A study of ELL students' engagement and participation in online education during COVID-19 pandemic

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, education has been delivered online not just in our country but around the world. Students have to face this change which impacts their learning deeply because they are used to the traditional education method. To investigate how they engage in this new education type, this thesis study tries to understand and determine the engagement levels of the students. Also, it seeks to reveal the relationship between engagement, motivation, and satisfaction, together with their attitudes towards online education. Although the universe of the study covers all students studying at the same departments, convenience sampling is utilized to determine the participants who are students studying at English Language and Literature departments at two state universities. An online questionnaire and semi-structured interviews were used to gather data. A total of 186 students responded to the questionnaire while 20 of them accepted to be interviewed. For the analysis of the data gathered through both methods, SPSS 16' was used to analyze quantitative data while content analysis was used to analyze qualitative data. The findings have revealed that ELL students have a moderate engagement level in terms of the four sub-scales; skills, emotional, participation/interaction, and performance. Additionally, it has concluded that student engagement has a positive relationship with motivation and satisfaction and that students have different attitudes towards online education which has both advantages and disadvantages in their eyes. The study also provides instructional implications, limitations, and recommendations for further research.