THE PERCEPTION OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT STUDENTS IN JOINING ENGLISH ONLINE CLASSES

To prevent the spread of COVID-19, schools and educational institutions were closed. Since the government requires all levels of education to conduct teaching and learning online, all aspects of education have recognized the benefits and challenges of this method. This study aims to find out the difficulties and strategies in joining online classes as perceived by English Language Education Department students. Qualitative design is applied as the research approach. The study was conducted by doing interviews with four participants selected from students of the English Language Education Department of a private university in Yogyakarta batch 2021. Findings of this research were collected from the participants who answered the above research questions. The first finding shows that there are five points of the difficulties in joining online classes as perceived by English Language Education students. The finding consists of physical difficulty, lack of motivation, difficulty in practicing a speaking skill, difficulty in listening, and unfamiliarity with online class technology. The second finding shows that there are also five findings about the strategies to overcome the difficulties in joining online classes as perceived by English Language Education Department students. There are five findings which are followed by some explanations from experts. The finding consists of self-discipline, technical aptitude enhancement, asking for help, peer learning, and self-study.