ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 10, Issue 2, June 2022 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 475 INVESTIGATING TEACHERS’ BELIEF AND PRACTICES TOWARD DIGITAL MEDIA OF ENGLISH LEARNING DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC Berlinda Mandasari English Education Department, Faculty of Arts and Education, Universitas Teknokrat Indonesia, Indonesia Email: berlinda@teknokrat.ac.id Dyah Aminatun English Education Department, Faculty of Arts and Education, Universitas Teknokrat Indonesia, Indonesia Email: dyah_aminatun@teknokrat.ac.id APA Citation: Mandasari, B., & Aminatun, D. (2022). Investigating teachers’ belief and practices toward digital media of english learning during covid-19 pandemic. English Review: Journal of English Education, 10(2), 475-484. https://doi.org/10.25134/erjee.v10i2.6248 Received: 21-02-2022 Accepted: 26-04-2022 Published: 30-06-2022 INTRODUCTION The immense development of technology in the 21st era has been a big advancement in every life sector, including education. This brings enormous merits for the improvement of teaching and learning process for both teachers and students. Kaharuddin (2020) stated that Technology aids students’ English learning process and culture included in material content may attract students’ interest to learn English. It is clearly seen that technology or lately it is broadly called as ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) has led to the upgraded teaching techniques in the classroom. Especially for teachers, the role of ICT in teaching process will facilitate the educators in the process of teaching and learning as well as improve their professionalism (Aminatun, 2019). The use of digital tools or media for teaching is really varied in many ways, including in teaching English since English is such a complex thing to learn. There are many applications that can be used to support English teaching and learning process and absolutely ease the teachers to teach. Technology is such a vital part of human life, and used as an effort to elevate the efficacy of language learning activities (McKenney & Voogt, 2017). Digital media as one of the products of technology also has a big impact on the development of teaching English skills, and has attracted many educators to use and implement it. The inclusion of digital media in language teaching has resulted in teachers having to design new teaching strategies incorporating digital tools (De Jager, Rwodzi, & Mpofu, 2020). This phenomenon has proved that the rapid growth of technology really matters on English teaching evolution. Further, the reality that digital learning nowadays has become really popular for educators, has also influenced the way teachers think and do toward the impact of technology for teaching. Abstract: The advancement of technology has made a lot of changes especially in educational field. Online learning is one of teaching modes as the response to the educational changes. Moreover, during Covid-19 pandemic, online learning is not an alternative solution, but a compulsory one. In response to this, various kinds of online learning media do exist to use. This study aimed at exploring teachers’ beliefs toward digital media of English learning during Covid-19 pandemic. This study uses qualitative design with participants coming from teachers teaching English at vocational school. Observation and semi-structured interview are used to gain data about teachers’ beliefs. Data were collected and analyzed by descriptively. The result of this research shows that Google Classroom, Instagram, and WhatsApp are preferable for conducting online learning. It shows the common digital media are preferred used by the teachers in order to enable the students to easily engage in the English learning process since the media are reachable and easy to access. Keywords: beliefs; digital media; online learning. Berlinda Mandasari & Dyah Aminatun Investigating teachers’ belief and practices toward digital media of English learning during covid-19 pandemic 476 Whether the teachers want it or not, they are demanded to adjust their way of teaching to the era and to the development of technology since the students will always mostly come from new generation. Therefore, teachers’ attitude toward the implementation of technology will change according to the era. The use of Grammar Translation Method, teaching English using blackboard or whiteboard in the classroom, has evolved to something beyond than that. Students as digital natives must be supported by teaching strategies that resonate and support their needs, that is by implementing new and developing digital technologies (Kincey, Farmer, Wiltsher, McKenzie, & Mbiza, 2019). Many teachers are currently exposed to various digital media for teaching and implement them in their class. It is because the shifting of learning from conventional way to technology-based is really popular nowadays (Mandasari & Aminatun, 2020). Besides its interesting sides, technology- based teaching tools also bring some merits for teachers. Meidasari (2016) also found that the use of digital media boosts the English language proficiency and reduces the level of cultural stress, academic difficulties, and negative emotions. In addition, Nugroho & Mutiaraningrum (2020) also explained that digital