Innovation in Language Learning

Teaching languages with technology in a public institution where technological resources are scarce can be challenging. However, with the boom of social media and the use of instant messaging as a way of daily basis communication among individuals, these could be a resource to take advantage of when these are sort of available for an average citizen that goes to school. In addition, in large classes where the communicative approach is the aim, opportunities to practice the language are limited and it is not necessarily a good scenario to develop all language skills, particularly speaking and writing. This is the case of two different beginner courses at the School of Foreign Languages at the National University of Honduras: Italian I and English I. Therefore, in this paper, we explain how instant messaging such as WhatsApp was used as a resource to trigger students to speak and write in their second language outside the classroom. Different prompts were elicited to have learners communicate in pairs, thus, chat partners were assigned to have them produce the language. Students then reported what they did and talked about by sending reports to their teachers, and they were also given simple rubrics to assess their peers’ pronunciation and use of grammar. Moreover, short surveys were given at the beginning and at the end of the courses to know their reactions on the study. Results have shown that students increased their confidence in their second language and were also more motivated to use it since communication was encouraged to happen in the same way it does in their daily lives.

Keywords: M- learning, interaction, motivation, learner confidence, language learning;