Boosting Students’ Motivation in Learning Descriptive Writing through Instagram ()
1. Introduction
English is always an essential language among the other languages in this modernisation world as technology evolves rapidly where people communicate in English everywhere. It is a vital need that everyone should equip with English to convey messages clearly. In order to achieve this target, the basic four skills, listening, speaking, reading and writing, have to be learned and taught since the early stage. In accordance with the goals to achieve both spoken and written ability, Ministry of Education (MOE) has come up with Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013-2025 with various curriculum such as a policy of teaching Science and Mathematics in English in 2002, the New Standard Curriculum which allocated additional time for English subject in 2011 as well as both Highly Immersive Programme and Dual Language Programme in 2016 (Darus & Subramanian, 2009; MOE, 2013; Pillai & Ong, 2018).
However, in Malaysia, English is taught as a second language which makes this a challenging task in achieving the goals. Malaysian primary and secondary students were still found to be incompetent in English despite all the efforts made by the MOE, especially in productive skill which is writing (Dar & Khan, 2015). According to the report of School Certificate Examination 2019 by MOE, half of the candidates failed to achieve the desired outcomes where 23% scored E-grade and 35% scored D-grade in English Paper 2 (024) which was writing paper (Siddek & Ismail, 2021). Rural area primary students are relatively weak in writing such as the application of correct tenses, punctuation, vocabulary usage, sentence structures and other grammar focus (Azlan, Zakaria, & Yunus, 2019). According to Setyowati (2016), writing is a process of meaning making which enables the readers to read meaningfully and logically. The author should have clear, fluent and effective communication of ideas through a series of related text-making activities (Raimes, 1983).
The major problem faced by the rural area primary students is the inability to generate ideas with the limited vocabulary they acquire. This is supported by other researches from Firmansyah (2015) as well as Yaccob and Yunus (2019) where the researchers found that learner’ lacking of understanding was due to the limited vocabulary thus demotivated them in learning English. Lawai and Aziz (2019) found out that the reasons for poor performances of rural area students were mainly because of the influence of mother tongue, limited English resources and monolingual environment. The students have only exposed to English during the school time with only three hours every week and they frequently use mother tongue in their daily communication.
To keep pace with 21st century, technology has been integrated in education since 1998 with giving interactive courseware as the alternative to teach Malay, English, Science and Mathematics subjects in the classroom (MOE, 2008). It has then transformed to mobile technology which is widely spread for various purposes in this decade. People have high demands in exploiting mobile technology for entertainment or education, particularly on social media. In order to overcome the problem in writing and motivation, for the past years, many educators have started integrating social media in teaching and learning process like Instagram, Facebook, YouTube or Tik Tok. These platforms are trending among the young generations as they can be accessed easily via mobile technologies, especially in this Covid-19 pandemic time where most of the students acquire a mobile phone for online class. In seeing the feasibility of social media, educators implemented these platforms as a learning tool in various ways (Mao, 2014). It is undeniable that social media plays a huge influential role among the young generations thus teachers are able to manipulate it outside the classroom to increase the chance of practicing the language.
One of the frequently used social medias, Instagram, is proved an effective learning tool in enhancing students’ language proficiency, interest and motivation. However, most of the studies were conducted in foreign language classroom, mainly secondary and tertiary classroom. Thus, this paper aims to investigate Malaysian rural primary students’ perceptions on Instagram as a motivation in descriptive writing.
2. Literature Review
2.1. Instagram in Language Learning
Studies on Instagram in education field are no longer a fresh topic or trend, especially for teaching English. The role of mobile technology and social media has been proven its effectiveness in language learning. Ali et al. (2017) claimed that the use of a variety of communication tools on social media like blogs, social networking sites and virtual game worlds provided unlimited opportunities for students to exploit and engage in the learning. They were able to communicate with their peers, interact and socialize with any other on the virtual world and share the knowledge they have with each other. It was supported by Kukulska-Hulme (2009), Borau et al. (2009), Lan, Sung and Chang (2009), Gonulal (2019), Azlan, Zakaria and Yunus (2019) and Devana and Afifah (2021) who agreed that students’ listening and speaking skills, collaborative learning environment, reading motivation and communicative competence were enhanced through mobile learning.
