High level Students’ Perception of online English learning activities at Eight Grade in SMP Islam Ma’arif 02 Sukun Malang

Abstract

This study presents high level students' perceptions of online English learning activities. Online learning is a process where students and teachers carry out teaching and learning activities remotely. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, almost every country experienced the impact of the Covid-19 outbreak, including in the field of education and learning. Therefore, in situations like this online learning is very important, because of Covid-19 the government makes regulations to not conduct face-to-face learning, but learning is done online. In previous research, most of the focus was on how students perceive online learning and how students perceive the use of platforms during online learning. However, no previous studies used high-level students' perceptions of online English learning activities. While this study aims to find out and describe the perceptions of high-level students towards online English learning activities, in class VIII students of SMP Islam Ma'arif 02 Sukun Malang. The design of this research is descriptive qualitative research. The participants in this study were class VIII students of SMP Islam Ma'arif 02 Sukun Malang in the 2022 academic year, totaling 17 students who got the highest semester final exam scores in English. To find out the high-level students' perceptions of online English learning activities, questionnaires and interviews were used as instruments to collect data. In this study, perceptions were shown in the responses to the questionnaire given to students about online English learning activities which included five indicators: student interest in online English learning activities, effectiveness of online English learning activities, teacher ability in online English learning activities, student involvement in online English learning activities and barriers in online English learning activities. The data analysis process includes data reduction, data presentation, as well as drawing conclusions and verification. The findings of this study indicate that high-level students' perceptions of online English learning activities are positive in several aspects such as students feeling happy and enjoying online English learning activities. In addition, students are also very active in learning English even though it is held online, active participation of students such as being active in class, often doing assignments and often asking the teacher and students also have no obstacles at all when learning English activities are carried out online. Only a small number of students stated that online English learning was less effective because students found it difficult to understand the media provided by the teacher. In addition, students stated that the teacher's ability in online English learning activities was less creative because the teacher only gave videos during the teaching and learning process. High-level students' perceptions of online English learning activities showed that the online learning was carried out effectively. However, the researcher found some negative perceptions during online English learning activities that did not go as expected because some students said that learning English online was difficult to understand the material. This research is expected to be useful for future researchers and can also be a reference for future researchers who are interested in the field of high-level students' perceptions of online English learning activities.

Keywords: High level, Students’ Perception, Online learning, English Activities