Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 LET: Linguistics, Literature and English Teaching Journal ||Volume||11||Issue||2||Pages||59-78||2021|| |P-ISSN: 20869606; E-ISSN: 25492454| Available online at: http://jurnal.uin-antasari.ac.id/index.php TEACHING ENGLISH USING WHATSAPP DURING LEARNING FROM HOME: IMPACTS TO STUDENTS AND IMPLICATION TO TEACHERS Iwan Fauzi i_fauzi@edu.upr.ac.id Palangka Raya University, Indonesia Article History: Received: 17 July 2021 Accepted: 05 November 2021 Abstract: This research departed from the result of training on the development of online learning design for secondary school teachers before the pandemic. On that training, WhatsApp is the best choice to be implemented by the teachers. In this research, WhatsApp-based learning design is chosen to facilitate English teachers during learning from home. As a result, the impact for students is that their learning outcomes were positively correlated to their perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitudes during learning from home using WhatsApp. Then, the implication of this research is that English teachers have competitiveness and also competence in the utilization of digital technology, especially in developing English learning designs while they taught from home. Keywords: WhatsApp; learning design; English teaching; INTRODUCTION The 2019 corona virus outbreak (Covid-19) which has hit 215 countries in the world (Suara.com) exposes its own challenge for educational institutions, especially in the secondary level of education. Since March 2020 the Indonesian Government through the Ministry of Education and Culture has banned schools and colleges from implementing face-to-face or conventional learning activities and http://jurnal.uin-antasari.ac.id/index.php mailto:i_fauzi@edu.upr.ac.id P a g e | 60 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 ordered to conduct an online learning (CNN-Indonesia). Referring to this appeal, the learning model that can be used as a solution in the covid-19 pandemic, especially for areas affected by the outbreak, must be done in a virtual way or learning through online applications which is so-called ‘learning from home’. The term of learning from home is the way of teacher and students doing teaching and learning process from their respective homes. This kind of teaching and learning is only able to be implemented by connecting the teacher and students via internet connection where it is commonly termed by online learning. According to Moore et al., (2011) online learning is a learning model using internet networks with accessibility, connectivity, flexibility, and the ability to generate various types of learning interactions. Furthermore, online learning is a breakthrough for a traditional classroom learning which has been mostly teacher-centered. Therefore, what Zhang et al., (2004) state tend to be true that the use of internet and multimedia technology in the online learning is able to change the way of delivering knowledge and to be an alternative for the learning in traditional classroom. One main reason of the emerging of online learning other than pandemic reason is to ensure the equal access of education for the citizens in this country, where some have no opportunity and resources to get appropriate education service in the educational institutions. Meanwhile, the online learning also aims to give more access to the specific groups who are less luckily for having the same access facility on education. For this reason, the online learning is regarded as the democratic education form since its objetive can cover whole segments of citizen. However, one of the drawbacks of online learning that possibly faced by many students is that they lack direct interaction with other students in the classroom. This is in line with what was stated by Rabe-Hemp, et. al., (2009) where the technical problem of the lack of interaction between teachers and students during online learning can also affect student education. However, with regard to using certain method and application the online learning is also not completely correct to minimize teacher and students interaction personally. Al-Kathiri (2015) proves that online learning can make easier for the teachers to interact with their students; and among students with their peers P a g e | 61 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 as well. By this argument, online learning can be effective depending on some condition. The effectivity of online learning is determined by the precise teaching and planing for improving learning quality and students’ learning outcome as a whole. Besides, online learning is also able to fulfill the needs of learning itself both passively and actively. This aims to provide students with complete knowledge that they can access from anywhere and anytime. This statement is similarly stated by Songkram (2012) where in online learning students and teachers can communicate and interact to each other’s outside classroom. Moreover, Songkram argues the management of teaching in online learning platform might exceed the classroom management, enable students to train their thinking skill and researching, and obtain new knowledge which can be