Innovation in Language Learning

Attitude is a predisposition or tendency to respond positively or negatively towards a certain idea. In the context of language teaching and learning, it is important to identify teachers and students attitudes towards any new ideas intended to be introduced into language classrooms. This can help in identifying their acceptance of these ideas and their readiness for implementing them.

Recently, Facebook has become a popular social network connecting teachers and students together and offering them the opportunity for sharing ideas and information. The aim of this study therefore was to investigate the attitudes of EFL university students and instructors towards integrating this application in English language teaching and learning. The mixed-methods approach was used in this study. A close-ended questionnaire was distributed among sixty EFL students randomly selected from different semesters in a college of education in Tripoli, University in Libya. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with four instructors from the English department in the same college. The quantitative and qualitative data analysis revealed the positive attitudes of most of the participants towards using Facebook application for educational purposes by teachers and students. The participants reported about their successful experiences in using this application in creating discussing groups, posting teaching materials and tasks in advance and for assignment submission with immediate feedback. However, they were faced with challenges such as lack or poor access to the internet, lack of necessary technical skills, female teachers and students’ avoidance of using this application and students’ misuse of it. This study brings new insights into the literature about the increasing interest in using social networks in language teaching and learning.

Key Words: Attitudes- FB- Integration-