Dewi Nur Suci, Yazid Basthomi, Bambang Yudi Cahyono, Mirjam Anugerahwati, Faradila Masuara & Merliyani Putri Anggraini*

## How Do Vocational Students Perceive the Use of Telegram for their Online Reading Comprehension?

## Abstract

The advancement of technology encourages English teachers to use online platforms and applications in their English teaching and learning process. There are many apps that can be employed, one of which is Telegram. This study investigates how students perceive the use of Telegram on their reading comprehension and the correlation between the perception and their reading comprehension. For this purpose, 104 students from an Indonesian vocational school from various majors completed an online questionnaire about the use of Telegram for learning English. Besides, a reading test was used to measure the students' reading comprehension. The results portray that the students across departments positively perceived the use of Telegram on their reading comprehension. Furthermore, this study reveals a weak correlation between how the students perceive the use of Telegram and their reading comprehension. It is signified by the correlation between the two variables  of  interest,  .364,  which  is  significant  at  the  .000  level.  It  indicates  that  the  student's  perception  and  reading comprehension for this set of data were significant but had a weak relationship. This may be caused by the reading strategies instructions as the teacher did not provide guidance before the treatment. It yields the pedagogical implication that teachers should train their students to use reading strategies effectively for their online reading comprehension.

## Keywords

ICT use, online reading, reading comprehension, Telegram, vocational students

## 1 Introduction

Engaging the students in reading texts is necessary for acquiring input and producing meaningful output (Indrayadi, 2021; Safaie, 2020; Soto et al., 2019). As one of the most crucial information processing skills (Hahnel et al., 2022), which depends on cognitive and linguistic processes (Nation, 2019), reading can influence students' academic success (Mulatu & Regassa, 2022; Alisaari et al., 2018). Generally, the utility of technology for reading creates critical challenges for education in terms of the speed of processing, text recall, and reading comprehension (Anggraini, Cahyono, et al. 2022; Beard, 2021). Previous research has investigated reading across mediums to determine its effectiveness  in  supporting  students'  reading  abilities.  Jeong  and  Gweon  (2021)  discovered  a difference in readers' visual preferences, reading skills, and attitudes when reading articles in print vs.  digital  formats.  They  found  that  readers  preferred  printed  texts for  reading,  although  the performance  gap  between  print  and  screen  reading  is  closing.  Research  reported  by  Singer  and Alexander  (2017)  revealed  that  the  students  preferred  digital  texts  and  often  predicted  better understandings  when  reading  digitally.  In  contrast,  performance  was  inconsistent  with  student preferences and outcome predictions. Furthermore, the students remembered essential details related to the significant idea and other pertinent material more clearly with printed texts. Thus, using a screen or printed medium for reading comprehension raises a conflicting issue.

Despite the debate about the technology's usefulness in reading, research has widely revealed that the  teachers  and  the  students  in  English  language  classrooms  have  commonly  grown  up  with information and communication technologies (ICTs). Of the 1.081 articles reviewed by Booton et al.

* Merliyani Putri Anggraini (Corresponding author)

Doctorate Program in ELT Faculty of Letters,

Universitas Negeri Malang, Indonesia

e-mail:

merlianiputri@gmail.com

For further addresses, see end of article

(2021), 11 studies explained that inbuilt narration as the feature of the mobile touchscreen could be beneficial  for  reading  comprehension  for  children.  Mah  et  al.  (2020)  conducted  a  preliminary investigation of Singapore's online reading education policy by encouraging bilingual students to read  e-books  and  visit  English  or  Chinese  websites  using  mobile  devices.  Their  research demonstrated that the digital technology use in English and Chinese positively predicted reading ability in both languages for students from English-dominant homes. In addition, their study found intriguing insights into how early reading skills were developed and how bilingualism and digital technologies were used.

