Using WhatsApp in language teaching
The development of technology is gradually changing and influencing every sphere of our life. In this respect, education is not an exception. While some teachers argue that gadgets and the Internet distract students from learning, others claim that the apps technology offers us make education more interactive and effective. In fact, the digital world has opened even wider doors to achieve better results in learning a foreign language. Among digital services, messengers such as WhatsApp may play a crucial role in the ELT classroom if used properly. Here we will discuss why using this service may be effective and how to use it in language teaching.
Why use WhatsApp?
Most teens are obsessed with their phones and spend hours texting each other. Bringing WhatsApp to the classroom will get your students’ attention and interest, will make them understand that learning a language is not just about reading textbooks and doing grammar exercises. Using this service in language teaching will also save your time and energy, as you will not have to spend much of both on assigning and explaining homework, checking their reading level, etc.
Ideas on using WhatsApp
Class groups. Create separate groups for your students of different levels, one group for beginner and elementary levels, next for pre-intermediate and intermediate levels, and another one for upper-intermediate and advanced levels. I usually send short motivational videos (up to 3 mins) to the group, share my opinion with my students and get them to leave their own comments on videos. This keeps their English mood even when they don’t have English classes, inspires them and makes their day.
The next thing that can be done with class groups is spreading the news. As for me, I do it in the evening and call it one-minute news break. Every day a different student is responsible for this task. One of them shares the news that he/she has heard and then other students in the group leave their short comments on it.
Emoji dictionary. This feature may come in handy when you introduce new vocabulary, such as food, vegetables, fruit, emotions, etc. to your beginner and elementary students. This helps to avoid using L1 and may be very effective with visual students. However, this feature is limited, as you can’t find necessary emojis for all English words.
Fill in the gaps. There are several ways to carry out this task. First is with the help of emojis. Send the text with missing words and ask your students to fill in. Here is an example that can be used with beginner and elementary students.
The same exercise can be done with audio recording to check how well students know the spelling of the new words. Send the text with missing information and then make an audio recording of the words to fill in the gaps.
Describe a process. Students choose a process of an activity they want to describe, such as baking a birthday cake, making an omelette, editing and posting photos on Instagram*, etc. Then they take or download photos for each step and describe the process. This activity is best suitable for pre-intermediate and intermediate students.
Improve pronunciation and intonation. From time to time I pick up the words my students have difficulty in pronunciation and send these words to them. They reply to it with an audio message reading the words out loud. Then I check their pronunciation and give some tips if necessary. If the students have problems with intonation as well, I send them a short text to read. Doing this kind of tasks saves time and helps students to improve their pronunciation and intonation skills.
Tour — guide. Students make a video of a place they visit during the week, such as a park, a museum, a school or a flat and tell about it in this video. Later they send these videos to each other and start a discussion. They can ask questions about the places, such as “Where is the museum situated?”, “What is the park famous for?”, etc. This can be sent either to the class WhatsApp group or individually.
Photo diary. During the day students take photos of what they do, what they wear and how they feel. Then they send these photos to each other with a short description of each photo.
Difficulties and how to overcome them
In spite of the advantages of using WhatsApp, there are still some difficulties that you may encounter in your classes.
— No time for searching for necessary materials? To make things easier, you can categorise the materials you will need in the upcoming month. If it is about motivational videos to send every day to your students, just subscribe to one of the YouTube channels:
Having a great source of motivational videos, you can send one every day.
— No time for checking tasks? It is not a big problem, as you can do it while drinking coffee, or watching a film. Just keep in mind, that WhatsApp tasks shouldn’t be too complicated and time-consuming. WhatsApp tasks should be additional and done with pleasure.
— Your students don’t take the tasks serious? Take the first step and send a photo of what you are doing or where you are. Write a message describing the photo and then ask your students what they are doing now or where they are. Seeing that you share your photo with them and are interested in their business, they will probably get motivated and do the task.
As you can see, modern technology and the services it offers us is not about hindering learning procedure. Vice versa, it may turn out to be extremely helpful if used properly and on time.
Do you use WhatsApp in your ESL classroom? Do your teens like it?
Маргарита Аветисян 