technology and mobile devices can increase learners’ confidence and motivation, facilitate them to do more practices, trigger their learning autonomy, and have significant impacts on language learning. Although, it also cannot be denied that there are still many teachers struggling with the use of abundant sophisticated technology because they lack of insight and experience in dealing with new technology. However, regardless of the negative impacts, the previous studies show that the use of technology and digital media brings positive effects to the process of teaching and learning if it can be used properly and wisely. The use of technology and digital media will always progress from day by day. Educators, especially teachers cannot just stay quiet seeing this phenomenon. They are demanded to always study, enrich their professional skills and get familiar with the latest development since there are some conditions that cannot be predicted in the future. One of those conditions is the sudden coming of Covid-19 as the global pandemic that has changed everything in almost every life sector, and education is one of the sectors that is significantly affected by this. Even, it is stated by Hermanto & Srimulyani (2021) that this change is a challenge for Indonesian education, which must also prepare students to adapt to face the challenges of the era of Society 5.0. Remote teaching and learning during Covid-19 faced ongoing challenges, as does the need for teachers’ professional development (Chin, Ching, del Castillo, Wen, Huang, del Castillo, Gungon, & Trajera, 2022). Teachers faced new and challenging environments, instructional approaches, and roles as educators (Pressley, 2021). Teaching and learning process that is usually done face to face must be avoided since this pandemic does not enable people to meet directly in order to decrease the dangerous effect of the virus. A government circular regarding to this matter was also issued considering the seriousness of this pandemic. No one is really ready for such condition, yet the fact demands all educational parties have to deal with it. There were actually several solutions proposed to keep teaching and learning process and the interaction among teachers and students run well. One of the solutions that makes sense and almost can be done by almost everyone in educational field is online learning. As it is stated before that the government, specifically The Ministry of Education and Culture has obliged to close schools and replace classroom teaching learning process by distant learning. By implementing this, teaching has changed drastically with the distinctive rise of online learning, whereby teaching is embraced remotely and on computerized stages (Famularsih, 2020). Considering that online learning is actually not a new thing for many educational institutions in Indonesia, this solution is the most likely to be implemented and has the highest effectiveness in carrying out the process of teaching and learning. It is also supported by research conducted by Ulfia (2020) which found that the conditions of facilities and infrastructure by educators and students adequately illustrate the readiness of implementing online learning. Since the implementation of online learning is strongly related to digital things, many digital media, like email, blog, chatting application, learning application, video, virtual conference or meeting platform, and e-learning management system are used to fulfill the need of distant learning. Information and communication technologies (ICT) tools, particularly digital teacher ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 10, Issue 2, June 2022 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 477 competence and teacher education opportunities to learn digital competence, are instrumental in adapting to online teaching during COVID-19 school closures (König, Jäger-Biela, & Glutsch, 2020). Several studies related to the implementation of online learning during the pandemic of Covid-19 had been conducted, and most of them show the positive results related to the implementation of online learning using digital media for teaching. Fitria (2020) concluded that implementing online learning system during Covid-19 pandemic has a potential to help the lecturers and students in the teaching and learning process. More, Mardiah (2020) suggested that e-learning system is considered as the one and only relevant teaching- learning method in the time of pandemic because both teachers and students can access the e-learning application that has been approved by the institution from home. In accordance with those findings, Suardi (2020) found that the implementation of e- learning using Zoom gives some advantages, such as learning process becomes more relaxed and both teacher and students, who are prospective teachers, can learn a new skill in teaching using digital platform. Nevertheless, still, it cannot be neglected that there still be many problems and challenges in carrying out full online learning process using digital technology, especially during Covid-19 pandemic, such as economic condition, students’ anxiety, government’s policy, the risk of user data security, and choosing appropriate and effective teaching and learning media (Simamora, 2020). It also cannot be denied that the utilization of digital