Infinity


 
 

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Volume 5, Number 1, February 2021 

SCHOOLOGY: AN ALTERNATIVE OF LEARNING APPLICATIONS 

TO IMPROVE STUDENTS 'WRITING SKILLS IN THE COVID 19 

 
Anita Anggraeni1, Cynantia Rachmijati2 

1Institut Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan Siliwangi 
1Institut Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan Siliwangi 

 1 anitaenglish26@ikipsiliwangi.ac.id., 2 cynantiarachmijati@ikipsiliwangi.ac.id 

 

Abstract 

The research objective entitled "Schoology : an alternative of learning applications to improve students’ 

writing skills in the Covid 19” to is to determine the effect of Schoology online learning media on 

students' writing skills and to identify students' perceptions about the use of Schoology. The research 

method used a descriptive qualitative research. Technique in collecting the data were test, 

interview,questionnaire with research subject is 44 PGSD Students from Class of 2019. The content 

analysis method was used to analyze the data that was started from 1)data reduction, 2)data presentation, 

3)drawing conclusion and verification. The results showed that 85.59% of students agreed that the use 

of Schoology improved their English language skills in general and 85.90% of students agreed it 

improved their writing skills. Perceptions of students using Schoology : 13.42% that Schoology is easy 

to use, 20.13% of students have an ordinary impression, 65.77% of students have the impression that is 

difficult to use. From their submitted task, there was improving of 40% of score and lessen writing error 

found.It is to be concluded that Schoology did improve writing skill because the language of instruction 

in Schoology was English with user friendly outlook hence force the students to study harder using and 

writing in English.  

Keywords: analysis, motivation, Schoology, writing 
 

Abstrak 

Tujuan penelitian yang berjudul “Schoology: alternatif aplikasi pembelajaran untuk meningkatkan 

keterampilan menulis siswa pada Covid 19” untuk mengetahui pengaruh media pembelajaran online 

schoology terhadap keterampilan menulis siswa dan untuk mengetahui persepsi siswa tentang 

penggunaan schoology. Metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah penelitian kualitatif 

deskriptif.Teknik pengumpulan data adalah tes, wawancara dan angket dengan subjek penelitian 44 

Mahasiswa PGSD Angkatan 2019. Metode teknik analisis digunakan untuk menganalisis data yang 

dimulai dari 1) reduksi data, 2) data presentasi, 3) menarik kesimpulan dan verifikasi. Hasil penelitian 

menunjukkan bahwa 85,59% siswa setuju bahwa penggunaan schoology meningkatkan kemampuan 

bahasa Inggris mereka secara umum dan 85,90% siswa setuju meningkatkan kemampuan menulis 

mereka dalam bahasa Inggris. Persepsi dan pendapat mahasiswa yang menggunakan schoology 13.42% 

bahwa schoology mudah digunakan, 20.13% mahasiswa mempunyai kesan biasa saja, namun 65.77% 
mahasiswa mempunyai kesan bahwa schoology sulit digunakan. Dari tugas yang dikumpulkan terdapat 

peningkatan nilai sejumlah 40% dan berkurangnya jumlah kesalahan dalam menulis. Dapat disimpulkan 
bahwa schoology memang meningkatkan keterampilan menulis karena bahasa pengantar di schoology 

adalah bahasa Inggris dengan tampilan yang ramah pengguna sehingga memaksa siswa untuk belajar 

lebih giat lagi dalam menggunakan dan menulis dalam bahasa Inggris. 

Kata Kunci: analisis, menulis motivasi, schoology, 

 

INTRODUCTION 

Recently, various countries in the world are being shocked by the outbreak of a disease 

caused by a virus called corona or better known as covid-19 (Corona Virus Diseases-19). This 

virus initially began to develop in Wuhan, China. This virus outbreak is indeed very fast, 

mailto:anitaenglish26@ikipsiliwangi.ac.id.