Handayani (2018) and Eraslan (2019) applied Instagram in their study and discovered that besides allowing students to generate ideas, it offered an enjoyable learning experience for teachers and students. Not only students can write on Instagram, teachers can utilize it to develop interesting and creative teaching materials. Similarly, the finding from Pujiati, Zahra and Tamela (2019) supported the above studies. The researchers found that students had an improvement in their competence and skills after learning through Instagram where the improvements can be clearly seen in grammatical competence, vocabulary and writing skills.
Generally, most result of the studies showed that students had positive attitude and perspectives towards using Instagram in language learning. Anggraeni (2017) found Instagram a motivated platform for university students where they utilized it positively in their writing assignments and hence helped them write better. Despite the moderate attitude towards Instagram from the previous study, some students believed that negative comments from peers motivated them to write even better although they were under pressure (Rinda, Novawan, & Miqawati, 2018). These positive perceptions were later supported by Laksono, Damayanti & Santoso (2019) as well as Yusuf and Jazilah (2020) where high percentage of students agreed on the effectiveness of Instagram as instructional media in high school or university.
However, there are less studies on can be found in Malaysia on how Instagram can assist in second language learning. Starting 2017, Akhiar, Mydin and Kasuma investigated students’ perceptions and attitudes towards Instagram in writing English and the result is positive. Therefore, a few researchers began to implement Instagram in their studies on both primary students and undergraduates. Shafie and Mahadi (2019), Shazali, Shamsudin and Yunus (2019) as well as Yunus, Tan and Mohideen (2019) found that Instagram was able to improve students’ writing, speaking and reading skills when they were actively involved in the process of sharing and commenting.
2.2. Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)
Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) was applied in this study to investigate the acceptance of an individual towards the use of information system which was proposed by Davis in 1986 (Lee, Kozar, & Larsen 2003). According to Davis (1985), five constructs included in this model were perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, attitude towards using, behavioural intention and actual use. In this study, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness were focused with the integration of motivational theory. Davis and Warshaw (1992) suggested individual’s behaviour to be included in this model based on the extrinsic and intrinsic motivation because perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use were one of the extrinsic motivations that helped achieve the desired outcomes from the activity conducted.
Many past studies had investigated the use of TAM on social media in education as perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness were useful to influence learners’ attitude in using social media as a learning tool. The findings found out that social media was considered as a useful and faster tool to communicate and it did not require a lot of effect to use (Alduaij, 2019; Alghizzawi et al., 2019; Al-Rahmi et al., 2018). Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and Instagram were among the trending social media these recent years and they were perceived as an effective tool for high school and university learners. Learners demonstrated positive attitudes, high level of engagement and behaviour intention in utilizing these social media in their learning (Mistar & Embi, 2016; Al-Daihani, 2016; Kumar & Syed, 2021). Thus, this study is carried out to investigate the perceptions of rural primary students towards Instagram as a motivation in writing.
3. Methodology
3.1. Research Design
This study employed mixed method design as the research design as a combination of quantitative research and qualitative research permit a more thorough analysis and a triangulation of data (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 2010). According to Creswell (2012), quantitative research provides a systematic empirical investigation and it increases the understanding of the variables to evaluate the relevancy towards the research problems while qualitative research is used to obtain complex details such as feelings, thoughts and emotions which are difficult to measure (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).
3.2. Research Participants
The participants of this study were selected from a rural school in Kahang, Johor and convenience sampling was adopted to suit the research objectives. Convenience sampling was a type of nonrandom sampling where members of target population were selected based on certain criteria such as easy accessibility, geographically proximity, availability at a given time or the willingness to participate in the study (Etikan, Musa, & Alkassim, 2016). A total of 13 students with mixed ability in writing were involved in the proses of data collection (Table 1) as this was action research which focused on finding solution to a classroom problem. Having the students of the researchers be involved in this research was found to be appropriate to well address the issue. Year 4 students faced problems in writing essays as they mostly wrote sentences in lower primary and they had to write an essay by their own when they stepped into upper primary. The students did not have enough experience to write an essay and they are lacking of self-confidence lead to low motivation in writing. This research focused on using Instagram as the medium, thus, Year 4 students with accessibility to technology appliances were enrolled.