technology or digital media in online learning during the pandemic found pros and cons. This leads to the fact that teachers as learning managers certainly have a tendency to carry out their teaching activities. Not all students have enough access to gain the facilities, such as the cost for buying internet data, mobile phone, and the reachable and stable signal for internet; therefore, teachers and students may require eligible infrastructures to run the class properly (Amnan, 2020). As it has been stated previously that teachers’ belief and attitude toward the implementation of technology will change according to the era and condition. English teachers, especially, need to consider various teaching components during Covid-19 pandemic since English is a complex language to be taught and every skill is integrated. Digital learning of English as proposed by Lee & Drajati (2019) has been widely implemented in the learning process by employing a range of digital devices, for example, computer, tablet, web apps, and smartphones though they are still traditionally used. However, amid this pandemic, not all teachers have the same thought and treatment in utilizing digital media for teaching English. Moreover, each school also has its own focus and goals for its students, such as vocational high schools. Teaching English in vocational high school demands multiple knowledge of material, methods, and strategy since teaching English must refer to the program study of the students who are being taught (Muliyah & Aminatun, 2020). Here, it is fascinating as well as necessary to know what teachers of vocational high school think about and perform their teaching and learning process equipped by digital media during the pandemic of Covid-19. This becomes crucial because understanding teachers’ belief of digital technology use for language learning would be fruitful in improving the quality of technology integration practices (Nugroho & Mutiaraningrum, 2020). Moreover, it can also become favorable information for other teachers and provision teachers in the future if they face such similar conditions. Further, it can also be a profitable resource for designing teaching curriculum for hybrid or even full-online learning in the institutions. METHOD This study aimed at investigating teachers’ beliefs and practices on English teaching media during pandemic Covid-19. In order to gain the data on teachers’ beliefs, the researchers employ a qualitative design by adopting semi-structured interview and questionnaire. Contextualization becomes the important aspect in selected research design (Harding, 2018). The present study focuses on portraying, summarizing, and depicting an in- depth understanding toward the issue. It limits the scope by concerning on the phenomenon gained from the data of Indonesian EFL teachers teaching on vocational high school. This study was conducted at a vocational private school in Lampung province. The participants were two female English teachers; Mrs. R (30 years old) and Mrs. H (33 years old). These two teachers were selected and chosen based on the criteria on having experience on conducting distance learning during Berlinda Mandasari & Dyah Aminatun Investigating teachers’ belief and practices toward digital media of English learning during covid-19 pandemic 478 Covid-19 pandemic and having been teaching English for at least four years. Both of them have experience in professional teacher training in undergraduate level. This study used questionnaire and semi- structured interview as the instruments to collect the data. Questionnaire is used to gain the data of respondents’ identity, teaching experience, training experience, and references toward some digital media. The instrument of questionnaire was distributed to the teachers via Google form. The data gained from questionnaire were used to formulate their beliefs. These data were then being clarified through semi-structured interview. As pandemic Covid-19 limits face-to-face interaction, interview was conducted via phone cell calls for 45 minutes. The data gained from questionnaire and semi- structured interview were analyzed based on Creswell (2013). Data obtained were tabulated and coded. Then, data were reduced based on the research objective. Data were then analyzed and integrated as reflected from both participants. Then, data were brought into conclusion drawing. As an effort of maintaining validity and reliability of the data, the researchers code the data independently. Discussion between researchers were done to gain data that meet the research objective. