VOCATIONAL COLLEGE STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS OF A NEWLY IMPLEMENTED ONLINE COURSE OF TEACHING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE-
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This study aims to investigate the student satisfaction with the Online English Language courses piloted for the first time at a Vocational College in a remote town located in the north-west of Turkey in 2014-2015 educational year. These courses were designed with a format of face-to-face testing and online delivery of course materials. Data were collected from students both quantitatively and qualitatively using a survey which included seven likert scale attitude questions and two open-ended questions where they had to express their opinions about either face-to-face or online courses of which they thought was more advantageous and relevant for them. Twenty three female and a hundred and eighty four male students attending ten different departments, aged mostly eighteen and nineteen years participated in our study. Quantitative data from the students indicate that while 52% of the whole participants thought that online teaching of English as a foreign language was not useful for them at all, just 6% of the students declared that the online teaching system was very useful. To the question whether they preferred online or face-to-face learning, quite surprisingly, 82% of the participants declared that they preferred face-to-face learning. As to why they preferred the particular kind of teaching; the online course proponents cited mostly “comfortness” and “no-attendance obligation”; on the other hand, the face-to-face advocates mostly cited “effectiveness of learning from a live instructor” and “possibility of asking questions when something is not clear” and “lacking of technical equipment “or “internet access”.