 
 

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spreading to various countries in the world. So that the World Health Organization (WHO), 

declared the outbreak of the Covid-19 virus as a world pandemic today. There have been many 

people around the world who have been exposed to this virus, even become victims and then 

died. The spread of the covid-19 virus is the cause of the highest death rates in various countries 

in the world today. As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, various policies were implemented 

to break the chain of spread of the Covid-19 virus in Indonesia. One of the efforts made by the 

government in Indonesia is by applying an appeal to the public to carry out physical distancing, 

namely an appeal to maintain distance between people, stay away from activities in all forms 

of crowds, associations, and avoid meetings that involve many people. Education in Indonesia 

has also become one of the areas affected by the covid-19 pandemic. With the existence of 

restrictions on interaction, the Ministry of Education in Indonesia also issued a policy, namely 

by closing schools and replacing the Teaching and Learning Activities process by using an 

online system. (Puspitasari, 2020) 

English has become the lingua franca in the arena of international relations. Currently 

there are approximately 479 million native speakers of English, and more than 700 million are 

people who can speak English as a second language or a foreign language. This figure has a 

high tendency to increase given the increasing number of schools that include English in their 

curriculum. The importance of the current position of English made this language is 

indispensable in various fields of life such as education, work and social (Arini, 2013). This 

situation leads to the need of English learners to improve their communication skill which play 

an important role which they have to master. Writing skills is the last language skills that 

students acquire. In this stage of life, a student gradually acquires listening and speaking skills 

sequentially. Students will actively acquire reading skill and writing skills. Writing skill 

obtained at the last show the complexity of learning. Writing does not just rely on sensory 

abilities. However, all potential knowledge and experience of students will support the results 

of their writing. Unlike spoken language, written language is relatively more complicated 

because it is not accompanied by the context of the speech. The context of the speech will help 

the speech partner understand the meaning of the conversation. Therefore, in written language 

to replace the context of speech and to keep the meaning of the writing not misunderstood, 

correct grammatical is needed. 

In the field of teaching and learning, both teacher and lecturer, will provide 

opportunities for every student to practice and write and improve their writing skills. Even 

though students have the same treatment in teaching and learning activities, they have different 



 
 

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results and performance in writing. According to Hasan in Farida (Farida, 2006) states that 

"there are several variables that affect the ability to learn language (1) the development stage 

of students which refers to the effectiveness of the learning process in the classroom, (2) the 

age of the students, (3) motivation, (4) personality, (5) environmental facilities that provide 

changes in student learning. " 

Harmer (Harmer, 1988) argues that writing is a process in which we write, often very 

much influenced by the limitations of genre, then these elements must be presented in learning 

activities. This means that writing is part of learning activities that have an impact on our 

language style and life. On the other hand, Thomas (Kane, 2000) states that writing about us, 

our experiences, and feelings is expressed in writing. This means that writing is an activity to 

transfer information to others. In addition, by writing, people can express their ideas, 

experiences, thoughts, and feelings in written form. That is, writing as one of the four language 

skills is not an activity in itself but an activity that serves other skills. 

The low writing ability of students is estimated that there are many factors that influence 

it, both from students (internally), from parents, from the surrounding environment, from 

facilities and infrastructure, from the methods used by the teacher in teaching. From the 

teacher's side, perhaps the cause of the low writing skills achieved by students can be identified 

through the less than optimal learning process being taught, the selection of learning methods 

and strategies that are not appropriate, and the lack of opportunities that the teacher gives 

students to practice intensively (Hossain , 2015). In addition, the writing assignments given by 

the teacher to students are still lacking, so that students feel that the writing they have written 

is good and correct. This can be seen in the field, most students in writing have not fulfilled 

provisions such as spelling, sentences, content, paragraphs, and other provisions. 

Because of traditional methods have become less motivating, currently technological 

innovations in language learning are used as learner motivation. English learners find it easy 

to access various resources in terms of communication with others through technology. Since 

its inception, various software and applications have been the subject of discussion about how 

technology can play a role in motivating students to learn languages (Warschauer, 1996) and 

as technology becomes more sophisticated, the more use of technology increases the potential 

for increased motivation. Especially in order to make the learning process as comfortable and 

effective as possible, most students choose the right digital device for learning. 

