Declaratoria de protección de la Denominación de Origen mezcal

Hypothesis 18 was to examine whether student achievements in the English course changed throughout an entire academic year consisting of two semesters. In this study, students took two examinations in the first week of the first semester; one was to assess their listening ability and the other was to assess their reading ability, the average of these two examinations formed the pre-test scoring. Following this, in the last week of the second semester the students were required to take the second test in which their listening ability and reading ability were measured, the average of these two tests formed the post-test scoring.

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Table 7.11 The mean of pre and post test

Level Class Pre-test avg. Post-test avg. Advanced Level 1 1 1 1 X6 78 81 X8 76 79 X14 77 79 X19 70 73 Higher Intermediate Level 2 X4 66 71 2 X5 63 68 2 X10 70 73 2 X12 58 68 2 X15 62 73 2 X18 66 69 Intermediate Level 3 X1 43 54 3 X2 63 67 3 X3 33 47 3 X7 54 63 3 X9 50 62 3 X11 45 62 3 X13 49 57 3 X16 39 51 3 X17 57 63

Thus, in order to compare student language learning achievements between two different phases (pre-test and post-test), a paired-sample t-test was conducted to see if there was a significant difference in student listening scores, reading scores and the overall scores (the pre-test and post-test). The findings revealed that the means of post-test results were higher than the pre-test scores, and there were significant differences between the two variables.

The paired-samples t-test was conducted to compare student achievement in two different phases: pre-test scoring and post-test scoring (table 7.12). From this there was found to be a significant difference between pre-test and post-test. The mean of the post-test scoring was higher, and a paired-sample t-test revealed that scores were greater for the post-test sub-scale (M=66.31, SD=9.55) than for the pre-test scores (M=58.87, SD= 13.22). It is shown that the differences between the two tests were significant (t(19)=7.36, p<0.000).

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Table 7.12 T-test output of test results

Mean Difference SD t df Sig. (2-tailed) Proficiency Test 7.43381 4.40157 7.362 18 .000 Listening 10.51635 3.36860 13.608 18 .000 Reading 4.30485 6.65931 2.818 18 .011

Additionally, the second pair-samples t-test further compared the listening section across the two different phases, and the results indicated that the scores on post-listening sub-scale (M=63.87, SD=12.06) were higher than scores on the pre-listening sub-scale (M=53.35, SD=13.49). These differences in the listening scales were again considerable (t(19)=13.60, p<0.000). Furthermore, there was only a marginal difference in the reading section of the two different phases. A paired-sample t-test indicated that scores were higher for the post-test sub-scale (M=68.73, SD=7.46) than for the pre-test sub-scale (M=64.42, SD= 13.45). These differences were relatively minor (t(19)=2.81, p<.011), and the findings supported the prediction of Hypothesis 19 that the differences between the two tests are significant.

A closer look at the data, however, reveals a more complex discovery, one where students in different levels of grouping performed differently in the post-test. In general, the achievements for students from the three different levels showed positive improvements, that is, all of the students in different ability groups performed better in their second test. It was indicated that a greater level of progress was found for students in the lower level (intermediate level), while the level of progress in higher ability groups was not as significant as the lower ability groups.

The average pre-test scoring for the nine intermediate level classes (X1, X2, X3, X7, X9, X11, X13, X16, X17) was 47.95 while the average post-test scoring was 58.33, which was an improvement of 23.5%. In addition, the average scoring of the pre-test in the six higher-intermediate level classes (X4, X5, X10, X12, X15, X18) was 64.21, and the students in this group improved their results by 9.88% after their second test. For the students in the four advanced level class (X6, X8, X14, X19), the progress was found to be the smallest (3.5%) with the average scores of the pre-test and the post-test being 75.48

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and 78.165 respectively. The findings of this study demonstrate a clear trend with regards to ability grouping in terms of student academic achievement. Students in the higher language level made a smaller degree of improvement than those in the lower level.

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CHAPTER EIGHT

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

8.1 Overview

Previous research studies on student language learning motivation have already shown a link between learner motivational beliefs and their academic achievement (Belenky& Nokes-Malach, 2012; Dornyei, 2001a, 2001b, 2005; Elliot, 2005; Pintrich, 2001; Pintrich and Schunk, 1996; Richey et al., 2014). However, these motivational variables concerned in these studies are based on a single motivation variable examining student learning. Currently, there have been only a few studies that have begun to investigate the effectiveness of integrating two or more motivational variables in order to have a better depiction of learner behaviour as well as their achievement. Due to the limited data, the present research aims to combine several motivational variables, which are frequently investigated in motivation research in order to examine student language learning. Thi s chapter synthesizes the findings with the previous literature and further discusses the results in the present research. The implications for the future research are also discussed in this section, and it is followed by the discussion of the strengths and the limitation of this research.

8.2 Discussion of motivational variables