In the Indonesian EFL university setting, Sumekto et al. (2022) have explored how online reading empirically  afforded  students'  experiences  and  motivations  because  they  assisted  reading  with technological tools and established the lecturer's instructional strategies. In the northeastern United States, Vorobel et al. (2021) explored the digital literacy of five language students in a university by using the ecological approach as the theoretical lens. Based on their study, the students felt that it was challenging to use a social bookmarking tool in online reading. The ESL students searched for a word or phrase's definition using software on their laptops, online dictionaries, Google Translate, or  Google  search.  This  activity  demonstrates  the  variety  of  approaches  the students  can  use  to interpret information and recognize the need for flexibility in reading assignments in the part of the allocated time for online reading practices. Thus, coping the students with digital information in online reading is essential. Besides, mobile technologies have been integral to language learning because they have been increasingly used at primary or secondary levels.

Mobile technologies like computers, tablets, or smartphones allow spontaneous and individual modes of language learning, referred to as Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) (Anggraini, Anugerahwati, et al., 2022; Zain & Bowles, 2021). Social Networking Service (SNS) has become integral  to  mobile  technologies.  Facebook,  WhatsApp,  Telegram,  Twitter,  Viber,  YouTube,  and Wikis  are  among  the  most  popular  SNS  platforms  utilized  by  students  and  lecturers  out  of  the hundreds  of  others  available  worldwide  (Noori  et  al.,  2022).  In  some  countries  like  Singapore, Telegram,  one  of  the  most  popular  digital  platforms  for  broadcasting  and  news  consumption (Herasimenka et al., 2022), promotes a cloud system and has Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology which benefits teachers and students in language learning (Aghajani et al., 2018; Chen et al., 2020; Hwang & Chang, 2021; Yin et al., 2021).

Some previous studies have examined Telegram in language learning. Alemi et al. (2019) applied Group Dynamic Assessment (GDA) through Telegram to review high school students' grammatical accuracy. Additionally, Ghorbani and Ebadi's (2020) study indicated that using chats in Telegram significantly improved learners' grammatical accuracy in the experimental groups. The results of the empirical study exposed that Telegram was a valuable educational tool that encouraged students to learn vocabulary in a fun way (Alakrash & Razak, 2020). In Iranian junior high classrooms, Vahdat's (2020)  study  on  Telegram  use  showed  a  significant  difference  between  the  performance  of experimental  and  control  groups.  The  experimental  group  confirmed  the  effect  of  Telegram  on improving  collocational  knowledge.  Based  on  these  previous  studies,  the  study  on  the  use  of Telegram in different language learning classrooms can be done to enrich the empirical data about students' ease of use of that application in reading skills and achievement. The previous investigations portrayed little attention on the use of Telegram for vocational high school students. Lin et al. (2020) also argued that the use of mobile technology for reading development has been underexplored. In the  Indonesian  context  of the  EFL  setting,  Citrawati  et  al.'s  (2021)  study  has  also  reviewed that Telegram had little  attention  to  reading  skills.  Therefore,  this  study  investigates  the  issue  of  the utilization of Telegram for reading skills in EFL vocational classrooms by addressing the following two research problems:

1. What is students' perception of the use of Telegram across study programs?
2. Is there any relationship between students' perception of the use of Telegram and their reading achievement?

## 2. Theoretical Considerations

## 2.1 Offline VS Online Reading

Reading is the most crucial part of English teaching (Liu et al., 2020) that involves the interaction of readers with the text at specific times and contexts of culture, social, and physical environment to construct  meanings  (Çetin  &  Kılıçkaya,  2019).  In  recent  years,  the  transformation  of  traditional reading material to electronic texts is gaining much attention because it promotes more complex, fluid,  and  multifaceted  competencies  that  involve  the  integration  of multimodal  texts  and  digital screens (Xodabande & Hashemi, 2022). A number of studies in the literature exposed the different aspects of reading electronic texts on computer screens that reported conflicting results. Recently, Liu et al. (2020) have proved that online reading instruction is effective. The students gained more knowledge and information than they had before. Besides, there were improvements in their reading skills, interest and motivation in learning, and a conducive learning environment. Another study by Liu et al.  (2019)  utilized eye-tracking  technology to identify  the  online  reading  behaviour  of  52 advanced students of English as a second language (L2). This study showed that lexical focus and glosses were considerably fixed when reading for vocabulary acquisition, whereas images were more intensely selected when reading for comprehension. Additionally, vocabulary concentration had a noticeably longer overall fixation period when the digital content was delivered in gradual steps. The analyses  indicated  that  sequential  reading  had  the  ability  to  direct  L2  students'  attention  toward micro-level aids.

