integration of technology in teaching and learning process. There are many advantages of integrating technology in classroom not only to students but also to the teachers. We know that technology is not something new nowadays as technology is considered as basic needs for human. Hence, teachers should consider to use technology as a medium in teaching the language students nowadays are so into technology. Apart from that, technology provides with many activities that the conventional method do not have. Therefore, I believe that this research can be an eye opener for all the language teachers to consider using the technology as a medium in teaching the language.