3.3. Research Instrument
For data collection, a set of questionnaires was distributed to the students via Google Form to obtain their perceptions on using Instagram as a motivation to improve their writing skills. The questionnaire was adapted from three researches which were Kitchakarn (2016), Alduaij (2019) as well as Saefurrohman and Istikharoh (2012). A total of 10 questions on perceived usefulness of Instagram in Section A, 5 questions on perceived ease of use of Instagram in Section B and 12 questions on student learning motivation in Section C were included. “Yes” or “No” options were provided in Section A and B while “Always”, “Rarely” or “Never” options were given in the Section C because young learners are more engaged in dichotomous thinking without accepting the possibilities that lie between two extremes (Caty, Arnould, Thornnard, & Lejeune, 2008). A semi-structured interview was also conducted with 4 students selected to gain their views and opinions on Instagram as motivation in writing. The interview questions were taken from Akhiar, Mydin and Kasuma (2017) who has studied about the undergraduate students’ perceptions and attitudes towards the use of Instagram in English language writing.
3.4. Data Collection Method
In this study, there were two stages of collecting data to access the effectiveness of Instagram as a motivational learning tool in descriptive writing. The first step
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Table 1. Students’ demography in one of the rural schools, Kahang, Johor.
was to distribute questionnaire to students and they were given 30 minutes to answer the items in the questionnaire. They could request for help whenever there was any problem or questions as their English proficiency level was not high to understand the items fully by themselves. The purpose of questionnaire was to obtain their perceptions on Instagram and motivational level after using Instagram in writing. Next, the selected students were interviewed to receive their feedbacks on Instagram, specifically on their motivational level to use Instagram in writing. The data collected was then being analysed and discussed.
3.5. Data Analysis Method
The data collected from the questionnaire was processed in the SPSS version 20 while the interview transcript was provided to be analysed. Percentage analysis was used to compare the result of Section A and Section B in the questionnaire as there were only two options given to be chosen by the students while mean analysis was used to analyse the data for Section C in the questionnaire because it was a three options section. On the other hand, thematic analysis was applied for the interview. The comments and responses given by the students were divided and categorized based on their feeling, challenges, usefulness of Instagram and suggestions. All the information collected was summarized, analysed descriptively and triangulated to draw a conclusion on the research findings.
4. Findings and Discussion
4.1. Students’ Perceptions on Instagram
The findings of this study discovered the perceptions of rural area primary students towards the use of Instagram as a learning tool in learning writing. The data collected were perceived ease of use of Instagram, perceived usefulness of Instagram and their motivation in learning through Instagram. The analysis of the study was analysed based on the research question mentioned above. Below are the data shown based on the questionnaires distributed to students. Percentage analysis was carried out for Section A and B while mean analysis was carried out for Section C in the questionnaire.
Table 2 demonstrated high frequency and percentage for every item related to perceived usefulness of Instagram. 13 students (100%) totally agreed that Instagram is a good place to keep in contact with other students from class, check class notes or homework posted by the teacher, ask for help about homework assignments, check for class-related information and notices, post and comment
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Table 2. Perceived usefulness of Instagram.
writing assignments, read articles and prepare for next class as well as for classmates to review or edit writing assignments. However, there were 1 pupil (7.7%) who disagreed on the usefulness of Instagram in discussing different topics with classmates while another 2 students (15.4%) also had an opposite view with their friends on the usefulness of Instagram to contact their teacher outside the classroom. Overall, students’ perceptions on the usefulness of Instagram were at a very high level.
Based on Table 3, most students perceived Instagram as an easily manipulated learning tool to be used. All of them (100%) agreed that Instagram is easy to access from mobile phones, easy to make posts, comment, upload pictures and videos as well as an easy way to communicate with their teacher and friends. Moreover, 92.3% of the students agreed that Instagram is easier to find language learning information and it does not require a lot of effort.
With the benefits of technology, students who were in the 21st century learning environment delivered and received information quickly and efficiently. Instagram features enabled students to access resources, review and discuss topics with their classmates as an additional learning time. They were not shy or felt ashamed to ask for help as it was not a face-to-face interaction and slowly, they
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Table 3. Perceived ease of use of Instagram.
started to gain confidence over time. Students also found it a good place to keep in contact with their teacher so that they could get advice and guidance to any problems they faced that required immediate solutions (Norashuha Tajuddin et al., 2013).
