Russian language needs among university students in Malaysia

Nikitina, Larisa and Mar, Ma Tin Cho and Furuoka, Fumitaka (2018) Russian language needs among university students in Malaysia. Problems of Education in the 21st Century, 76 (5). pp. 693-705. ISSN 1822-7864,

Full text not available from this repository.
Official URL: http://www.scientiasocialis.lt/pec/node/files/pdf/...

Abstract

In the context of higher education foreign language courses are viewed as skills-oriented subjects that aim to enable students to communicate in a foreign language. The main four language skills to be developed are listening, speaking, reading and writing. Until recently, decisions about which of the linguistic skills should be emphasized in a foreign language program have been taken without seeking the opinions of language learners. To address this issue, the present research examined needs for learning the Russian language among students in a Malaysian public university. To achieve this research aim, a survey questionnaire was distributed among prospective learners of Russian. Four different statistical methods were performed to analyse the data, namely, the descriptive statistics, the independent t-test, the exploratory factor analysis and the reliability test. The findings from the descriptive statistics revealed that the respondents considered developing face-to-face interactive skills, such as the speaking and listening skills, as most important. The findings of the t-test suggested that demographic variables might have some influence on the students' perceptions of the skills' importance. For example, the students who spoke Malay at home placed a higher value on developing their ability to speak in a polite manner and to understand non-verbal communitive acts, such as gestures. The results of the exploratory factor analysis revealed that the language skills as perceived by the students formed several dimensions where interactive and non-interactive skills tended to form distinct clusters. This research concludes with a discussion of pedagogical implications to be drawn from the findings.

Item Type: Article
Funders: UNSPECIFIED
Uncontrolled Keywords: higher education; language needs; Malaysia; Russian language
Subjects: P Language and Literature > PG Slavic, Baltic, Albanian languages and literature
Divisions: Faculty of Languages and Linguistics
Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic & International) Office > Asia-Europe Institute
Depositing User: Ms. Juhaida Abd Rahim
Date Deposited: 07 May 2019 03:03
Last Modified: 07 May 2019 03:03
URI: http://eprints.um.edu.my/id/eprint/21126

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item