THE EFL LEARNERS' ATTITUDES TOWARDS USING MOODLE AS AN LMS FOR LEARNING ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Abstract

The present study is empirical which attempts to examine the EFL tertiary learners’ attitudes towards using Moodle as an LMS in an English course of conversational listening and speaking skills. The research design is a quantitative approach to collecting and analysing the research data. Owing to the current prevalence of the pandemic Coronavirus (COVID-19), most of the Iraqi Kurdistan universities have attempted to find a way to keep the social distance and teach learners in an alternative way using different methods including E-learning, Blended Learning, and even online learning. Furthermore, due to existing large classes, the university instructors have also been attempting to increase the learners’ motivation, interaction, exposure and practice through implementing Moodle as an LMS, at least at the public universities of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region.The study aims to find out the tertiary learners’ attitudes towards using Moodle in English language learning before and after the experiment in second-year at English Department/ College of Basic Education/ Salahaddin University-Erbil for the academic year 2019-2020. For this reason, the researchers taught a group of 20 learners a 13-week conversation course via using Moodle as an LMS and Blended Learning.The study findings revealed that there was a remarkable increasing level of agreement and satisfaction in their attitudes from the pre- to post-treatment estimated by a pair-samples t-test in SPSS. It was concluded that their increasing motivation and satisfaction in their learning process while using Moodle as an LMS eventually pave the way to a more student-centred instruction.