DIFFICULTIES IN LEARNING ENGLISH AS A SECONDARY LANGUAGE IN THE SAUDI ARABIAN EDUCATION SYSTEM

English as an additional language is inevitable in the Saudi Arabian education system. This study is an analysis of some of the causes of English learning problems. The goals of the study were to find out the root cause of the problems in learning English; to find out if there was a significant difference in the causes of the problems that students were comparing due to various attributive variables such as gender, location, habit of reading English daily newspapers, and a habit of listening to English news. The methodology for collecting information was a survey method. The sample consisted of 500 students with 307 boys and 193 girls. The data collected was analyzed. The result of this study showed that the environment was the main cause of learning English. Boys had more problems compared to girls. Another important finding was that rural students felt more problems than urban students.


Introduction
As Saudi Arabia becomes globalized, there is a sense of English as a global language, not just a foreign language of the United States or the United Kingdom. Arabs in different contexts are more likely to have witnessed, or experienced benefits to have more skills than before. These changes in functions and benefits have resulted in change in the status of English from that of a foreign language to a global language. In the field of teaching, English is growing day after day because of good and dedicated teachers; the researchers contributed something to the English language teaching and in addition many linguists have made imprint in the field of applied linguistics.

Literature Review
English instructing and learning in KSA dates back to the late 1920s, when English was first presented in the Saudi training framework. The correct date that English was presented first as an   (2005) Rahman and Alhaisoni (2013) expounded on the present status of English in KSA, expressing that it is at present the medium of direction in specialized training, prescription, and other numerous majors. They are of the view that presently English is not treated a dialect to just pass examinations, but instead, is a subject essential in advanced education, worldwide correspondence and business, and exchange.

Methods and Tools
This investigation purposes at reviewing several reasons for the difficulties in learning English as an additional language. The data collection was done through survey method. The population comprised of 500 students from different universities of Saudi Arabia.

Results and Discussion
As observed in Table 1, Environment is the foremost cause in learning English while relating it with Attitude and available Resources.  Table 2 that male students took Environment and Attitude as the main cause of problem in learning English than girls. The resources as the reason of problem in learning English with respect to gender is not much prevalent. The students studying in rural areas believed boldness and resources as the main cause of problems in learning English than urban students (Table 3).  The number of students reading English newspapers and those having a habit of listening to news channels as per both gender wise and location wise is given in Tables 4 and 5. The males outshine females in terms of having a habit of reading newspapers and listening to news channels frequently. Also, the rural students lag behind the urban students in both newspaper reading and watching English news channels. This can be attributed to lack of resources and facilities at rural and far flung areas.

Conclusions
The result of this study showed that the environment was the main cause of learning English. Boys had more problems compared to girls. Another important finding was that rural students felt more problems than urban students. The government agencies need to produce an encouraging atmosphere in educational institutions to study English. They should offer them with English newspapers, journals and magazines to enrich the reading skill. The role of parents is however, to inspire the wards to communicate in English even at their homes and to encourage them to watch English programmes and listen to English news.