In contrast, L2 students seemed to divide their attention between macro- and micro-level supports when presented with information simultaneously. Additionally,  Çetin and Kılıçkaya (2019) have reviewed articles published between 2009 and 2017 about reading on paper or screen. They state that the  reviewed  studies  are  inconclusive  but  provide  enlightening  findings.  Although  the  students preferred  both  paper  and  screen  readings,  the  students  showed  lower  performance  on  reading accuracy and speed when reading on screen. It also indicated that reading on a screen might take longer than reading on paper, mainly when the screen and font size are uncomfortable and lead to visual fatigue.

Similarly,  Chou  (2016)  revealed  that  electronic  texts  made  unpleasant  reading  experiences because  the  students  commonly  faced  eyestrain,  an  unstable  Internet,  and  the  inconvenience  of hardware portability. On the other hand, Martin-Beltrán et al. (2017) discovered that students were more  likely  to  participate  in  meaningful  conversation  and  employed  text-based  tools  to  aid  in comprehension more frequently. Due to such obstacles to text readability in online reading, current advancements  and  technological  improvements  also  need  reconsideration  to  be  offered  to  the students during the reading process with paper or digital media. Moreover, it has been claimed that the increase in smartphones continues to raise the potential ways to read in mobile practices (Alisaari et  al.,  2018;  Booton  et  al.,  2021;  Haoning  Mah  et  al.,  2021;  Lin  et  al.,  2020;  Momani,  2020; Xodabande & Hashemi, 2022). In this regard, because mobile devices showed students a variety of affordances and potential for new forms and cultures of learning, it is vital to research these emergent learning environments to better understand the students' associated perceptions and achievements.

## 2.2 MALL in Language Learning

Modern technology in the form of the internet and mobile gadgets has shifted the ways of language instruction into Mobile-Assisted Language Learning (MALL) (Alkhezzi & Al-Dousari, 2016; Elaish et al., 2021; Zhang et al., 2021). Supported by the implementation of handled devices and portable technologies that promote features for interactivity and portability, MALL is used to engage the students in the learning process (Alamer & Al Khateeb, 2021). Previous studies have analyzed the use of mobile phones in language classrooms. Klímová's (2018) review study concluded that mobile phones and their applications benefited English learning. Besides, there was a primary effect on the use of mobile applications for language skills and testing, and these apps had no significant impact on the advancement and retention of students' vocabulary. Additionally, Zain and Bowles (2021) have reviewed 25 empirical research articles from 2016 to 2020. Their analysis pointed out that the research trends on MALL were about the effectiveness of MALL, which resulted in the pedagogical benefits  and  perception.  Several  theoretical  and  conceptual  frameworks,  including  the  Zone  of Proximal Development (ZPD), the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), and the Community of Inquiry (CoI), were also discovered. Thus, the present study is centered on using TAM to understand educational technology's potential.

Telegram is one of the MALL applications, which can be used on a wide range of electronic devices,  including  laptops,  tablets,  and  mobile  phones  (Yin  et  al.,  2021).  It  has  been  a  popular platform for communication and English learning among many Iranian EFL students (Ghorbani & Ebadi, 2020; Yin et al., 2021), Jordan (Momani, 2020), Indonesia (Citrawati et al., 2021), and other countries. This application initially functioned as a mobile instant messaging service. As a social media platform,  Telegram functions for interaction  and  information  sharing  (Ghorbani  &  Ebadi, 2020; Ivone et al., 2020). The advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has invited scholars to apply machine learning and natural language technology to the development of chatbots. It  enables  Telegram to make specific commands to create a quiz, manage learning material, and handle the classroom. In other words, the usefulness of this app leads this app to be used as a Learning Management System (LMS). Accordingly, the current study examined the use of the Telegram bot that  was  designed  for  EFL  language  learning.  The  bot  has  encouraged  the  teachers  to  develop instructional materials and assessments that are accessible to the teachers and the students.

