The Effects of Using Designed and Developed Instructional; Website in Teaching Classical Literature

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

English classrooms across the country making use of traditional texts are now colliding with new technologies, leaving educators scrambling to figure out how to teach Classical Literature in the midst of a digital revolution. It has become the teachers' responsibility to exert more effort in making literature enjoyable and meaningful for Filipino students. In their attempt to do so, the researcher designed and developed an instructional software, specifically an instructional website that will determine if incorporating and using it in class would make teaching and learning ClassicalLiterature different, relevant and meaningful to the students.

METHODS

The study determined the effects of using designed and developed an instructional website in teaching literature among students. This entailed the use of mixed methods research such as experimentation on the innovation's effectiveness, distribution of questionnaires, and administration of focus group discussions and interviews to the respondents to determine their schema or prior knowledge on the use of the instructional website. It also required a quasi-experimental design.

RESULTS

The study yielded to the result that respondents ranged from 15 to 16 years old. However, there was 1 respondent from the female group who was just 13 years old and there was 1 respondent from the male group who was already 19 years old. The administered pretest of the researcher which was a 40-item test had a weighted mean of 26.51. The highest score in the pre-test was 36 and the lowest was 14. The same kind and number of item tests were given to the respondents as post-test with a weighted mean of 31.68. The highest score was 39 while 28 was the lowest. The result of the study showed that there is a significant difference between the pre-test and post-test scores of the group. On the focus group discussion and interview, the respondents shared that the effects of using the designed and developed instructional website as a learning aid in teaching literature are: participating in online discussion groups with their classmates is interesting and effective in learning, using the instructional website in learning activities helps build a good classroom community and develops collaboration.

DISCUSSIONS

Learning Classical Literature is an integral part of studying the English language. However, with the advent of technology, new ways of learning the language are needed by the learners. The results of the study demonstrated a positive impact of using the designed and developed instructional website in teaching Classical Literature. It can be gleaned that an instructional website as an example of Computer-assisted Language Learning was highly successful as an enhancement for traditional teaching. It also showed that the integration of technology into the classrooms considerably improved the learning and teaching of Classical Literature.