Senior High School Students Emotional Experiences, Obstacles, and Ways to Overcome the Obstacles of Online English Learning during COVID-19 Pandemic: A Narrative Study

Abstract

The covid-19 pandemic has changed almost all aspects of human life, including the economy, social structure, and education. In Indonesia, schools and universities also have experienced significant changes in the system of the instructional process up to the present time. This shift has happened in all courses, including English language teaching and learning. Students may experience positive and negative changes in their emotional aspects during online language learning due to the cessation of social interaction with peers and teachers. Besides, they also might encounter obstacles in which students have never experienced before. To know students‟ experiences of online learning, the present study aimed to explore the senior high school students‟ emotional experiences of online English learning, to describe the obstacles they experience, and to know some ways they overcome the obstacles. I conducted this research at a state senior high school in Jember by involving three participants of XI MIPA 1. This research used a narrative study to explore the story or personal experience directly from the participants. In collecting the data, I employed semi-structured interviews with the students. In analyzing the data, I employed thematic analysis by following the steps of transcribing the data, coding the data, categorizing the data, finding and analyzing themes. The research findings identified three themes: (1) Students‟ emotional experiences conveying positive and negative emotions, (2) Students‟ obstacle, and (3) Students‟ ways to overcome the obstacles. The findings of the first theme reported three aspects; flexibility, control, and analysis experience (positive and negative). Positive emotion (such as happiness) was due to the freedom to choose the convenient place, shorter learning duration, the teacher‟s way in delivering the material, the teaching media employed by the teacher, rich learning resources on the internet, scores gained in online learning, and desire to get a satisfactory final result. Meanwhile, the negative emotion (such as sadness) was commonly caused by lack of social interaction with peers, inconvenience of quiz schedule, lack of lesson meeting intensity, monotonous learning activity which lower the interaction between students, inconvenience to contact with the teacher online, and network problems Concerning students‟ obstacles, the findings indicated three aspects: (1) technological issue in which students experienced wi-fi network problem and a lack of electronic devices, (2) cognitive issues where students experience non-optimal knowledge, overloading homework, and lack of feedback, (3) social issue where students show a surprise finding where they do not experience any obstacle about the support from around people. And to overcome such obstacles: (1) ways to overcome technological issue, (2) ways to overcome cognitive issue, and (3) other ways to overcome cognitive issue, students were helped by the support of family, peers, school institution, and internet utilization. They also tried to make peace with own self to overcome their obstacles.