Today, there are countless tools, methods and platforms that can be used for online 

learning. Among the various online media applications, the learning management system or 



 
 

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LMS that is quite developed and utilized during this pandemic is Schoology. Schoology is an 

e-learning application. Through this application, teachers / tutors can create classes that will be 

followed by students. The teacher can create several classes at once, each class choosing the 

access code. This access code will be used by students to enter the classroom created by the 

teacher. Through this application, teachers can design classes, share information with students, 

determine learning outcomes, determine assessment grades, create folders to manage learning 

material, create discussion forums, make assignments, make quizzes, conduct assessments and 

download the results of student development analysis (Huda, 2018).  

The Schoology platform was designed by Jeremy Friedman, Ryan Hwan and the 

Trinidad team. This platform is offered free of charge to all educators. Applications that are 

part of the LMS (learning management system) can be accessed via iOS, Android, and Kindle 

based devices. LMS can develop student competencies. The Schoology application is part of 

the LMS that makes it easier for educators and students to interact anywhere and anytime, 

especially making it easier to deliver material, answer quizzes, and collect assignments. 

Schoology takes the form of a website that combines e-learning and social networking 

(Aminoto & Pathoni, 2014).  

In connection with the description above, motivation is an important aspect in writing 

activities. Without strong motivation, students will find it difficult to do writing activities. 

Theoretically, motivation is any inner force that strengthens everyone to do something. Writing 

motivation is the inner strength that determines the success of writing activities. Students need 

motivation in writing, because with motivation they will be active in writing activities 

(Aryanika, 2016).  

According to Cheng and Dornyei (Cheng & Dornyei, 2007) , motivation is one of the 

main key factors in determining the success or failure of foreign language learning. Learners 

need to be involved in English speaking activities that require a certain level of motivation. In 

general, motivation is divided into intrinsic and extrinsic factors that stimulate energy and 

longing for students to continue to be interested in learning and engaging in English activities. 

Especially while using media to improve writing skill for students, Schoology is one 

application that can help to improve motivation and help students to study more. This is stated 

by previous several studies which already conducted by Tommy Hastomo (Hastomo, 2019) in 

his research entitled “Schoology effects on students writing ability” and Agustin Apriliani et 

al (Apriliani, Asib, & Ngadiso, 2019) in their research entitled “Schoology as learning media 

platform for writing skill : implication to teachers and students” stated that Schoology as 



 
 

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alternative learning media platform that used by the teacher and the students and  has great 

potential to help students in enhancing their writing skill ability.  

Muhtia et al (Muhtia, Suparno, & Sumardi, 2018)  also elaborated in their article entitled 

“Blended Learning Using Schoology as an Online Learning Platform” where they 

demonstrated that it is important to raise teachers’ awareness about the crucial role of 

technologies in their practices. They encourage teachers to use e-learning platforms such as 

Schoology. Referring to the theory of experts and these phenomena, this study is focused on 

analyzing the use of Schoology learning media for the motivation, perception and improvement 

of students' writing skill. 

 

METHOD 

This study uses a qualitative research approach with a case study research type. 

According to Mulyadi (Mulyadi, 2011) qualitative research is a research approach from 

representatives of naturalistic understanding that emphasizes the meaning from within, 

reasoning, in certain circumstances and contexts where its related to everyday life. The data 

obtained in this study is how the assignments and implementation of Schoology in teaching 

and learning activities can improve students' writing skills. 

Research subject. This research was carried out on 44 PGSD class 2019 students who 

have received general basic courses related to English and English courses for scientific papers. 

The data source is the subject from which data is obtained (Arikunto, 2006).  This study used 

students as a source of data where the data obtained from students in the form of test results, 

interviews, and questionnaires through google form. Data collection procedures in this study 

were carried out by providing test methods, interview methods and questionnaire methods 

Test Methods. According to Ilmi et al (Ilmi, Indrowati, & Probosari, 2012) data 

collection methods using test techniques are used to retrieve ability data in a series of scientific 

actions that emphasize the cognitive realm. The steps taken by the researcher to collect data 

using the test method were as follows: giving the task of making research titles, research 

questions and research objectives collected by students through the Schoology channel which 

were then assessed and discussed again to get feedback. 