transferred into innovation. For today, online learning is a must for students and teachers regardless of pandemic situation. Various media platforms can be used to support the implementation of the online learning, for example virtual classroom media through Google Classroom, Edmodo, and Schoology application services (Hamidi, et. al., 2020; Irawan, et.al., 2017), as well as other instant messaging applications such as WhatsApp (So, 2016; Rabbianty, et.al., 2021), Facebook and Instagram (Kumar & Nanda, 2018). On its implementation, the online learning requires the support of mobile devices such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets which can be used to access information anytime and anywhere. The use of mobile technology indeed has a major contribution in educational institutions, including the achievement of instructional goals through distance learning (Korucu & Alkan, 2011). In addition, the online learning can also connect students with learning resources such as databases, teachers, and libraries that are physically separated or even far apart but students can communicate with each other, interact or collaborate directly and indirectly (Molinda, 2005). Thus, the rapid development of communication technology today has erased the reason for educational institutions, especially primary and secondary education, not to implement online classes for their students P a g e | 62 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 since various applications for computer and smartphone already provide facilities that support virtual classrooms. One of user-friendly mobile applications is WhatsApp. It is a messaging application that focuses on privacy, security, and speed (Basma, 2013). This type of technological platform, according to Tartari et al. (2019), offers real-time approach, communication synchronicity as well as the sharing of authentic and creative work. Of all, the very basic reasons why WhatsApp is more practical and simpler to be used than other applications are that WhatsApp is a free messaging application with no ads and subscription fees; it provides the accessibility to send and receive messages via groups created; and it allows users to share and exchange the unlimited number of photos, videos and any files of any format up to 2GB in its capacity (Suhaimi, et al., 2019). For this reason, one of the instant messaging applications has become the main choice for teachers to conduct online classes during the pandemic; especially for teachers and students who live in areas characterized by the unstable internet signal and by mobile devices that have low RAM memory and are not yet designated for 4G network. By this situation, WhatsApp platform is able to anticipate those problems. Indeed, there are many studies discussing the effectiveness of learning through WhatsApp platform. In education, for instance, WhatsApp undeniably becomes a new and convenient tool for teaching and learning activity (Gon and Rawekar, 2017), and also it is more effective for the increase of students’ success in education process (Cetinkaya, 2017). Moreover, WhatsApp can support spontaneous communication, the exchange of images, and the sharing of captured video clips in teaching and learning activities. So, educators can utilize an excellent opportunity to adopt WhatsApp for teaching and learning activities (Ghee, et.al., 2019). With regard to teaching and learning English, WhatsApp helped students to develop English skills and enriched their vocabulary (Hamad, 2017); it enhanced students’ motivation to learn English narrative writing (Suhaimi, et al., 2019); it raised a greater enthusiasm for reading in English language of foreign language P a g e | 63 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 students (Plana, et al, 2013); and it also was effective to use in teaching listening skill (Fauzi and Angkasawati, 2019). In relation to students’ motivation, attitudes, and learning outcome, WhatsApp unquestionably has given positive impacts to students or pupils as a replacement of the face-to-face instruction in the classroom. Amry (2014), for instance, found that students who were treated using mobile learning through WhatsApp mobile instant messaging performed better on the achievements and attitudes than the ones who were subjected only to face-to-face instruction in the classroom. Again, Plana et al., (2013) have also found that the instant messaging application WhatsApp increased students’ motivation and willingness to study. Besides, Barhoumi (2015) confirmed in his study that WhatsApp mobile learning activities carry benefits for students’ achievement and attitudes towards mobile learning and teaching. The more interesting about this instant messaging application in facilitating learning is that the interesting feature available in the WhatsApp, which is the use of emoji that could engage the pupils in the learning. According to Sabrina and Benedictus (2017) the use of emoji in the context of their study functioned as a motivational tool for the pupils such as the ‘applause’ and ‘thumb up’ which may be used to compliment the pupils. With regard to this research, WhatsApp instant messaging application has been introduced to the secondary school of English