## 3. Method

## 3.1 Participants

The  study  group  comprised  104  students  from  state  vocational  schools  in  Malang,  East  Java, Indonesia. Four classes were selected based on their English learning processes which  integrated Telegram  and  the  face-to-face  (F2F)  meeting.  Besides  seven  English  teachers,  only  one  teacher frequently used Telegram for instructional purposes. The reason for using Telegram was because of its  feature.  Based on the authors' understanding, Telegram has an artificial intelligence feature: a chatbot. This feature lets users customize the bot using programming languages based on their needs. The Telegram application was then used by the teacher and the students to compile the materials for one academic year. Fourteen sets of English materials were made available for the students and the teacher.  The  selected  English  teacher  has  used  Telegram  for  almost  two  years  for  instructional purposes. The following table provides an overview of the number of students and their subjects.

| Class   | Major            |   Number |
|---------|------------------|----------|
| XI      | Multimedia (MM)  |       31 |
| XI      | Logistics (L)    |       34 |
| XI      | Production (PD)  |       19 |
| XI      | Mecathronics (M) |       20 |
|         | Total            |      104 |

## Table 1: List of Student Group

When observed, state vocational school students learned English reading skills through Telegram. First, the students opened their Telegram group in which their teacher had sent a link to a Telegram bot that comprised initiation material, quizzes, and tests during two semesters of one academic year. The  initiation  materials  contained  texts  from  any  relevant  resources,  teacher's  PowerPoints,  and videos. The students were directed to collaboratively learn the initiation materials in 15-20 minutes. The students who did not understand or did not want to share their opinions on the initiation materials could directly ask through Telegram. Then, the teacher and other students responded to it.

For the next activity, the students did the Telegram quiz and test to reinforce their understanding. The quiz and test were connected to other learning platforms such as Socrative and Quizlet. During daily practice, one mobile phone should be used in pairs. It was done to avoid any non-academic activity while using a mobile phone in the classroom. At the end of the meetings, the teacher asked students to access and learn the materials outside the classrooms.

## 3.2 Instruments

This study employed a questionnaire that was sent to the students through Google Forms. This Likert scale consisted of five categories with 36 items, including perceived ease of use (PEU), perceived usefulness (PU), attitude towards use (ATU), behavioural intention (BI), system characteristics (SC), and material characteristics (MC). This Likert scale category was adapted from Davis (1989) and Huang et al. (2012). PU, PEU, ATU, and BI were adapted from Davis (1989), while SC was adapted from Huang et al. (2012). The reliability of the questionnaire was measured by Cronbach's alpha for each construct and suggested an overall internal consistency of .949 (cf. Table 2).

Table 2: Questionnaire Reliability

|   Cronbach's Alpha |   No of Items |
|--------------------|---------------|
|               .949 |            36 |

According to Hatch and Farhadi (1992), the reliability is considered low if the alpha model value ranges from 0.000 to 0.401. When the measure of test item dependability ranges from 0.401 to 0.700, it indicates that it is average. Based on the analysis, Cronbach's alpha (α) for the perception questionnaire  was .948,  indicating  that  it  has  high  reliability  to  be  used  in  the  study because it was between 0.701-1.00.

The students' reading comprehension achievements were also collected to be compared with the students' responses on how they perceive Telegram. The reading test delivered by the English teacher was used to measure Vocational students' online reading comprehension. However, the teacher did not do the tryout of the reading test before administering it to the students. Instead, he only adjusted whether the test included the materials they had learned in Telegram.

