FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE

 
 
 
 

MASTER THESIS

“Challenges of Kosovo English Professors and Students in Teaching and Learning Idioms”
Case Study: the first and the second year students from the AAB College English Department
 
 
 
Candidate: Mentor:
 
Borëbardhe Rraci Dr. Sc. Mirsad
Suhodolli
 
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I'd like to express my heartfelt gratitude and

I dedicate my dissertation work to my parents and affection to my advisor, Dr.Sc. Mirsad Suhodolli,
brothers, who have always supported and who has a forward-thinking approach in the field of
encouraged me, even when I had lost faith in my ELT and has been a great mentor in life and
ability to continue and complete this project. through my studies with his wisdom. Even when I
Thank you a million lost hope, he guided and motivated me to do my
times... best and led me in the right direction. This thesis
To my beloved, who appeared out of nowhere in would not have been possible without his unending
front of me and altered the course of my life encouragement and assistance.
journey in the hope that everything will be fine with This thesis, as well as all of my academic studies,
him in our shared future. would not have existed if I had not had a father who
I love you a billion times... was always critical, forcing me to think outside the
box. I will always be grateful to you.
 01. Purpose Table of 03. Objectives
The main aim of this
contents
The main objectives of this study
research paper is to are:1.To find out more on the .
challenges on teaching and learning
study the challenges that
teachers and students 02. Hypothesis idioms.
2.To analyze the tools that are used
encounter while teaching H1. Students are not motivated enough to help professors and students
overcome obstacles in teaching and
and learning idioms and to learn idioms due to the learning idioms.
their opinions about how inappropriate techniques and 3.To study the role of motivation in
motivated they are in this methods used by their professors; learning idioms by students.
H2. The right tools and methodology 4.To provide a methodological
aspect and to determine that are used by professors in proposal based on the results
the degree of motivation teaching usually help students
achieved to reflect the most
important factors affecting student
04. Methodology overcome challenges in learning motivation.
idioms.
05. Conclusions
To achieve the objectives, research was H3. Teachers' motivation is one of
carried out at AAB College in Pristina. the keys that teachers use to Idiomatic expressions should be taught
Quantitative and qualitative methods help students achieve success more deeply to English Department
are used for carrying out the research. and satisfaction in learning lecturers, whether in speaking, writing, or
The research carried out through the idioms. translation subjects, in order to improve
following instruments:Structured their ability to become native-like, to
questionnaires for students, an idiom introduce the existence of idioms and their
quiz and observation. function, and, of course, to enrich their
vocabulary, particularly about idiomatic
expressions.
An idiom is a phrase or
Purpose statement
clause whose meaning,
in most cases, cannot
be deduced from the
literal definition;
instead, it refers to a
figurative meaning
that native speakers in
a culture are well
known.
 Slidesgo School

“The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap

between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns, as it were, instinctively
to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.’’
—George Orwell

``The hardest portion of English, I must say it: Idioms.’’

Flula Borg
 LITERATURE REVIEW

• Idioms are essential to effective communication, whether listening, speaking, reading, or writing.
Dixon (1994),

• demonstrated that idioms are a universal aspect of all languages; they are regarded as an inherent part of human communication.
Furthermore, they befuddle novice learners to a large extent. They may cause non-native speakers not only linguistic but also cultural and
Thawabteh technical difficulties; as a result, these difficulties may have a negative impact on communication.
(2011)

• provide a similar definition, stating that "an idiom can be defined as a number of words that, when taken together, have a different
meaning from the individual meanings of each word"
(Seidl &
McMordie 1988

• teachers can improve their students' competence and performance by investigating areas of psychology and pedagogy that promote
cooperation, motivation, and participation, as well as the development of students' mental processes.
M. Gonzalez
Davies (2004),
 Motivation: a good means to learn and teach idioms

Types of Motivation

Motivation is an action that

promotes guides and supports
behaviors to achieve a goal. In
the last decade, with changing
learning conditions and with
increasing attention to students
in the learning process,
motivation plays a very important
role in the process of teaching
and learning in general and for
teaching and learning idioms too.

Students need to have internal motivation in learning idioms, but they are at a stage when they often need an
external motivation and in this type of motivation a very important role play the teacher, especially when learning
idioms because is considered as a hard part to learn, where students often encounter many challenges that
make them not to deal with the challenges learning idioms.
 Methodology
An online multiple-choice
The questionnaire and the Quantitative questionnaire.
idiom quiz are shared to 90 A short quiz with multiple-
students (45 students from choice which had 6
the first year and 45 from the questions with the
second year from the AAB
College English Qualitative meaning of idioms and 6
other idiom questions that
Department ). students’ had to choose
which phrase could
replace the idiom part.
Observation The participants were
ensured anonymity before
completing the
questionnaire.
The last instrument was the
classroom observation in the
same college and department.
 Data analysis and discussion
Phase 01 Phase 02