teachers a year before the Covid- 19 outbreak. The researcher gave them a training on the development of online learning design through the program of community partnership in anticipating the forest and land fires in 2019. Almost every year several regions in Indonesia are hit by forest and land fires that cause haze in the region. This smog phenomenon greatly impacts to the teaching and learning process of students at schools. The impact of the disaster is that many teachers were unable to carry out face-to-face learning in class at the time. Therefore, at that time the researcher needs to make a breakthrough for teachers who had low computer literacy—those who were unable to carry out online learning through complicated applications on desktop or laptop, in order that P a g e | 64 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 class did not just stop because of the reason that they did not have sufficient knowledge to operate computers for online learning. Regarding this, they had to design an easier and more practical online learning model so that the learning process remains continuing. Therefore, the training project was provided by the researcher. The output of the training was targeted that teachers can still carry out the teaching and learning process though they remain teaching from home. So, the WhatsApp application was the best choice for the online learning design at the training because it was considered the easiest application to operate by teachers. And, in fact the training was successful since the result gave an improvement for the teacher's ability to design online learning model through the WhatsApp platform. When the Covid-19 outbreak hit the region, teachers who had been given the training were considered to be ready to face the learning process by online, though they only teach by the WhatsApp messaging application media. Therefore, this research has an aim to test the impact of WhatsApp application toward students in the post-training. There are two objectives to be achieved in this research; (1) to examine students' learning outcome through the WhatsApp-based online learning design whether it is positively inter-correlated with students’ perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitudes in learning English during the pandemic; (2) to find out the implication of the WhatsApp-based online learning design for teachers. METHOD This research belongs to a descriptive quantitative method by using the design of correlational study to find out the relationship among students' learning outcome and their perception, knowledge, motivation and attitudes in learning English using WhatsApp-based online learning design during the Covid-19 pandemic. There were 34 secondary school students who were the subjects of this research taken randomly from the grade 8 of class-B cluster. These students are taught by a teacher who has been given the training few months before the outbreak on how to make WhatsApp-based online learning design. Table 1 shows the distribution of research subjects based on gender and age. P a g e | 65 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Table 1 Research subject based on gender distribution Subject Ages Gender Total Female Male f % f % f % Secondary school students of grade-8 13—14 19 55,9 15 44,1 34 100 These students were given the online learning of English subject through WhatsApp for eight weeks amid the Covid-19 pandemic by one online meeting. Each week they were given with different instructional material topics referring to the subject syllabus. The learning model given through WhatsApp is the same as what the teacher received in the training. The duration of the learning on the instant mobile application must not exceed than 50 minutes. There were six steps of implementing teaching via WhatsApp covering opening, attendance checklist, providing learning material, discussion, feedback, and closing. In the opening teacher uploaded a video related to the lesson on the application, continued by student attendance checklist. In the core activity teacher started by providing learning material to the application, and invited students to discuss related matters on-screen or if necessary, the discussion might use voice note facility button. Then, teacher gave feedback before ending the lesson. To close the lesson teacher may close the forum directly by pressing voice note or may use a short video recording that has been prepared before. To be more specific figure 1 below shows the design of learning model implemented through the WhatsApp application for students. 1. Opening Related video recording uploaded to the application • The teacher opens the lesson by giving greetings • The teacher conveys the learning objectives • The teacher provides a brief description of the content of the material 2. Attendance checklist Texting attendance on-screen • The teacher checks student attendance by asking them to type their name or say “I am in” on the application screen 3. Providing learning material Related video recording uploaded to the application P a g e | 66 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 • The teacher provides a video recording related to the learning material • Students elicit information related to the material on the video 4. Discussion Texting discussed matters on-screen; or discussing lesson via voice note • The teacher and students share questions and answers to discuss the lesson or tasks 5. Feedback Texting instructions on-screen; PDF document of tasks uploaded to the application • The teacher provides assignments to students in group related to the learning material and it must be submitted via WhatsApp application a day before the next meeting. 