Assessing Mobile Instant Messaging in a Foreign Language Classroom

The present research represents a longitudinal investigation into Mobile Instant Messaging to develop second language skills. WhatsApp application was selected as the chat-based communication tool to carry out this study, which focuses on writing and speaking skills' development. Quantitative a...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inInternational Association for Development of the Information Society
Main Author Andújar, Alberto
Format Report
LanguageEnglish
Published International Association for the Development of the Information Society 01.03.2018
Subjects
College Students
Comprehension
Computer Oriented Programs
Grammar
Handheld Devices
Language Fluency
Language Skills
Pronunciation
Second Language Learning
Teaching Methods
Telecommunications
Vocabulary
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Summary:The present research represents a longitudinal investigation into Mobile Instant Messaging to develop second language skills. WhatsApp application was selected as the chat-based communication tool to carry out this study, which focuses on writing and speaking skills' development. Quantitative and qualitative analyses were used to tackle students writing ability in terms of grammatical, lexical and mechanical accuracy as well as syntactic complexity together with lexical diversity. Similarly, this mobile chat-based application was also used for the creation of a speaking group where the language-related episodes were analyzed as well as students overall performance in terms of pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, fluency and comprehension. In order to observe the differences among the participants, a control and experimental group were set at the start of the study in each of the groups. Pre-post tests were given to the students and participation was tracked throughout the interaction. Screenshots in the application were also taken at different times in order to observe students' use of the language. Positive results were found in terms of accuracy in the experimental group whereas syntactic complexity yielded no significant differences. Regarding the speaking ability, students in the experimental group outperformed those in the control in each of the aspects analyzed, becoming a constant source of language-related episodes. Overall, the application was found to be a rich environment for language acquisition and learning thanks to the social interaction taking place in the application. [For the complete proceedings, see ED590271.]