Investigating Students’ and Teachers’ Attitudes and Perceptions toward the Implementation of Project-Based Learning in EFL Speaking Class: The Case study of Second year LMD students of English at Yahia Fares University of Medea

Abstract

The speaking skill is an important skill particularly in Foreign Language learning so that EFL learners can communicate and interact inside and outside the classroom. However, many EFL students at the university level still face some difficulties in speaking sessions to speak out and share ideas. Accordingly, Project-Based Learning is a teaching method that comes as a solution to help students practise and enhance their speaking skill. The main thrust of the present paper is to investigate second-year students’ and teachers’ attitudes and perceptions toward the implementation of ProjectBased Learning in the EFL speaking class. The study was carried out in Yahia Fares University of Medea (UM) Department of Foreign Languages (English Section), Algeria in the academic year 2019-2020. The participants of this study involved 29 second-year EFL students and 7 teachers of speaking. A descriptive research design has been employed with a cross-sectional survey to determine whether the participants have positive or negative attitudes toward this teaching method in the speaking class. Hence, two questionnaires were directed online to both the students and teachers. The gathered data were quantitatively analyzed using Microsoft Excel 2007 program. The results revealed that both learners and instructors showed positive attitudes toward the PBL method and they perceived it as an effective teaching approach to be integrated by teachers in the speaking classes in order to enhance the students’ speaking competency. Nevertheless, the teachers claimed some challenges hindering the success of PBL’s implementation. Therefore, at the end of this thesis, the researchers offered some recommendations for teachers and administrators that may in turn ameliorate and remedy the situation.