6. Closing Related video recording uploaded to the application • The teacher provides a lesson summary related to the topic being learned • The teacher provides students motivation and character strengthening • The teacher ends the lesson by delivering closing salutation Figure 1 WhatsApp-based learning model offered by the researcher Then, the quantitative data of this research were collected from questionnaires and students’ scores. The data obtained from the questionnaire were data related to students' opinions about their perceptions, knowledge, motivation, and attitude during the online learning while students’ scores were data related to students’ learning outcome of summative test in the pandemic. The summative test data were taken after completing eight weeks of the learning process. So, these scores are pure data on student achievements during online learning using the WhatsApp mobile application. There were 25 questions given in the questionnaire which consisted of 10 questions related to perception, and five questions related to respectively students' knowledge, motivation, and attitudes towards WhatsApp-based application used in the online learning. All questionnaire questions used the Likert scale describing satisfaction or agreement by the score range 1 to 5. The higher score was given by students, the more positive to their perception, motivation, and attitude; and also, the more increasing the knowledge they obtain as well. All of these questionnaire questions have been tested for their validity and reliability. To confirm the validity of questionnaire questions, the researcher P a g e | 67 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 analyzed each questionnaire item using Pearson correlation to find out the relationships between responses to different questionnaire items. The result showed all questionnaire items were valid in which 24 items were significant at p<0.01 and one item was significant at p<0.05. Then, Cronbach’s Alpha was used to count the reliability coefficient of those questionnaire items. The reliability statistical values of Cronbach showed 0.86 for items of perception, 0.83 for items of knowledge, then 0.84 and 0.88 for respectively items related to motivation and attitude. All of those values define that all questionnaire items are highly reliable. So, the researcher felt confident about the validity and the reliability of the questionnaire. To analyze the data, Spearman’s correlation was used to find out the significance correlation between students’ learning outcome and the other four ordinal data obtained from the questionnaire represented by students’ perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitude. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS Findings Related to findings, all data obtained from questionnaire and learning outcome are depicted in some tabulated forms. Table 2 below firstly shows the summary of data found in this research. Table 2 the description of data summary No Data classifications N Mean Std. deviation 1. Students’ perception 34 36.32 6.812 2. Students’ knowledge 34 17.32 3.557 3. Students’ motivation 34 19.09 3.613 4. Students’ attitude 34 18.47 3.351 5. Students’ learning outcome 34 72.74 12.508 Before these data were analysed, all numeric data were supposed to be normal on their distribution. Table 3 shows that data of this research are confirmed to be normally distributed for further analysis since all sig. values are higher than 0.05. P a g e | 68 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Table 3 the normality test of the data No Data classifications Shapiro-Wilk test df Sig. values 1. Students’ perception 34 0.505 2. Students’ knowledge 34 0.473 3. Students’ motivation 34 0.407 4. Students’ attitude 34 0.243 5. Students’ learning outcome 34 0.681 To depict the finding on how students’ perception related to WhatsApp-based online learning, Table 4 shows percentages gained for each item. On these data there are ten items questioned to students related to their perception in learning English through WhatsApp application. Of ten questions, most students agreed and strongly agreed that this learning platform saved internet quota (70.6%), was quite accommodative to all media formats such as texts, photos, or videos (61.8%), was easy to operate (76.5%), and was well-facilitating to manage teacher-given tasks (55.9%). However, two other indicators were marked by exactly 50% students who considered that online learning using WhatsApp was very practical and very effective in simplifying discussion forum between students and the teacher. In contrast, other perception indicators such as internet connection, instructional videos delivered, student attendance administration, and class management were