Teachers’ and Learners’ Attitudes Towards the Use of ICTs with Special Reference to Audiobooks to Improve Pronunciation Learning

Abstract

The present study aims chiefly at probing into teachers’ and learners’ attitudes towards the use of audiobooks as an Information and Communication tool to improve pronunciation leaning. To meet this objective, it is hypothesized that teachers and learners would hold positive attitudes towards the use of audiobooks in fostering pronunciation. It is also hypothesized that EFL teachers and learners would support audiobooks integration in English classes. To this end, two questionnaires were administered to a randomly chosen sample of 20 Algerian EFL teachers and 80 Algerian EFL students at Mohammed Seddik Ben Yahiya university, Jijel. The analysis of the aforementioned research instruments has demonstrated that nearly all teachers and students hold favorable attitudes towards the use of ICTs in general and audiobooks in particular to enhance pronunciation learning. They emphasized the vital role of audiobooks in providing an atmosphere whereby learners can listen to authentic speech while engaging in meaningful discussions simultaneously. Besides, the same vast majority of the sample under scrutiny adhered to the idea of integrating audiobooks in English learning classes. Teachers, thus, can expose their learners to authentic materials that involve the use of audiobooks with an eye to pronunciation improvement. Therefore, the research assumptions were confirmed. The findings of this current study serve as grooming ground for future research to further dive into the importance of using audiobooks for a better mastery of pronunciation