  

Interview Methods. The interview method is one of the methods used in data collection 

procedures to obtain information through question and answer activities. According to 

Sugiyono (Sugiyono, 2015)  the use of the interview method in data collection can be done if 



 
 

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the researcher wants to find the problem being studied and know the deeper things of the 

respondent. According to Yulianti et al (Yulianti, Tahyudin, & Nurfaizah, 2014) there are two 

forms of interview methods, namely structured and unstructured interviews. In this study, 

researchers used unstructured interviews by following the following steps, 1) the rules used 

were only in the form of an outline of the problems to be asked of students, 2) interviews were 

conducted in an open way between researchers and students regarding the perception and 

implementation of Schoology in improving writing skills 3) interviews were conducted to each 

student in a separate way, 4) the researcher conducted an interview analysis therefore things 

which related to the perception and implementation of Schoology were obtained in students' 

writing skills. These results imply the opinions of research subjects on writing motivation when 

they learn to use Schoology learning media. 

Data Analysis Techniques. The data analysis technique in this study uses content 

analysis. The steps of analysis according to Miles & Huberman in Pasa (Pasa, 2019) are as 

follows: data reduction, data presentation and then drawing conclusion and verification.  In 

data reduction the researcher creating categories and analysis the data test, interview, and 

questionnaire. In data presentation the researcher displays the result in the form of narrative 

text and for conclusion and verification are drawn after the data has been previously displayed 

then the researchers compared the result.  

Conclusion and verification. Conclusions are drawn after data interpretation 

(interpretation) is made of the data that has been previously displayed. Researchers compared 

the results of student work, interviews, and questionnaire results. And for data validation, the 

researcher used triangulation techniques with approach that researchers use when conducting 

research, collecting, and analyzing data (Kasiyan, 2015). In the triangulation of data sources, 

the researcher compared the test results and interview data. In method triangulation, researchers 

use more than one data collection method to obtain the same data. The researcher conducted a 

rewriting test which was later clarified by interview.  

 

 

 

 

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 

Results 



 
 

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When using the Schoology application, students generally felt enthusiastic, because this 

application was something new for them. However, at the second meeting students began to 

complain about a number of things related to the use of this application. The most complained 

about is the problem of the language of instruction used in Schoology which uses English, it 

cannot be set to Indonesian. However, at the 6th meeting they started to show significant 

progress in their choice of English vocabulary. This is reflected in the assignments submitted 

to the lecturers. 

The reasons obtained from interviewed respondents stated that the use of Schoology 

application made them to open dictionary repeatedly to get the meaning. Therefore, for the 

“English for Research” course, they claimed to spend at least 2 to 3 hours translating every 

word they encounter into Indonesian. With the help of a book dictionary, not by the digital or 

online ones.  They avoid using Google translate because it requires them to repeatedly edit the 

translation results obtained from Google Translate. 

At the 8th meeting where the midterm examinations were carried out, students were 

able to adapt to the conditions of the Schoology platform. Indirectly, this platform has a positive 

effect on the commitment and willingness of students to complete writing assignments using 

the English language that is assigned to them. 

To find out the relationship between the use of Schoology applications and the ability 

of students to write, the authors analyzed 3 writing assignments done by students. The author 

tries to recap the number of students who make more than 2 mistakes for each component of 

the assessment in his writing. The tasks given include making a research title (Title) which 

consists of 5-25 words, for Task 2 making Research Questions consisting of 10-30 words and 

the 3rd task which is making research objectives which consist of from 10 - 30 words. 

 

Things that were grading components for the writing tasks, were : 

1 Word order 

2 Wrong word choice 

3 Missing Subject 

4 Structure 

5 Organization 

6 Content 

7 Punctuations 

8 Spelling 



 
 

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9 Capitalization 

 

 In assignment 1, 90 percent of students made mistakes in all aspects of the assignment 

assessment. However, these errors were reduced in the results of the second assignment, with 

significant differences in the mechanics aspects, namely punctuation, spelling and 

capitalization. Meanwhile, in the 3rd assignment, the number of students who made mistakes 

in all components of the assessment was below 50 percent of the total number of students. 

There was improvement by 40% in number of writing skills and lessen writing error found on 

their writing task. Some of the students’ error in writing which is found on their task : 

1. Word order and structure : What is teacher and student response toward using scientific 

approach?  

