Online Digital Platforms During Covid-19 in Efl Classes: Visual Impairment Student’ Perception

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, the government decided to implement work and learning from home. Teachers are expected to teach online. It also applied to teaching and learning English. Thus, Google Classroom, WhatsApp, and Zoom are commonly used as online learning platforms by EFL teachers and students during pandemic. The online digital platforms are also used as the main tool to provide teaching materials not only for the sighted student but also for Visual Impairment student (VIs). The present study is aimed at investigating how Visual Impairment student (VIs) perceive utilizing Digital Platforms in online learning, the barriers VIs faced in utilizing Digital Platforms, and the kinds of Digital Platforms that appropriate for Visual Impairment student (VIs). The study involved one Visual Impairment student (low vision) in one of the private universities of Makassar, South Sulawesi. Questionnaires and interviews were used to collect data. It analyzed using descriptive qualitative research. The results of the study showed that Visual impairment has a positive response towards Google Classroom, WhatsApp, and Zoom in understanding the content, improving the ability to use various digital platforms in learning, presenting more interesting teaching materials, selecting of Digital Platforms by English Language skill, and hindering of utilizing Digital Platform. Even though slow-speed internet connectivity, take longer, and vague learning instruction was considered to be barriers in using Digital Platforms. Besides, Zoom is a digital platform that appropriates for VIs; Zoom is a video conferencing learning platform that offers VIs an opportunity to respond in real-time and there is a recording system that records the learning process from start to finish.

English language teaching and learning during Covid-19: A global perspective on the first year

“…These platforms took the place of brick-and-mortar classrooms in the offered course subjects and engaged the students by providing a sense of the online classroom environment. One of the most remarkable findings of this study is that Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams were also favoured for some of their default features, such as recording the sessions, which contributes to the flexibility of online teaching and learning, narrowing the power/status distance between students and teachers, and offering screen sharing opportunities and chat rooms (Destianingsih & Satria, 2020;Hamid, 2020;Wong, 2020). Apart from these, WhatsApp was also much favoured by students and WhatsApp created an online language community where language use continued even while everyone was staying at home during quarantine (Hadianti & Arisandi, 2020;Kholis, 2020).…”

“…The students' tendency to adapt to online learning was also enhanced by social media; this helped to focus the online learning community, in which they reproduced linguistic content by making use of free online resources and were involved in social interaction with their peers and teachers (Krishan et al, 2020;Mustadi et al, 2021). It was also reported that another aspect the students regarded positively is that online learning was appropriate for visually-impaired students, who were learning English remotely at home (Hamid, 2020).…”

“…The researchers who studied the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on the teaching and learning of the English language focused inevitably on educational technologies and online teaching platforms, since the schools and teachers facilitated various online platforms for teaching and social media applications for smartphones. The findings show that Zoom, Moodle, Google Meet, WhatsApp, Facebook, Blackboard and other platforms were commonly used for delivering the courses and providing intra-communication during the pandemic (Almekhlafy, 2020;Fitria, 2020;Hakim, 2020;Hamid, 2020;Nartiningrum & Nugroho, 2020;Ritonga et al, 2020;Shaaban, 2020). Based on the online platforms and social media networks, teachers adopted various teaching practices and methods to comply with the aims of the course and turn them into achievable outcomes.…”

“…English language related studies during the Covid-19 process (between March 2020 and February 2021) (Aji et al, 2020;Allo, 2020;Almekhlafy, 2020;Andriivna et al, 2020;Ariyanti, 2020;Astuti & Solikhah, 2021;Atmojo & Nugroho, 2020;Bailey & Lee, 2020;Chiatoh & Chia, 2020;Dahmash, 2020;Davies et al, 2020;Destianingsih & Satria, 2020;Farrah & Al-Bakry, 2020;Fatima, 2020;Fitria, 2020;Forrester, 2020;Fuad et al, 2020;Fuentes Hernández et al, 2020;Gao & Zhang, 2020;Hadianti & Arisandi, 2020;Hafidz, 2020;Hakim, 2020;Hamid, 2020;Hartshorn & Mcmurry, 2020;Hazaea et al, 2021;Hodges et al, 2020b;Hopp & Thoma, 2020;Huang et al, 2021;Kamhi-Stein et al, 2020;Karakuzu et al, 2020;Karataş & Tuncer, 2020;Karim & Hasan, 2020;Kawinkoonlasate, 2020;Khafaga, 2021;Kholis, 2020;Krishan et al, 2020;Kusumawati, 2020;Li et al, 2020;Lie et al, 2020;Loo, 2020;…”

“…The studies show that teachers mostly made use of online video conferencing platforms such as Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams for the interactive features they offered in synchronous teaching of the language (Almekhlafy, 2020;Destianingsih & Satria, 2020;Hakim, 2020;Hamid, 2020;Nartiningrum & Nugroho, 2020). These platforms took the place of brick-and-mortar classrooms in the offered course subjects and engaged the students by providing a sense of the online classroom environment.…”