less supporting in this messaging application since the percentages of positive perception were lower than 50%. Table 4 Students’ perception on WhatsApp-based online learning Numbers in percentage (%) Item indicators questioned SDA* DA* N* A* SA* Practicality 0.0 8.8 41.2 20.6 29.4 Saving internet quota 5.9 5.9 17.6 26.5 44.1 Accommodativeness 0.0 17.6 20.6 32.4 29.4 Internet connection 8.8 17.6 32.4 32.4 8.8 Delivering instructional videos 2.9 14.7 38.2 38.2 5.9 Easy application to operate 0.0 2.9 20.6 41.2 35.3 Simplifying discussion forum 0.0 17.6 32.4 32.4 17.6 Administrating student attendance 2.9 17.6 35.3 11.8 32.4 Facilitating instructional tasks 0.0 5.9 38.2 29.4 26.5 P a g e | 69 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Class management 0.0 8.8 44.1 26.5 20.6 *SDA (strongly disagree); DA (disagree); N (neutral); A (agree); SA (strongly agree) In term of knowledge, table 5 depicts that only on awareness indicator significantly defines 88.3% students who agreed and strongly agreed that WhatsApp not only can be used for chatting activity in common but also it can be utilized as the media for learning. However, the other four indicators were unconfidently gave benefit to students’ knowledge since percentages of agreement and strong agreement were less than 45%. In this regard, students tend to be neutral to admit that learning via WhatsApp can increase their knowledge in general, obtain more learning experience, be more curious to instructional learning material, and facilitate connecting the previous knowledge to learning tasks. Table 5 Students’ knowledge on WhatsApp-based online learning Numbers in percentage (%) Item indicators questioned SDA DA N A SA Increasing general knowledge 0 20.6 47.1 29.4 2.9 Obtaining learning experience 5.9 20.6 32.4 32.4 8.8 Curiosity on learning contents 2.9 11.8 50 29.4 5.9 Connecting previous knowledge to learning tasks 5.9 14.7 35.3 29.4 14.7 Awareness on application utility 0 0 11.8 32.4 55.9 Meanwhile, online learning through WhatsApp gave students good motivation, as shown on table 6, where student punctuality in accomplishing learning tasks, and student activeness on responding related materials from the teacher respectively reached 58.9%. Meanwhile, students’ motivation on watching instructional videos provided by the teacher through the platform reached 68% which was able to surpass two items previously mentioned. More surprisingly, 82% students had strong motivation on the punctuality to fill class attendance via the application. However, a little bit disappointing in regard to the kind of media platforms used where only 29% students admitted that WhatsApp was not better at providing them motivation in learning English than other learning platforms. In this regard, students seemed to opt being neutral to say that WhatsApp cannot be more motivating them in learning since the percentage barely reached 53%. P a g e | 70 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Table 6 Students’ motivation on WhatsApp-based online learning Numbers in percentage (%) Item indicators questioned SDA DA N A SA Learning motivation compared with other platforms 2.9 14.7 52.9 17.6 11.8 Punctuality in accomplishing tasks 0 5.9 35.3 32.4 26.5 Activeness on responding the teacher 0 8.8 32.4 26.5 32.4 Punctuality on attending class 0 0 17.6 29.4 52.9 Motivation on watching instructional videos 0 8.8 23.5 35.3 32.4 Another indicator observed in this research was students’ attitude. Five items questioned through questionnaire gave encouraging results. More than 50% students gave positive attitudes regarding online learning using WhatsApp. As depicted on table 7, students acknowledged themselves that they were very interested, respectively 53%, in instructional techniques given, and in instructional contents shared by the teacher on the learning platform. In addition, students more positively marked their attitude in terms of the variation of instructional materials provided and the way of teacher used her language in the messaging application where both respectively reached barely 59%. Further, students’ attitude about the application and the English subject in general showed none disappointing result where its percentage was close to 68%. Table 7 Students’ attitude on WhatsApp-based online learning Number in percentages (%) Item indicators questioned SDA DA N A SA Students’ attitude in general 0 2.9 29.4 32.4 35.3 Instructional techniques given via the application 0 8.8 38.2 35.3 17.6 Variation of instructional materials provided 0 8.8 32.4 41.2 17.6 Instructional contents shared via the application 0 8.8 38.2 50 2.9 Language use by the teacher on the application 0 0 41.2 47.1 11.8 To attest whether four indicators above-depicted are positively correlated with students’ learning outcome and also positively inter-correlated to each other, the data on table 8 are the result of analysis using the Spearman correlation test. P a g e | 71 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Table 8 Correlation analysis result Learning outcome Percept- ion Knowledge Motivat- ion Attitude Learning outcome Correlation coefficient 1.000 .939** .890** .829** .780** Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 N 34 34 34 34 34 