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION It is notified that both participants realized that digital media integration in EFL learning contributes positive impact for learners. As the students taught nowadays are digital native, it is believed that digital media enables learners to learn fast. It also shapes learners to be independent, improves their motivation and interest. As stated by Mrs. H, she shared her beliefs that digital media integration has benefits to improve students’ ability in communicating using target language. “Anak-anak saya sekarang kan berasal dari Gen- Z yang notabennya pengguna media digital. Mereka itu sudah pada bisa menggunakan media digital supaya bisa memperoleh informasi sebanyak mungkin missal, dengan menggunakan HP, aplikasi dan internet untuk berselancar di dunia maya. Positifnya yakni anak-anak saya ini cepat memperoleh informasi, sumber belajar Bahasa Inggris, dan menggunakannya untuk saling komunikasi. Artinya, media yang digunakan mereka itu sangat mendukung mereka untuk belajar.” (Mrs. H) “My students are coming from Gen-Z which is most of them are digital native. They are literate with some digital devices that enables them to gain information as much as possible. Mobile phone, mobile applications and internet connection are such best combination as media to surf on online world. The positive side of it is my students can get knowledge fast, gain a lot of English learning sources, and even make use of them to interact with others. In other words, this media might support students to learn better.” (Mrs. H) On the other side, digital media is believed to boost the learners’ motivation and interest. The learners enjoyed studying by using digital technology. “Saya biasanya mengajar menggunakan aplikasi Google Classroom dan WhatsApp. Siswa saya bisa membaca materi yang terunggah di aplikasi Google Classroom. Mereka juga punya grup WA dimana mereka bisa diskusi terkait materi yang ada. di WA group, mereka bisa merespon pertanyaan saya, merespon pertanyaan teman lainnya, dan mengumpulkan tugas. Semua siswa saya punya aplikasi WhatsApp di HP mereka masing-masing. Nampaknya, sih tidak sulit menggunakan aplikasi WhatsApp tersebut” (Mrs. H) “I usually teach online using Google Classroom and WhatsApp application. My students can read the teaching materials on Google Classroom. Then, they also can make a group discussion via WhatsApp group. This WhatsApp group enables them to response my questions, to response their friends’ questions, and share their works. All of my students have WhatsApp application on their mobile phone. It is not hard to use it as learning tool.” (Mrs. H) “Saya biasanya menggunakan Instagram sebagai media ajar. Siswa saya senang pakai Instagram karena mereka bisa mengunggah penampilan mereka saat praktik berbicara Bahasa Inggris di akun Instagram dan memperoleh tanggapan dari teman lainnya” (Mrs. R) “I usually use Instagram as learning media. My students enjoy using Instagram because they can post their speaking practice on it and get feedback from their friends.” (Mrs. R) The teachers’ preference on using digital media on language learning EFL teachers’ beliefs on digital media closely relates to the fact that most of the students are ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 10, Issue 2, June 2022 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 479 digital native which means that the students have been familiar with selected digital media. Therefore, teachers strongly believed that those digital media could affect the learners’ language performance. Since the school did not provide an online learning platform that can be used by all teachers, WhatsApp is the most preferred application as a tool to conduct online learning by the participant of this research. “Saya lebih memilih pakai Instagram dan WhatsApp sebagai media ajar bagi siswa saya. Aplikasi tersebut memberikan manfaat dari segi tamppilan, kegunaan dan kemudahan. Di Instagram, siswa saya bisa menulis sesuai dengan materi yang diajarkan dan menambahkan gambar yang mendukung tulisan mereka semenarik mungkin. Selain itu, Instagram juga ada fitur sukai, komen dan bagikan yang memungkinkan untuk menarik pengguna Instagram untuk memberikan respon melalui fitur yang ada. Kadang juga saya kasih tugas anak-anak untuk membuat kegiatan Live di IG berbahasa Inggris. Biar siswa saya ini lebih percaya diri. Saya yakin anak-anak ini punya akun Instagram. Jadi pastinya anak-anak ini bisa mengikuti instruksi yang diberikan. Yang selanjutnya yakni saya menggunakan aplikasi WhatsApp. Di aplikasi ini, ada beberapa fitur untuk mengirimkan pesan teks, gambar, pesan suara dan video. Saya juga punya grup WhatsApp buat anak-anak sebagai wadah diskusi. Jadi kedua aplikasi ini sangat mendukung saya dalam mengajar Bahasa Inggris. Anak-anak juga terlihat aktif mengikuti pembelajaran online dan mereka pun bisa menggunakan kedua aplikasi ini dengan baik.” (Mrs. R) “I prefer to use Instagram and WhatsApp as digital media used by my students. Those applications bring benefits in terms of attractiveness, usefulness, and easiness. Instagram enables my students to create an output of writing skill supported by relevant picture. The students could find out relevant picture and make it as interesting as possible. Instagram provides like, comment and share features that may attract viewer to give response to the task. I sometimes assign my students to make a kind of live video via Instagram using English. It is done in order that the students can be much more confident to talk in English. Besides, I believe that all of my students have this Instagram account on their mobile phone. Therefore, I believe that my students can make use of it based on the instruction given. Another digital media that I prefer is WhatsApp. It provides some features that enable my students to send text, picture and voice notes and even make a video call. I provide WhatsApp group for the class to facilitate classroom discussion. These two applications support me in teaching English. I found that my students are actively involved during