## 4. Data Analysis

Dealing with the  study  questions,  first  of  all,  this  study  analyzed  104  students'  responses  to  the questionnaire using descriptive statistics. Secondly, the result of this questionnaire was interpreted to  reveal  whether the  students  perceived the  use  of Telegram  well. Then, this study employed a correlational test, Pearson correlation, to find out the relation between how the students perceived the use of Telegram and the students' reading comprehension. The result of this correlation was used to answer the study questions.

## 5. Results

## 5.1 Students' perception of the use of Telegram across study programs

This study was intended to investigate the relationship between students' perception of the use of Telegram and students' reading comprehension skills. Therefore, this study first presents the analysis of  how  the  students  perceive  the  use  of  Telegram  obtained  from  the  result  of  the  Telegram Acceptance Model (TAM) questionnaire in Table 3. The result shows that the student's perception of the use of Telegram is close to point 4 on the Likert scale, which is equal to 80%. The mean of each category presented in percentages can be seen in Table 3.

Table 3: Mean Score of Telegram Perception

| Telegram Acceptance Model     |   Multimedia (%) |   Logistics (%) |   Production (%) |   Mechatron ics (%) |
|-------------------------------|------------------|-----------------|------------------|---------------------|
| System Characteristics (SC)   |            79.80 |           77.80 |            80.40 |               82.60 |
| Material Characteristics (MC) |            80.60 |           78.40 |            78.20 |               78.20 |
| Ease of Use (PEU)             |            76.80 |           75.00 |            75.00 |               78.20 |
| Perceived of Usefulness (PU)  |            78.00 |           76.20 |            76.40 |               77.60 |
| Attitude toward Use (AU)      |            78.00 |           76.00 |            73.80 |               74.20 |
| Behavioural Intention (BI)    |            74.80 |           72.00 |            70.80 |               64.00 |

Table 3 presents the means of students' perception of using Telegram to facilitate their online reading comprehension. There were six sections to examine the students' perceptions proposed by Haghighi (2019), i.e., system characteristic, material characteristic, ease of use, perceived usefulness, attitude toward use, and behavioural intention (see Appendix). The system characteristics of Telegram across study programs are high. It indicates that the students reported that Telegram was able to engage them in highly interactive activities as well as enhance their reading activities. It can be seen from the table that the students across the study programs positively perceived that Telegram could help them access  the  reading  materials  uploaded  by  the  teacher.  There  are  three  criteria  for  students' perception, namely, high (the means range from 70% to 100%), moderate (the means range from 50% to 69%), and low (the mean ranges from 20% to 49%). The means of constructing material characteristics portrayed that the initiation materials in the form of videos, power point and online texts created and posted by the teachers enhance students' English skills. The means also depicted that students have a high perception of Telegram use (there is no mean which is less than 70%).

The teacher's guideline makes Telegram a convenient and exciting platform for language learning, as it is evident in response to the construct perceived ease of use. It also contributes to high means based  on  Table  3.  Moreover,  concerning  construct  perceived  usefulness,  the  results  reveal  that learning through Telegram increases the students' desire to use appropriate forms of reading texts. As for the construct attitude about use, the participants mostly agree to incorporate Telegram into the curriculum. Finally, regarding the construct behavioural intention, some students decided to continue reading with Telegram, and some were neutral because the students' behavioural intention to use Telegram obtained a low mean on average. The mechatronics program got the lowest mean score of 64% among the study programs.

## 5.2 The relationship between how students perceive the use of Telegram and the students' reading achievement

In  response  to  the  second  research  question,  Table  4  presents  the  correlation  between  students' perception of using Telegram and their reading achievements.