2. Punctuation : to describe the scenario and implementation of teaching writing recount 

text using scientific approach with guided question technique  

3. Missing word : for the effectiveness teaching, the teachers also need approaches in 

teaching writing.  

4. Organization : through using the Pictionary game as a technique for teaching 

vocabulary, this study can help students in learning English effectively and improve 

students’ vocabulary skill mastery.  

5. Structure : for the effectiveness teaching, the teachers also need approaches in teaching 

writing. 

6. Capitalization : what are teacher’s and student’s responses towards teaching 

vocabulary using Pictionary game ? 

7. Spelling : deacriptrive text 

  

 From the data, the number of errors decrease along with the number of exercises 

performed by students. The exercise is in the form of giving 3 different tasks as described 

above. The findings of the interview stated that:  

1. They are getting used to English. Starting with the features in the Schoology application 

which are entirely in English  

2. The habit of opening the dictionary is awakened  

3. There is a Resource feature in the Schoology application that makes it easy for students 

to find learning resources that are relevant to the topic being discussed 4. Even in this 

feature, students can upload their work so that it can be accessed by Schoology users in 



 
 

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other parts of the world. Resources itself is a place where all material is stored. In this 

feature, users can manage all files, assignments, assessments, and learning outcomes. 

Resources consists of 2, namely My resources and Public Resources. In My resources, 

users can import files which are new resources obtained from other sources or the user's 

own writing. Meanwhile, through the public resource feature, users can share resources 

with groups and download resources according to their needs. Based on the results of 

interviews, this resource for them is a place to store written results as well as a place as 

a source of documentation and learning resources 

 

Based on the results of interviews, test results and a Google Form questionnaire, it can 

be concluded that students' perceptions and opinions regarding the use of Schoology learning 

media are:  

1. As many as 91.95% of respondents have used Schoology and 0.74% have never used 

Schoology.  

2. The impression of students using Schoology was 13.42% that Schoology was easy to 

use, as many as 20.13% of students had an ordinary impression, but 65.77% of students 

had the impression that Schoology was difficult to use. 

3. For students and respondents who have the impression of being easy and are used to 

saying because Schoology has a simple appearance. Meanwhile, students and 

respondents who stated that it was difficult to state because the language of instruction 

in Schoology was English and they preferred Google classroom to Schoology.  

 

From the findings and research and answering the research objectives, it can be 

concluded that the use of Schoology as a learning medium is 

1. Schoology improves students' English proficiency both in general and specifically, 

namely writing skills  

2. Students' perceptions and opinions of the use of Schoology in general are difficult, 

especially for those who are just learning English because the language of instruction 

used in the Schoology app is English. 

Discussion 

In this section, the researchers will present the interpretation and discussion after getting 

the result of the research.  As mentioned before, the use of Schoology is to facilitate an online 

communication and discussion, submit the assignment, and share the learning sources. From 



 
 

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the findings above there were several important factors to be noted related to the research 

question which was to determine the effect of Schoology online learning media on students' 

writing skills and to identify students' perceptions about the use of Schoology. Those several 

important factors were the students’ impression on Schoology, how is the students’ perception 

towards Schoology and last, how Schoology improves students’ writing skills. 

Schoology provides students quick access to relevant information. Through Schoology, 

teachers can build courses, upload their lectures and lessons, create assignments and 

discussions, grade submissions, and test and quiz their students online. Through Schoology, 

teachers can list or schedule events or activities. This helps keep everyone in touch and on the 

same page. Schoology offers automated gradebook and attendance. Schoology also provides 

easy communication, posts, updates, messages, and comments. Through Schoology, everyone 

can be simply informed. The previous studies on Schoology proved that Schoology, as an LMS, 

is an effective, easy, and flexible tool that can effectively contribute to the development of 

learning from distance, especially in blended learning and e-learning (Astuti, 2019).  

Though it has many good offers and tools, most of the students while using it first time 

were a bit confused. But for those who already familiar with Facebook, stated in the findings 

that it was user friendly. This finding on research is the same finding as stated by Karyawati 

and Ndadari (Karyawati & Ndadari, 2017) where they stated that indeed some students found 

the difficulties when they used it the first time where they weren’t familiar with it.  