online learning and could use those two applications well.” (Mrs. R) “Saya lebih suka menggunakan Google Classroom dan WhatsApp selama pembelajaran online. Kalau pakai Google Classroom, saya bisa posting materi, bisa minta anak-anak untuk mengumpulkan tugas disitu dan juga diskusi. Tapi kadang diskusi dilakukan di WhatsApp karena mereka bisa merespon diskusi dengan cepat. Kalau di Whatsapp ada fitur kirim pesan teks, kirim pesan suara dan video. Kalau missal saya mau kasih tugas keterampilan membaca, saya biasanya akan menugaskan mereka membaca dan merekamnya lalu mengirim tugas tersebut menggunakan fitur pesan suara. Lalu, siswa lainnya saya minta untuk memberikan tanggapan.” (Mrs. H) “I prefer to use Google Classroom and WhatsApp in conducting online learning. By using Google Classroom, I could post the learning materials, enable students to post the assignment, and make a discussion. However, discussion session is sometimes conducted via WhatsApp. I prefer WhatsApp to conduct discussion because the students could response my questions in real time. WhatsApp provides not only chat feature but also voice note and video call. Whenever I need to know my students’ progress on reading, I assigned them to send their voice note via Group. Then, I assigned other students to listen and give comment on their friends’ voice using chat feature.” (Mrs. H) Teachers’ challenges in using digital media in teaching English The participants believe that involving digital media nowadays is important. However, their beliefs implemented on the classroom practices encountered some challenges in terms of personal and conditional constrains. “Kadang susah juga untuk mengontrol anak-anak kalau mneggunakan aplikasi WhatsApp. Di satu sisi, anak-anak senang dan terlihat mengikuti instruksi yang diberikan. Namun di sisi lain, karena siswa saya banyak dan mereka merespon dalam waktu yang bersamaan, maka aka nada banyak sekali pesan yang menumpuk. Jadinya saya harus scroll up dulu untuk baca pesan satu per satu dan itu butuh waktu.” (Mrs. H) “I found that it is hard to control my students Berlinda Mandasari & Dyah Aminatun Investigating teachers’ belief and practices toward digital media of English learning during covid-19 pandemic 480 when they are using WhatsApp application. In one side, my students seem enjoying the learning process and follow the instruction given. On the other side, my students’ response at one time results a lot of chats. Consequently, I need to scroll up to read the chat one by one. It takes time.” (Mrs. H) Internet connection becomes one of the challenges for teachers and students. The school is located in a suburb which only certain internet provider could be accessed by the students. “Kadang anak-anak ini lama responnya. Alasannya karena koneksi internet yang buruk. Hal ini menyebabkan anak-anak ini tidak mengikuti diskusi dengan baik.” (Mrs. H) “I found that some of my students give slow response during discussion. They said that they encounter bad internet connection access. It results the students could not participate the discussion well.” (Mrs. H) Teachers believe that the digital media can be helpful. However, they are not well equipped with proper trainings. The teaching technique they use is based on their personal adaptation. “Saya rasa penggunaan teknologi dalam pembelajaran Bahasa Inggris akan sangat bermanfaat. Namun, yang saya lakukan selama mengajar menggunakan Instagram dan WhatsApp hanya sebatas pengetahuan saya saja. Nampaknya kalau ada training jauh lebih bagus supaya kita ngajarnya tidak ragu-ragu. Kita sepertinya butuh best practice bagaimana cara memanfaatkan aplikasi di HP untuk belajar Bahasa Inggris.” (Mrs. H) “I think utilizing technology in teaching English can be very useful. However, what I have done in teaching English using Instagram and WhatsApp is based on my personal adaptation. If there is such kind of professional training, it will be much better. We, as teacher, won’t be hesitant in teaching. We need some best practice in utilizing some mobile applications for English learning.” (Mrs. H) Lastly, the teachers suggested that the school must have one digital media that can accommodate all teachers at school to conduct online learning. Professional development such as workshop is required. This workshop should accommodate teachers to prepare teaching materials, discussion forum, conduct synchronous and asynchronous learning, and prepare for assessment method. It is to ensure that all teachers could create classroom activities based on digital learning pedagogy. “Sekolah kami ini tidak punya pelatihan atau workshop pemanfaatan media. Kami sebenarnya membutuhkan pelatihan tersebut. Setidaknya ada satu media/platform belajar yang bisa digunakan oleh semua guru seperti Moodle atau yang lainnya. Jadi, nantinya semua guru akan menggunakan platform yang sama. Kalau aplikasi di HP ini jadi pendukung saja.” (Mrs. H) “The school does not provide us with some training or workshop in utilizing digital media. We actually need that training. At least there is one main learning platform that can be used by all teachers such as Moodle or something. Therefore, all teachers will use the same Online learning platform. Mobile application can be used as supporting media.” (Mrs. H) “Saya kira semua proses pengajaran kudu dimonitor oleh pihak sekolah, termasuk