An Analysis of Student Responses to English Communication Classes during COVID

This paper presents the results from a study focused specifically on EFL classes that used a communicative language teaching (CLT) approach. The aim of the study was to explore students’ attitudes to both online and in-classroom communicative English language learning, and subsequently consider what implications these would have for student learning and teacher pedagogy. As part of a questionnaire survey administered to 327 non-English major students at a science and engineering university, an open response section was included in the survey. Participants were asked to write about their overall experience of learning communicative English both online and in the classroom. A total of 43 valid responses were received. Summative content analysis was used to identify eight main themes from the written data: Technical issues; Worksheets; Breakout rooms – benefits; Breakout rooms – problems; Online advantages; Classroom advantages; Health; and Preferences. As with the questionnaire data, analysis of the written responses showed that students clearly prefer in-class language learning. Students considered the classroom-based pedagogy to be more effective, particularly in terms of peer involvement and interaction. Findings from this study have significant implications for how students experience communicative language learning and how teachers can best enhance this experience.