The Effects of Online Peer Tutoring on First-Year Undergraduate Students’ English Grammar Achievement

Abstract

The purposes of this research were to study the effects of online peer tutoring on the first-year undergraduate students’ English grammar achievement and to examine their satisfaction towards an online peer tutoring process. The sample used in this study consisted of 53 first-year English major students, registered for the course of English Structure 2 in Semester 2/2017. The research instruments used for data collection were pre-and post-tests, a questionnaire with a reliability of 0.84, and a semi-structured interview. The obtained quantitative data were analyzed by mean, percentage, standard deviation, and paired sample t-test, while the students’ answers from the interview were analyzed based on the qualitative analytical methods. The results  showed that the students’ English grammar achievement was significantly improved at the .01 level after the process of online peer tutoring covering five compulsory grammar points in the course syllabus, comprising conditional clause, indirect speech, causative form, transitional words, and subjunctive mood. Besides, the students’ satisfaction towards the online peer tutoring process was overall rated at a very high level as it, compared to in-class activities and a traditional teaching method, more apparently helped promote not only students’ grammatical knowledge retention, sense of responsibility, and genuine collaboration with classmates but also their motivation and confidence in using English for daily communication.