kegiatan siswa-siswi. Sebaiknya siyh sekolah pakai satu platform saja yang ada fitur-fitur yang lengkap yang nantinya memudahkan guru untuk menyiapkan materi, forum diskusi dan metode penilaian. Jika demikian, saya yakin bahwa tujuan pembelajaran dapat tercapai. Tujuan monitoring siswa dan guru adalah dala, rangka meningkatkan kemampuan mengajar guru.” (Mrs. R) “I think all teaching process must be monitored by the school, including students’ activity. I can suggest that the school must decide to use one main online learning platform which provide complete features and enables teachers to prepare the materials, discussion forum and assessment method. If it is so, I believe that the learning objective can be achieved. Teachers and students’ activities can be monitored as an attempt to improve the teachers’ pedagogical skills.” (Mrs. R) This study uncovers that the teachers have strong beliefs on the digital media in EFL teaching. Teachers could provide teaching activities that grab students’ interest, improve students’ motivation, and lead students to be autonomous learners assisted by technology in EFL practices. Nevertheless, some personal and conditional challenges hamper the teaching practices. First, in Indonesian context, it is notified that face-to-face learning is preferred rather than making use of digital technology to assist students’ English learning. However, pandemic Covid-19 brings ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 10, Issue 2, June 2022 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 481 changes in all aspects, including teaching mode. The Ministry of Education, Culture and Higher Education of Indonesia has made a policy to switch face-to-face learning into online learning as an effort to prevent the spread of virus. This policy brought a surprise for teachers, students and school since this kind of teaching mode is such a new teaching mode for them. However, this rapid change of teaching mode does not always match with teachers’ professional developments. It results the gap between teachers’ beliefs and practices (Nugroho & Mutiaraningrum, 2020). This also happened when teachers implement a new method of teaching, in this case is by integrating digital media in teaching English. As stated in the findings, digital media used in teaching English for EFL students brings lots of benefits, such as boosting students’ autonomous learning, improving their motivation, and gaining students’ learning interest. The implementation of Google Classroom, WhatsApp, and Instagram has done a big contribution in bridging the gap among students. Students with various learning types can do learning activities more confidently and independently. Sari (2021) stated that using digital media makes students enjoy the learning process and feel relaxed; besides, it also elevates their creativity. Learning motivation is also enhanced by implementing digital media during the process of teaching and learning using digital media. Students were showing high involvement compared to conventional class without implementing digital media. It is also in line with Lin & Chen (2017) who stated that the implementation of digital learning which is also by applying digital media can present positive learning motivation and learning outcome better than the traditional class can. This also implies that the role of digital media can also enhance students’ engagement since digital media is really close with students nowadays. Therefore, it is really important for teachers to know and understand the employment of technology and use current digital media that can engage students and improve students’ motivation in learning. Moreover, in pandemic situation, nothing can bridge the distant learning process effectively, but technology. In teaching language especially, teachers need to be able to select an appropriate teaching medium in order to achieve learning goals that have been set. Knowing students’ interest can also be a factor in managing the classroom setting. Choosing teaching media which are relevant to the materials, to the assessment, and to the students are being an important thing to be considered. Selecting and using appropriate and relevant learning applications and platforms could support the online teaching and learning process to take place (Lusiyani & Anindya, 2021). Seeing the findings that have been explained previously, teachers chose some digital media to support teaching process during Covid-19 pandemic and to enable students to be actively involved in learning process. Google Classroom became the main platform used by teachers to upload and share the materials. This medium is very useful for online teaching and learning, and can be obtained for free of charge and can be used on any device (Alim, Linda, Gunawan, & Saad, 2019). Moreover, Google Classroom helps teachers to save their time, keep classes organized, and communicate better with students (Azhar & Iqbal, 2018). The features of Google Classroom are easy to operate and students get familiar with them fast. This platform is also really beneficial for teachers because it has large space to upload learning materials with big size. Moreover, through this learning platform, teachers can assign the students’ assignment, give homework, and evaluate students’ work. It cannot be denied that Google Classroom