Table 4: Correlation of Telegram Perception and Reading Score

| Perceptions              |   Reading Score |
|--------------------------|-----------------|
| System Characteristics   |            .132 |
| Material Characteristics |            .187 |
| Ease of Use              |            .175 |
| Perceived of Usefulness  |            .217 |
| Attitude toward Use      |            .211 |
| Behavioural Intention    |            .167 |
| System Characteristics   |            .087 |
| Material Characteristics |            .027 |
| Ease of Use              |            .036 |
| Perceived of Usefulness  |            .012 |
| Attitude toward Use      |            .014 |
| Behavioural Intention    |            .043 |

It  can  be  discovered  that  all  the  categories  of  perception  demonstrated  a  significant  relationship between perception and reading score (Sig.  value < 0.05).  However,  only  one of  the  perception categories did not show any considerable degree of relationship, i.e., system characteristics, as the significance level was higher than 0.05. Additionally, the Pearson correlation of those categories ranges from .132 to .217. According to Schober et al. (2018), the correlation coefficient is weak if it is less than 0.40. Thus, it can be inferred that the level of relationship between the perception and reading score is weak as the scores of Pearson correlation signified less than 0.40.

## 6. Discussion

The objective of this study was to investigate students' perceptions of the use of Telegram across study programs and whether there was any relationship between how students perceived the use of Telegram and their reading achievement in the vocational school in the Indonesian EFL context. To commence, the present study extended students' perceptions of Telegram use, which revealed a high level  of  approval  for  using  that  online  platform  in  English  Foreign  Language  (EFL)  vocational settings.  The  majority  of  students  believed  that  this  application  should  be  used  for  reading instructions. In line with the findings, other previous studies have discovered the effectiveness of using Telegram in enhancing students' English performances, such as grammar accuracy (Ghorbani & Ebadi, 2020), vocabulary (Alakrash & Razak, 2020), and collocation knowledge (Vahdat, 2020). Besides that, the findings of this study appear to be compatible with Amiryousefi's (2019) finding that investigated first-year English students from two colleges in Iran succeeded well in utilizing Telegram to improve their English skills, namely speaking and listening.

Nevertheless, the outcomes of this study contributed to the body of research that has not explored the use of Telegram on online reading comprehension. We claimed that Telegram could also facilitate the reading comprehension of EFL vocational students as Telegram can be integrated into another online  platform,  including  Socrative,  for  reading  and  supplemented  by  freely  available  initiation materials in the form of PowerPoint, online texts, and videos. The accessibility of tutorial videos, movie clips, and other learning tools may influence a student's reading score. The movies sent to the participants were brief and under 3MB in size. Although Telegram supported bigger files (up to 2GB), lesser file sizes were utilized to facilitate download. According to Anggraini, Cahyono, et al. (2022),  technology  produce  some  intrinsic  incentive  in  L2  students  for  reading  comprehension, which  may  have  a  part  in  the  students'  reading  performance.  The  motivating  feature  of  new technology  and  learning  settings  was  apparent  in  the  current  study  since  most  students  readily volunteered in pre-class and in-class activities.

Referring to the relation between the students' perception of the Telegram application for learning English and reading achievements, the result of this study disclosed a weak correlation between the variables. This may be due to the study's limitations contributing to the degree of correlation. First, it  can  be  due  to  the  teaching  strategy  used  by the  teacher in the  classroom.  It was  good that the students  could  read  the  materials  inside  or  outside  the  classroom.  Kung  (2019)  found  out  that students' reading comprehension can be affected by the reading strategy and the authentic texts that the teachers delivered. Reflected into the reading practice using Telegram, the students collaboratively learned the initiation materials for 15-20 minutes. Second, reading may be hampered by the students' proficiency level.

As demonstrated by Anggraini and Cahyono (2020), online reading comprehension processes differ among readers - with high proficiency levels seem more individual rather than low-proficient readers who are more frequent employ a socio-affective reading strategy, such as sharing, asking, and confirming their comprehension by communicating in a live chat with their group members. It is  inclined  that  low-proficient  readers  tend  to  use  chat  features  compared  to  their  counterparts. Therefore, reading comprehension might not only be influenced by the use of Telegram but also by the reading strategy that was applied by the teacher and the students with different proficiency levels. Reading strategies  were  noticed  as  a  reading  process,  which  is  automatic  in  nature,  and  readers sometimes have a significant level of active control over their reading process reading strategies (Dawadi & Shrestha, 2018).

