Vocational High School Students’ Emotional Experiences of English Online Learning during Pandemic

Abstract

The sudden shifting learning mode from conventional learning to prolonged online learning resulted in many challenges for educational institutions. The emotional state of the students became the root to overcome the hurdles. However, the high school students’ emotions had not gained too much attention specifically during online English learning under the health emergency situation. This Narrative Study aimed to explore the features of students’ emotional experiences and their strategies to overcome the challenges during online English learning. A semi-structural interview was conducted to obtain the data from three vocational high school students. The data analysis revealed that the students experienced positive emotions (e.g. enjoyment) which were provoked by learning style, the teacher’s attitude, the value of materials and pleasant learning environment. The negative feelings such as confusion were caused by the absence of personal contact with the teacher, connectivity problems and insufficient knowledge dealing with technology for academic purposes. This study also revealed that social support from parents, peers, teacher and school played a significant role to maintain the students’ English learning engagement during the ‘forced’ online learning.