has become the main learning management system chosen by many school and educational institutions to conduct teaching and learning process. However, Google Classroom is sometimes not enough to be the only learning tool in conducting teaching and learning process during pandemic. There were many cases when the students did not have sufficient mobile data or incompatible devices to access the complete materials. Students sometimes also missed the class since they cannot see the reminder without accessing their mobile phone or laptop. Therefore, another supporting medium was used to facilitate this. WhatsApp was selected as the secondary digital medium employed by the teachers as a tool for communication. Besides that, WhatsApp was regarded as a practical application to support teaching process in a simpler way. WhatsApp usage has enabled students to obtain learning-related information and get involved in learning discussions for the perceived usefulness aspect (Mulyono, Suryoputro, & Jamil, 2020). In addition, all students knew how to use this Berlinda Mandasari & Dyah Aminatun Investigating teachers’ belief and practices toward digital media of English learning during covid-19 pandemic 482 application and it was really practical for teachers to share materials or assignment that do not have large size. Students with the teachers can create a WhatsApp group and discuss the material that is being learned. Teachers can also give feedback directly toward the students’ works and inform students the materials that have been uploaded on Google Classroom. Kholis (2020) stated that WhatsApp can support the language learning to be more effective and efficient for the reason that it is accessible for distant learning; moreover, the students were more responsive and enthusiastic in joining the class. After that, besides Google Classroom and WhatsApp, in displaying students work, teachers also chose another digital medium, Instagram as a place to show students’ assignment. Instagram is also one of the applications in which students are really familiar with. This application can also be a choice for the teachers to boost students’ confidence and creativity. Nevertheless, the implementation of digital media to support learning process during pandemic will always face some problems and challenges. Bad internet connection became the main problem in conducting an online learning during Covid-19 pandemic. Zhong (2020) stated that the insufficient access, the availability of the internet, the lack of technology and students’ capacity to participate in digital learning and lack of proper interaction with instructors became the major effects in the implementation of online learning. These problems also happened during teaching and learning process in this research setting. Therefore, teachers need to think clearly to overcome this kind of situations. Guiding students patiently and having good communication with students were believed to help teachers and students keep in the same learning pace. Besides that, not every teacher and student were trained to the employment of new technology, so that it led to several technical problems in operating the learning media. Learning by doing from time to time was the only solution for this phenomenon. No one could not predict this pandemic, so this situation was possibly to happen. Teachers then found out by themselves the ways to improve their professional development and distribute it to the students. Although finally it could run properly with some obstacles, but systematic training initiatives should be provided to improve teachers’ and learners’ technological skills in relation to new emerging models and approaches encouraging the effective use of online learning (Ferri, Grifoni, & Guzzo, 2020). CONCLUSION The coming of Covid-19 pandemic that hit many sectors in life including education has become a new trend in teaching. Online learning is not only as a choice anymore, yet it is a necessity. Every teacher, student, and school must conduct this kind of learning model regardless the setting they are currently at. Digital media are tools needed to support this teaching system. This research digs English teachers’ belief and practices towards the use of digital media in conducting online teaching and learning process. Some findings show that the use of digital media, such as Google Classroom, Instagram, and WhatsApp really helped teachers to do online learning. It shows the common digital media are preferred used by the teachers in order to enable the students to easily engage in the English learning process since the media are reachable and easy to access. Although there must be some obstacles and problems happened in the process of implementing it, teachers and students could manage it well, so the learning objectives still can be achieved. This study is limited to the setting of online English learning in a private vocational high school. It is suggested for the next researchers to have different research setting and add other related variables to be observed. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The writers want to acknowledge Universitas Teknokrat Indonesia for the endless support in completing this article. REFERENCES Alim, N., Linda, W., Gunawan, F., & Saad, M. S. M. (2019). 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