Interdisciplinary education has been drawing attention as one of important educational methods to nurture creative convergence talents needed in our society today. Interdisciplinary education, which creates new knowledge and value by integrating vario...
Interdisciplinary education has been drawing attention as one of important educational methods to nurture creative convergence talents needed in our society today. Interdisciplinary education, which creates new knowledge and value by integrating various subjects, is also highly emphasized in the ‘2015 Revised Curriculum’ in Korea. However, interdisciplinary classes are not actively being implemented in middle schools and there is not much research on them. Therefore, it is necessary to systematically implement interdisciplinary classes and analyze their effects.
This study aims to analyse whether there are differences in middle school students’ English class satisfaction and students’ self-efficacy for English between a group that has taken Interdisciplinary English classes and one that has taken standard English classes.
In this study, the following research questions were investigated and verified.
1. Is the level of English class satisfaction higher in the group with the interdisciplinary English Classes than in the group with the standard textbook-based English class?
2. Is the level of self-efficacy for English higher in the group with the interdisciplinary English classes than in the group with the standard textbook-based English class?
In order to address these research questions, "Attitude to Interdisciplinary English Class Scale(AIECS)" was used to secure homogeniety between the experimental and control groups before the experiment. "Self-efficacy on English Scale(SES)" were developed based on comprehensive literature reviews and consultations with experts. "English Class Satisfaction Scale(ECSS)" by Baek et al(2018) was used to measure English class satisfaction. The AIECS consists of 'Significance', 'Favorability', and 'Confidence'. The ECSS consists of 'Goal(objective)', 'Content', and 'Method' and 'result'. The SES consists of 'Self-efficacy for Learning English' and 'Self-efficacy for Applying English'. All three scales showed good Cronbach's α as well as good construct validity.
The subjects of the study were 153 first-year students (65 in the experimental group and 88 in the control group) who were attending K Middle School (a coeducational school) in North Chungcheong Province, Korea. To check the effectiveness of the interdisciplinary English class, the interdisciplinary English classes were conducted for the experimental group for four weeks (a total of 11 sessions) starting in April 2019, and for the control group, standard textbook-based English classes were conducted. On both groups, attitude to interdisciplinary English class was measured in advance, and English class satisfaction and self-efficacy for English were measured after the experiment.
The main findings are as follows.
First, English class satisfaction of the group that received the interdisciplinary English class was statistically significantly higher than that of the group that received the standard English class (t=3.251, p<.001).
Second, self-efficacy for English of the group that received the interdisciplinary English class was statistically significantly higher than that of the group that received the standard English class (t=6.139, p<.001).
These results suggest that the interdisciplinary English class is more effective in improving English class satisfaction and self-efficacy for English than the standard textbook-based class, and that it is necessary to implement interdisciplinary English classes more actively.
However, since these results are from a limited number of students in one middle school, it is hard to generalize them. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out systematic and comprehensive research on more schools and students, for a longer period.