Perception Correlation coefficient .939** 1.000 .739** .672** .674** Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 N 34 34 34 34 34 Knowledge Correlation coefficient .890** .739** 1.000 .706** .808** Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 N 34 34 34 34 34 Motivation Correlation coefficient .829** .672** .706** 1.000 .663** Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 N 34 34 34 34 34 Attitude Correlation coefficient .780** .674** .808** .663** 1.000 Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 N 34 34 34 34 34 ** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed) The students’ perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitude on WhatsApp- based online learning highly correlated with learning outcome gained where all significance values define that p<0.01. Also, the correlation in-between the students’ perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitude are highly inter-correlated as well. As a result, the learning design model implemented by the teacher through WhatsApp platform during the pandemic can positively support student learning success instead of increasing students’ knowledge and motivation, and positively changing their perception and attitude in the online instruction. Discussion The Covid-19 pandemic seems to be a blessing in disguise for teachers who want to improve their digital literacy in implementing online learning for their students. Those who do not have the ability to run online devices should choose other alternatives regarding what application is the simplest and most user-friendly P a g e | 72 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 to be implemented. WhatsApp is indeed a platform that provides enough features for teachers to teach from home, especially for those who lack digital ability and ICT skill. The benefit of using online learning via WhatsApp showed that learning materials given by the teacher can help students to improve their understanding about the lessons learned. Students also realize that more tasks and exercises given via WhatsApp platform help them polish their language skill especially writing and enrich their new English vocabularies as well. In addition, students also agree that listening tasks given by their teachers via WhatsApp screen can be used for practice after online learning. Moreover, online learning platform also exposed students on abundant learning materials in the internet where this situation found by Chapelle (2003) that the improvement of students’ linguistic input is one of benefits that must be supported by teachers when they use digital technology for learning. To be more specific with the result of this present study, most students realized that WhatsApp is an easy application to facilitate online learning since students had no significant constraints to operate it. This finding confirms previous research made by Cheung et al. (2008) that underscored the importance of a user-friendly web- based application in learning. In addition, students’ perception on this instant mobile application tends to be satisfied in terms of saving internet quota compared with other platforms. No other smartphone applications are more economical to use for online learning other than WhatsApp. This is what make this instant messaging platform unbeatable for online learning albeit it is only asynchronous form. Furthermore, WhatsApp is quite accommodative to deliver all media formats for learning content such as texts, photos, and videos; and it is well-facilitating to manage teacher-given tasks while in the process of learning. Through this platform, the teacher is not difficult to convey the media that he or she made either in the form of images or videos that supports classroom learning while online. These students’ perceptions imply that WhatsApp resolves learning difficulties related to the teaching and learning management and the learning content which can hinder the online learning during the pandemic. P a g e | 73 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Meanwhile, the result of this research depicts students’ awareness on using WhatsApp that it not only can be used for a chatting tool in common but also it can increase their knowledge when this messaging application is utilized as the media for learning. This is in line with Rambe and Chipunza’s study (2013) which also observed that WhatsApp supports knowledge sharing among students, and between students and teachers. Likewise, the result of this research reveals that online learning through WhatsApp gave students good motivation in the punctuality of accomplishing learning tasks, students’ activeness joining the class and watching instructional videos through the application. The students seem more interested watching video than paying attention to teacher’s instruction in the real classroom. That is why teachers reason that they must provide any video on WhatsApp to attract student attention on learning. This teacher’s effort confirms Ghada’s (2016) study where the use of WhatsApp mediation was more effective than the regular instruction in increasing their motivation for learning. Instead, by using WhatsApp teacher and students can be involved with interpersonal