By utilizing TAM model in the questionnaire, overall, students demonstrated positive perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of Instagram as a learning tool in descriptive writing. According to Chen et al. (2011), perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness could predict students’ acceptance, attitude and adoption in using an application in learning. Most of the students showed positive feelings like happy, enthusiastic, active, interesting and confidence after using Instagram in writing. It was believed that these positive feelings towards Instagram increased students’ performance to adopt Instagram in writing hence improving their ability in writing. As for the aspect of perceived ease of use, high percentage in all the items in questionnaire concluded that students’ willingness to use Instagram was high as it was an application which was free of effort. Therefore, Instagram can be concluded as a usefulness application in learning writing based on students’ perception.
4.2. Students’ Motivation in Learning Descriptive Writing on Instagram
In order to investigate the motivational level of students towards the use of Instagram in their learning, a section in the questionnaire which focused on motivation in learning and an interview were carried out as well. Pimentel (2019) had come out with the 3 levels of mean scores analysis (Table 4) so that students’ motivational level can be categorized into low, moderate or high and statistically analysed.
Based on Table 4, it can be clearly seen that when the mean score fell on the range of 1.00 to 1.66, it indicated a low motivational level in learning through Instagram while a moderate level of motivation obtained a mean score between 1.67 and 2.33. In order to get high level of motivational level, the mean score must be a value between 2.34 and 3.00. The mean scores for each item in Section C had been analysed in SPSS and shown in Table 5.
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Table 4. Levels of mean scores analysis.
Table 5 showed the motivation of students on using Instagram as a learning tool in learning writing. The highest mean score (2.92) was displayed in the item 10 where 12 students always found Instagram building a good communication with their teacher and friends. Followed by item 8 with the second highest mean score (2.85), 11 students found Instagram a great place in getting much knowledge of English learning. 69.2% of the students were happy, enthusiastic, having big interest and followed every stage in learning on Instagram which had a mean score of 2.69 while 61.5% of the students were active in the class and submitted their assignment on time with 2.54 mean score. Meanwhile, 53.8% of the students felt confidence when using Instagram to develop their skill of learning English, especially in writing. However, item 4 showed the lowest mean score which was 2.23, 2 students (15.45%) felt bored when joining a lesson on Instagram while 6 students (46.2%) rarely felt bored and lastly 5 students (38.5%) found it interesting to be joining a lesson on Instagram.
The result showed high level of students towards the use of Instagram in learning descriptive writing as most of the items obtained mean score between 2.34 to 3.00. During this Covid-19 period, students were all well-equipped with mobile phones, tablets or laptops. They can easily access online materials and information via technology appliances. Making sentences, uploading photos and videos with the guidance of their teacher did not require a lot of effort. When they face any problems with Instagram, they can communicate with their teacher with ease. There was only an item obtaining mean score lower than 2.34 where a few students felt bored to join the lesson on Instagram. The reason might be the monotony of the activity conducted on Instagram.
According to Saefurrohman and Istikharoh (2012), in order to learn a language, a good feeling towards the language was important and effective to influence students’ motivation. Based on the findings on this study, 9 out of 13 students were found to be happy, enthusiastic and showing big interest in joining the lesson on Instagram. On the other hand, building good relationship between teacher and students as well as among students themselves lowered students’ affective filter and enhanced their willingness to communicate. It could be seen from the findings that the highest mean scores fell on item 10 where 12 out of 13 students considered Instagram a good place to communicate with their teacher and friends. According to Dwijuliani et al. (2021), teachers as educators must motivate students to learn in order to achieve desired goals and behaviors. The findings of this study shared similar result with the studies on social media in language learning (Akhiar, Mydin, & Kasuma, 2017; Yunus, Tan, & Mohideen, 2019; Kasuma, 2017) where the integration of various online learning media provided more engaging activities, vast information and materials as well as a relaxed learning process to the students who had less motivation in learning. Therefore, Instagram was considered an effective learning tool to motivate students in descriptive writing with diversity of the activities carried out.
Meanwhile, there were five open-ended questions asked in the semi-structure interview. The responses of the students were analysed thematically (Table 6) and further discussed. Samples were also provided for a clearer view of the responses.