In this stage of the survey is the The observation method is

collection of data from quiz and used to look even closer to
questionnaires and statistics from which methodology is being
the research are compiled in tabular used and how motivation
and graphical form from. affects in learning and
teaching idioms.
In addition to this presentation, the collected data
Furthermore, it demonstrated that students who are
provided conclusions, challenges for professors and
motivated by their teachers achieve satisfactory results
students in learning idioms and suggestions on how
when learning idioms. More specifically, this study
professors can motivate students to improve learning
demonstrated the role and influence of teachers in
idioms.
motivating students to learn idioms.
 Analysis of Nr. Questions YES PARTLY NO
1. Do you like learning idioms? 67 / 74.4 % 22/ 24.4 % 1 / 1%
the results 2. Are you motivated to learn idioms? 38/ 42.2% 43/ 47.8% 9 / 10%
3. Is your motivation internal? 51/ 56.7% 24/ 26.7% 15 / 16.7%
4. Is your motivation external? 22 / 24.4% 43 / 47.8 % 25 / 27.8 %
5. Do you think that learning idioms is easy? 11/ 12.2 % 41 / 45.6 % 38 / 42.2 %
6. Do teachers explain the meaning of idioms that you 56 / 62.2 % 29 / 32.2 % 5 / 5. 6 %
learn?
7. Do they use methods and techniques that facilitate 50 / 55.6 % 31/ 34.4 % 9/ 10 %
Students’ learning idioms?
question- 8. Do teachers encourage you to learn with warm 52 / 57.8 % 31 / 34.4 % 7 / 7.8 %
naire words?
results 9. Do you think that teachers do their best to teach 46 / 51.1% 34 / 37.8 % 10 / 11.1 %
you idioms?
10. I want to have extra class just to learn idioms. 51 / 56.7% 25/ 27.8 % 14/ 15.6 %
11. I think that knowing more idioms help me to 52/ 57.3% 33/ 37.1% 5/ 5.6%
communicate better.
12. Are you satisfied with the way idioms are taught? 32/ 36 % 48/ 52.8 % 10/ 11.2 %
13. I think being able to use idioms is indispensable 45 / 50 % 39/ 43.3 % 6/ 6.7%
nowadays.
14. My parents motivate me to learn idioms because 36/ 40 % 26/ 28.9 % 28/ 31. %
they think it's important.
  Do you want to learn and eventually teach 41/ 45.6 % 28/ 31.1 % 21 / 23.3 %
15.
idioms in the future?
 a
b
IDIOM QUIZ- Results
c

1. If something is on your bucket list 3) If you bite off more

  than you can chew
a) You need to buy it quickly  
b) You want to do it before you die a) You eat everything on
c) It is something you do when it is raining a plate, thus depriving
anyone else of having
2) If you cut corners any
  b) You take on a task that
a) You do something in the easiest or most is way too big
inexpensive way c) You drink very heavily
b) You are in a strong position when you
are competing with someone else
c) You stop doing something before you
have finished
4) If you hit the sack  
Meaning of idiom:
a) you go to bed
b) you go to the gym
c) you quit your job

6) If something is a piece of cake

 
a) It is easy or simple
b) It is very sweet
5) If you do something once in c) It is only for girls
a blue moon
a) You do it very often
b) You do it once a month
c) You do it very rarely

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 Results for replacing the idiomatic expression with the
correct phrase:
1) You need to get over this
and move on, though I
know it's easier said and done.
3) The harsh punishment
a) It’s easy said and done handed out to him is 'an
b) It’s easier said than done abstract lesson' to all
c) It’s easy to be said and criminals.
done

a) An abstract lesson
b) An object lesson
c)An abstruse lesson

2) Everyone will ''spill the

bucket'' someday.
a) Kick the busket
b)Touch the busket
c) Change

13
4) Elsa was afraid to ''speak the
beans'' about her shopping bills.
a) spill the bucket
b) give secrets
c) spill the beans 6) Sumit had his 'back on the
wall' on this occasion; there
was no escape for him.
a) Back on the wall
b) Back at the wall
c) Back against the wall

5) The police searched "every

nook and each cranny" for the
thieves.
a) every nook and each cranny
b) all nooks and crannies
c) every nook and cranny

14
 Observation Method
We used a picture to explain the context in the classroom observation method. This worked best
with an image that illustrates the literal meaning of the idiom in a humorous way. This made
students laugh while also assisting them in understanding or guessing what a phrase means.

15
 CONCLUSION
The teacher should have close co-operation with the parent community.
There will be a deep study of challenges in teaching and learning idioms,
and some of the current factors that influence motivation in learning and
teaching idioms based study in the first and second year students from AAB
College English Department. Students need to have internal motivation in
learning idioms , but they are at a stage when they often need an external
motivation and in this type of motivation a very important role play the
teacher. The work of the teacher is also to motivate and convince the student
to learn especially idioms because is considered as a hard part to learn,
where students often encounter many challenges that sometimes they think
is better not to deal with the challenges about learning idioms because it
takes too much time. Teachers have to motivate students in different ways in
learning idioms and in this case to learn English language, making them feel
comfortable at first learning this language by showing that even if they do
any mistake at using idioms, they should not be ashamed because they will
learn, or even motivate them with warm words. They should think that they
are also students and sometimes think by the students' perspective.

16
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Thanks