Learners’ attitude towards English language learning in the Bangladeshi Madrasa context

Abstract

In Bangladesh, the English language is considered a foreign language, and unofficially its usage is very elaborate in practice. However, Bangladesh is a monolingual country, and English has the second-language status in private offices, conversations, etc. So, learning English is very important for students in Bangladesh. Among the educational stream in Bangladesh, there are three major streams in Bangladesh, and the Madrasa stream is one of them and one of the most significant streams. According to some studies, English language proficiency among the Madrasa students is very weak compared to the other two streams of Bangladesh. Other streams follow and maintain much more advanced and suitable ways of teaching, while the Madrasa sector needs to improve their performance in teaching the English language. Improving and advancing teaching methods and techniques also affect learners’ attitudes towards learning a particular language, especially in the context of the Bangladeshi English learning process. This paper analyses the Madrasa learners’ attitude towards English language learning. Both qualitative and quantitative methods were conducted for data with 137 students and four English Teachers from two big cities, one town, one Upazila and one village. The findings were positive among students. They showed interest in learning English, but some behavior norms and facilities created problems for their better performance. It shows their positive and negative concern and other emotional sentiment connected with English learning. At the end of the paper, way of implications and some suggestions will be discussed.