A Survey Study On Online English Learning Autonomy Of Junior High School Students During COVID-19 Pandemic

At the end of 2019,the new coronavirus pneumonia(COVID-19)broke out in our country and spread rapidly,causing all schools have to postpone the start of spring semester.The Ministry of Education advocated“suspended class,ongoing learning”,online teaching was adopted from basic education to higher education,which lasted about one semester.Online English learning is different from offline English learning,and its learning effect largely depends on students’ learning autonomy.At present,the online and offline blended teaching develops rapidly,which also requires students to have better autonomous learning abilities.At the same time,New English Curriculum Standard proposed attaching importance to students’ autonomous learning abilities and emphasized the importance of English learning autonomy.Therefore,the study of students’ English learning autonomy is of great significance.On the basis of the theories of humanistic,cognitive constructivism,and self-regulated learning,this research investigates the autonomy of the second-year students of Hohhot Experimental Middle School in online English learning during the COVID-19 pandemic,and tries to answer the following questions:(1)What is the situation of Hohhot experimental middle school students’ online English learning autonomy during COVID-19 pandemic?(2)What are the factors that influence Hohhot experimental middle school students’ online English learning autonomy during COVID-19 pandemic?In order to answer the above two research questions,225 students and12 English teachers in the eighth grade of Hohhot Experimental Middle School were selected as the research subjects.And the investigation method was adopted to collect data through questionnaires and interviews.Questionnaires were distributed to 225 students in four randomly selected classes,12 eighth-grade students and 12 eighth-grade teachers were selected for interviews.Consequently,the study shows that during COVID-19 pandemic,the students’ online English learning autonomy in Hohhot Experimental Middle School was generally at a medium level.The main factors that affecting the autonomy of online English learning of Hohhot Experimental Middle School students during COVID-19 pandemic are students’ subjective initiative,students’ self-management abilities,electronic equipment and teaching platforms.Based on the above research results,several suggestions are put forward for improving students’ autonomy in online English learning:(1)Firstly,teachers should pay attention to and bring students’ own subjective initiative into full play.(2)Secondly,it is very necessary for teachers to help students improve their self-management abilities.(3)Thirdly,teachers need pay attention to the use of electronic equipment and teaching platforms and then try to optimize online teaching mode.(4)Finally,teachers need pay more attention to students’ learning motivations and learning methods,because these two aspects are weaknesses for students.