Investigating Yemeni University Students’ Perceptions and Collaborative Knowledge Construction Performances in a Blended Course

Abstract

This descriptive study surveyed the perceptions and the attitudes of a group of Yemeni student teachers towards technology use in a blended course (BC). It also aims at finding out whether the student teachers differ in their perceptions and attitudes towards blended learning based on their gender. The sample of the study consisted of (128) Yemeni EFL student teachers of the third level who are studying Morphology and Syntax at the Department of English in the College of Education in Sana’a University. The study attempted to answer research questions regarding (a) their perceptions about technology use in a blended classroom, and (b) if the participants’ perception about technology use differ based on their gender. The researchers collected the data via a questionnaire whose results showed positive perceptions about the face-to-face classroom and a negative attitude towards the Web course. The results of the current study showed that the highest mean average among the six domains of the attitudes towards technology use was the domain of Web course (M= 3.85), followed by the domain of Engaging (M= 3.16) and the domain of effectiveness(M= 3.05). In the fourth place came Motivation (M= 3.01) The last two domains with the lowest means were the domain of proficiency (M= 2.91) and the domain of performance (M= 2.48). Moreover, the differences between the attitudes of the male and female students were not statistically significant. The findings of the current study present some pedagogical implications and suggestions for future research studies.