English Teachers’ Attitude and Challenges in Facing Immediate Online Teaching: A Case Study in Vietnam

Abstract

Background and Purpose: Early 21st century saw great changes in all fields of life due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Education worldwide has to suffer from many difficulties when schools are forced to close down for safety. In Vietnam, online teaching has been applied in most of cities and provinces where COVID-19 pandemic has been serious. The implementation of remote teaching in a large quantity of schools was first seen in 2021. However, not many studies have been found on massive immediate online teaching. Due to the fact that a thorough understanding of online teaching in English language teaching is necessary for better online teaching to be delivered in the near future, this study aims to investigate English teachers’ attitudes towards online teaching and their challenges.
 
 Methodology: This study was designed as a qualitative case study. Nine English teachers from the primary schools and high schools were invited to participate in the semi-interviews. The research instrument used was the in-depth interviews, in which the questions were adapted from the previous studies. Data were generated using codes and analysed in themes.
 
 Findings: The findings revealed that COVID-19 is the main factor forcing English teachers to equip themselves with knowledge and skills for online teaching. It was found that English teachers in Vietnam were reluctant to conduct remote language teaching due to the lack of knowledge and skills of integrating technology in education, facilities, teaching condition, and parents’ interference.
 
 Contributions: The study concludes that English teachers in Vietnam experience hardship with the remote teaching and their challenges. With such understanding, it is suggested that instant support for teachers and continuous training should be provided to reduce the hardship and improve teachers’ skills in conducting online teaching.
 
 Keywords: English teaching, online teaching, teachers’ attitude, teacher training, educational technology.
 
 Cite as: Vo, T. K. A. (2022). English teachers’ attitude and challenges in facing immediate online teaching: A case study in Vietnam. Journal of Nusantara Studies, 7(2), 495-511. http://dx.doi.org/10.24200/jonus.vol7iss2pp495-511

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“…On the other hand, most of the teacher participants in 3 out of 24 studies exhibited negative perceptions on digital tools (Abugohar et al, 2019;Foltyn & Polok, 2022;Kim Anh, 2022). There are also studies which focused on how teachers perceived online teaching, deficiency in terms of technical support provided and digital literacy knowledge the teachers possessed had impeded them from being supportive to the use of digital tools (Kim Anh, 2022;Foltyn & Polok, 2022). Furthermore, it was also discovered that the teacher's perception was rather significantly correlated with their digital literacy skills (Afrilyasanti et al, 2022;Meirovitz et al, 2022).…”

“…It was revealed that English language teachers' computer readiness and their beliefs about technology significantly influence their perceptions of using digital tools. Teachers with higher levels of computer readiness and positive beliefs about technology are more likely to perceive digital tools as beneficial for language teaching (Canals & Al-Rawashdeh, 2019;Kim Anh, 2022;Foltyn & Polok, 2022). Teachers who had prior experience and better familiarity with digital tools demonstrated a higher level of confidence in incorporating them into their teaching.…”

“…Challenges such as limited access to equipment and support, lack of guidelines from the Ministry of Education, limited collaboration and guidance and lack of resources were also identified (Foltyn & Polok, 2022;Nguyen, 2022). The scarcity of appropriate digital tools, limited access to relevant materials and insufficient technical support poses significant barriers to English teachers' digital tools' integration efforts (Foltyn & Polok, 2022;Nguyen, 2022;Kim Anh, 2022).…”

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