A Descriptive Study: The Students’ Difficulties and Learning Strategies Using Technology

Abstract

In Indonesian, there are many obstacles to conduct online teaching and learning processes. Firstly, the condition of teachers in Indonesia does not fully understand the use of technology, this can be seen in teachers who were born in the 1980s. One of the difficulties faced by students is the internet network. According to D’Mello et al. (2014) found that inducing difficulties and confusion in an intelligent tutoring system appeared to enhance learning. This study investigated the students’ difficulties and learning strategies using technology. The researcher used a qualitative approach with a descriptive qualitative design. The participants of this research were 25 students of the second students of The Muhammadiyah Mburak Junior High School. The participants were chosen only 4 students for interview. To explore the students’ perception of the use of questionnaires for their difficulties, an online-based questionnaire and an online-based interview were used as the methods of collecting the data. The instruments used in this research were a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview. The questionnaire used in this research was using Likert Scale, hence the data was analyzed by using a theory derived from Sugiono (2015). After analyzing the questionnaire and interview, the data obtained by the researcher are as many as 16.7% of participants chose strongly agree (SA), and 50% of participants chose to agree (A). On the other hand, there were 29'2% of participants chose to disagree (DA) and 4'2 strongly disagree (SD). Based on the above findings, some students face problems related to signal constraints when they do distance learning. To solve the problem, the teacher must convey to the students that learning can take place at any place to maintain their enthusiasm and maintain their interest in the subject. Then, the teachers establish communication and cooperation with the parents of students so that parents always remind, help, and provide guidance to their children so that they continue to study at home. Teachers also always pay attention by remembering students to keep studying at home every time they start the learning process and at night through WhatsApp (WA) messages.

Keywords: Students’ Difficulties, Learning Strategies, Technology