Based on how they feel about using Instagram as part of their English classes, Pupil A found it interesting, “use Instagram to do homework assigned by the teacher, I find it interesting.” Similarly, Pupil C mentioned, “I feel very interesting using Instagram in my English classes.” The other students have positive feelings towards Instagram as well. For example, Pupil B responded “I am very excited because it is the first time to use the Instagram for my English classes.” And Pupil D answered “I feeling excellent. It is because can learning more simple word and can increase knowledge.” Overall, students were all excited and interested to explore a new learning tool as rural area students seldom have the opportunity to try on new things.
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Table 6. General views on Instagram.
As for the challenges faced, the students experienced less problems although it was the first time they tried on a new thing. Students normally encountered some minor problem, as Pupil D mentioned “I don’t know how to log in Instagram.” and Pupil C responded “I need to have a device such as handphone, tablet or computer. Secondly, I need to learn the way to insert words.” Meanwhile, Pupil B faced the similar soft skills problem where she replied “It’s difficult to learn this system.” On the other hand, Pupil A thought that “The challenge of studying with Instagram is to compete with other students. This makes me feel pressured, but it also makes me improve.”
By posting sentences through Instagram, students found it useful and helpful to their journey of learning English. Pupil A addressed “Instagram helped me write because its settings make me feel very convenient.” While Pupil D shared the similar thought with Pupil A, as she mentioned “It gives me some words, let us write, so we can make sentences better.” Although there were some challenges faced, Instagram was still a useful learning tool that benefits students outside the classroom. Pupil B said, “I can refer to other’s sentences before writing.” It was one of the excellent learning methods to review peers’ works and indirectly learned from their pluses and minuses. Pupil D found Instagram a good place to keep in contact with teachers. He responded, “I can get response faster from my teacher.”
There were some suggestions on the other language activities given by the students to be implemented on Instagram. Most of the students suggested the same activity in other languages such as Chinese, Malay, Science, Art and Math. Pupil A, B and D had the same opinions while Pupil C suggested other activities in English. He mentioned, “Many activities can be implemented on Instagram. It has got post pictures and videos to the Instagram and guess the words.” He preferred to choose his own pictures and videos and then post them to Instagram with captions. This can be another alternative to be implemented in the future study.
Overall, students’ motivational level on Instagram was relatively high based on the result of questionnaire and interview. According to Raw and Ismail (2021), online learning tool provided a positive learning environment which made learning more enjoyable so that learners felt motivated to learn what was being taught in the classroom. Although there were some challenges faced throughout the process of learning, it did not extinguish their interest and excitement to learn something new to improve their writing. ESL primary teachers should adapt and adopt modern technological tools to make learning more effective and also equipped themselves with the technological skills for better communication with students (Avelino & Ismail, 2021). Since primary students had low opportunity to explore technological appliances, using online learning tool would trigger them to learn better as they perceived Instagram a convenient tool to learn and get faster responses from their teacher. Students learnt from the mistakes they made previously and made their sentences better. In general, Instagram was a motivational platform for students to write more and improve their writing skills from reviewing their peers’ sentences on Instagram.
5. Conclusion
In conclusion, rural primary students showed positive perceptions towards Instagram as a motivation learning tool in writing. Based on the findings from questionnaire and semi-structured interview, the overall feedback given by the students was positive in terms of their perceptions and also motivation in learning. Those who possessed positive perceptions on the ease of use and usefulness of Instagram as an effective learning tool had relatively high motivation. Therefore, teachers should have creative and innovative teaching methods to arouse students’ motivation and interest in learning.
Students in the 21st century learning environment should be equipped with basic technological skills from an early age, specifically for those students who live in rural areas. Educators should make an effort to provide the students with the necessary knowledge so that they would not be left out in the years to come. This study is hoping to let more rural area learners get the benefits from using social media in their learning. There were concerns on the age restriction to use Instagram. Although Instagram is not for educational purpose, its settings and features which allow fun learning should be recommended with the guidance of teachers and parents. Primary students are suggested to register an account under their parents’ name so that parents are able to track their activities and it can be a useful learning tool outside the classroom.
Future research is suggested to focus on more interactive activities that can be done on Instagram so that teachers could promote language learning with the support of parents and the integration of ICT.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia (MOHE) under the Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS) with project code no. FRGS/1/2019/SS09/UKM/02/2 for supporting this research and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia under research grant no. GG-2021-003.