communication. The application features such as ‘message’ and ‘voice note' make easier for the teachers to interact with their students. This is in line with Al-Kathiri (2015) that WhatsApp and the like can also encourage students’ self-confidence and motivate them in addition to facilitating shy students to interact more with their peers and teacher as well. Learning from home via WhatsApp, as depicted by this research, also give impact to students’ attitude on their learning interest both on the instructional content and the instructional technique given by the teacher through the mobile application. Students were more excited to follow teacher’s instruction during the lesson. The students show positive attitude when the teacher was conditioning the class activity into student-center. This affirms Amry’s study (2014) that found attitudes of students while using WhatsApp resolve learning difficulties related to the instructional content distributed through the instant messaging application. Additionally, this research also encourages Hewitt’s (2004) activity theory of learning communities in online learning environments which stated that the ease of P a g e | 74 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 use of the technology exploited in online learning and its usefulness are both pertinent factors that influence students’ positive attitudes toward the adoption of online learning communities to construct and share knowledge. More importantly, the learning outcome is the reflection of students’ successfulness. The result of students’ learning outcome in this research shows students’ grades in average had surpassed the minimum passing standard of the English subject. Therefore, it is not exaggerated to speculate that WhatsApp platform is able to facilitate the success of teacher and students in running an online classroom during the pandemic. This is also affirming that the digital technology is considered effective tools for learning (Gillingham & Topper, 1999), both for developing an understanding of a concept and enhancing the cognitive performance of the students. Consequently, as what signified by Amry (2014), discussion among the teacher and students on social networks have a cognitive added value that provides them with the opportunity to construct and share knowledge and then attain good results on achievement tests. CONCLUSIONS Whatever the circumstances, WhatsApp has undeniably become the most user-friendly teaching platform among teachers during learning from home, especially for those who have low digital literacy. Accordingly, WhatsApp is quite accommodative and well-facilitating to manage teacher-given instructions while the online teaching. Apart from being easy and friendly to operate, this instant mobile messaging can also facilitate teaching and learning English, mainly to four language skills on its screen without leaping to other platforms at the same time. Consequently, the implication of this research gave a positive impact to students and English teachers. Students who have positive perception, knowledge, motivation, and attitudes on WhatsApp-based learning platform can achieve better learning outcomes even though they learn from home. This implies that teachers have competitiveness and competence in the application of digital technology in their community, especially in developing English learning designs by online materials while learning from home. P a g e | 75 Iwan Fauzi LET: Linguistics, Literature and Language Teaching Journal Vol. 11 No. 2 2021 Regarding with this research findings, several recommendations are given. For teachers, since the use of online learning via whatsApp is promising to be implemented in online classroom, teachers must be more creative in selecting learning materials. The challenges faced by teachers are that they must be able to choose interesting learning materials which not only they can fill the student needs but they also assist students to achieve learning objectives. In addition, teachers are also encouraged to be more interactive during the online learning process. It would be better for teachers to provide direct responses and feedbacks related to students’ works personally, instead of messaging students regularly on the application. Although students’ problems in operating online learning platform via whatsApp do not discuss as a research problem in this present study, it is recommended for teachers to show to their students’ step-by-step procedure in conducting online learning platform by using whatsApp to ensure their students have been familiar with such online learning platform. Finally, further studies involving more research subjects or different areas of studies are recommended in order to explore much more findings which not only about the effectiveness of online learning via WhatsApp but also about the teacher-and-student activities related to their problems faced specifically using the application. This thing is more useful to unveil what students’ handicap in online learning through WhatsApp platform. REFERENCES Al-Kathiri, F. (2015). Beyond the classroom walls: Edmodo in Saudi Secondary School EFL instruction, attitudes and challenges. 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