There were several problems in student’s writing skills as stated by Mutia (Mutia, 2018) 

. First, lack of vocabularies. When the teacher asked students to make a sentence without a 

dictionary, many students were still confused. They able to make a sentence in Indonesian but 

when they translate into English without opening a dictionary they did not know how. Second, 

they did not know how to make a good sentence. When students make a sentence, the structure 

of sentences were incorrect. When students make a simple sentence in past tense, many students 

sill use verb 1, sometimes the sentence didn’t have a subject. Third is content. When teacher 

asked students to make a paragraph, they look confused about what they should write. They 

cannot construct the main idea and supporting detail into paragraph. This is similar to the 

researchers finding where the students submitted their writing task into Schoology and then 

found some errors such as word order and structure, punctuation, missing word, organization, 

capitalization and even spelling mistakes were found.  

When using the Schoology application, students generally felt enthusiastic, because this 

application was something new for them. However, at the second meeting students began to 



 
 

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complain about number of things related to the use of this application. Such as the application, 

the system, the needed of large data and so on.  Other than that, they also complained about the 

problem of the language of instruction used in Schoology which uses English. After getting 

used to it and spend many hours familiarizing themselves with Schoology, most students and 

respondents answered that Schoology was easy and Schoology has a simple appearance which 

has Facebook alike look. This positive perception towards using Schoology and getting familiar 

with using Schoology is similar to the findings of Amalia (Amalia, 2018) where her finding 

stated that the students have a positive perception toward the use of Schoology and even the 

assessment system in Schoology. The similar statements posed by Abbas (Abbas, 2020) were 

in his findings he found that most students were motivated by learning using schoology e-

learning because of its easiness, friendly look, and challenging way of doing the task. 

In improving English writing skill, the research finding stated that there was 

improvement by 40% in number of writing skills and lessen writing error found on the student’s 

writing task. It can be concluded that Schoology does improve writing skill. This stated 

supported by several other previous research such as Hastomo (Hastomo, 2019) and Apriliani 

et al (Apriliani, Asib, & Ngadiso, 2019) where they stated that Schoology as alternative 

learning media platform that used by the teacher and the students and  has great potential to 

help students in enhancing their writing skill ability. Sicat (Sicat, 2015) also stated that 

Schoology as an LMS is an effective tool for enhancing college student’s proficiency in writing 

in English, especially in business writing.  

The finding proved that Schoology can be an effective, easy, and flexible LMS platform 

for e-learning and blended learning. The platform has many advanced educational features for 

teachers and students in times of COVID-19 and certainly to improving students’ writing skill.  

 

CONCLUSION 

Students' English skills improve because they are forced to use English because there 

is no Indonesian language setting in the Schoology channel. And due to the English setting 

therefore students are forced to use dictionary to understand the language and instruction used. 

For writing tasks, components of errors that are often found included: word order, wrong word 

choice, structure, organization, and spelling. With the increasing number of assignments given 

and the more frequent use of Schoology therefore students get used to using it and improve 

their proficiency in English. From their task which was submitted, there was improving of 40% 

of score and lessen writing error found on their writing task. Majority of the students stated 



 
 

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that Schoology had simple appearance.  It is to be concluded that Schoology did improve 

writing skill because the language of instruction in Schoology was English with user friendly 

outlook hence force the students to study harder using and writing in English. 

 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

Thanks to Allah SWT, IKIP Siliwangi , English Education Study Program of IKIP Siliwangi  

and UPT LPPM for providing support therefore this research is carried out well. 

 

REFERENCES 

 

Abbas, A. H. (2020). Reasons why we should use Schoology in e-learning. Retrieved from 

https://jilrc.com/reasons-why-we-should-use-schoology-in-e-learning-a-review-paper/ 

Amalia, R. (2018). Students' perception on online assesment use in schoology in EFL classrooms. 

Surabaya: Universitas Islam Negeri Sunan Ampel Surabaya. 

Aminoto, T., & Pathoni, H. (2014). Penerapan media e-learning berbasis schoology untuk 

meningkatkan aktivitas dan hasil belajar materi usaha dan energi di kelas XI SMAN 10 kota 

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