Secondly, the reading texts used in the test that were used by the teacher to examine reading comprehension can be categorized as less valid because the teacher just took it from any sources without validating the texts whether it was appropriate for his students' reading proficiency or not. It can  be  assumed  that  the  students'  reading  test  scores  may  not  reflect  reading  comprehension. According  to  Tengberg  (2018),  an  educator  should  be careful  with  how  he  or  she  identifies and characterizes the difficulty of questions since it helps him or her understand which specific task a test taker must complete more accurately. Furthermore, Dawadi and Shrestha (2018) proved that students utilize comparable strategies to tackle challenging activities. Therefore, future research can consider the limitations of this study in administering the reading test to obtain more comprehensible findings.

Lastly, a coin has two sides. We grasp that Telegram also has advantages and disadvantages in educational settings. Alizadeh (2018) investigated the use of Telegram as a Social Networking Site (SNS)  under  the  qualitative  analysis  of  students'  responses,  finding  merit  and  demerit  codes. Regarding merit code,  Telegram is  adequate  for its  accessibility,  data  exchange,  group  learning, competitive atmosphere, peer-checking, and time-saving, which is similar to the findings of Habibi et al. (2018) and Sutikno et al. (2016). On the other hand, Alizadeh (2018) mentioned that the demerit codes emerging from the analysis were dependence and cheating, distrust, addiction, distraction, internet problems, lack of supervision, and lack of instruction. Additionally, considering the result of the questionnaire regarding behavioural intention, it indicates that some students understand the intention of using Telegram for broader purposes of communication, but some are neutral. It suggests that  the  teacher  can  try  to  find  another  way  to  make  students  recognize  that  Telegram  can  be positively used for broader communication purposes in daily practice and more functions in EFL learning.

## 7. Conclusion

The findings of the present study unveiled the positive perception of Telegram use in facilitating EFL vocational students' online reading comprehension. Furthermore, the significant but weak correlation has portrayed the relationship between students' perception and reading achievement after Telegram use exposure. Overall, the findings of the current study have several pedagogical implications. First, it indicates that Telegram is appropriate to assist vocational students in improving their EFL skills. Second, Telegram provides ample opportunities for L2 students to interact actively and collaborate in EFL classrooms. Finally, the teacher should consider the reading strategy, the reading test validity, and Telegram's positive and negative sides when they intend to use it for teaching reading.

In  the  end,  the  limitations  of  this  study  need  to  be  acknowledged.  It  is  suggested  that  future researchers study more subjects to gain meaningful insights into the use of Telegram. Then, this study uses the reading test scores from the teacher in the vocational school that becomes the study object. Further  study  should  investigate  the  relationship  between  how  the  students  perceive  the  use  of Telegram and the students' reading comprehension achievement by using the standardized reading test. Therefore, the results would be more fruitful.

## Acknowledgements and Grants

The  first,  second,  and  third  authors  of  this  study  would  like  to  express  their  gratitude  to  the Directorate  of  Research,  Technology  and  Community  Service  (DRTPM)  -  The  Ministry  of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology (MoECRT), Republic Indonesia, for providing the financial support of the research with the research grant number: 18.3.31/UN32.14.1/LT/2021

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## Author addresses

| Dewi Nur Suci Doctorate Program in ELT, Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang State Institute of Islamic Studies (IAIN) at Kediri, East Java, Indonesia Email:   | Bambang Yudi Cahyono Department of English, Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Indonesia Email: bambang.yudi.fs@um.ac.id       | Faradila Masuara Department of English, Faculty of Cultural Science, Universitas Khairun, Indonesia Email: fmas1512@gmail.com                                     |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Yazid Basthomi Department of English, Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Indonesia Email: ybasthomi@um.ac.id                                                 | Mirjam Anugerahwati Department of English, Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Indonesia Email: mirjam.anugerahwati.fs@um.ac.id | Merliyani Putri Anggraini (Corresponding author) Doctorate Program in ELT Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Indonesia Email: merlianiputri@gmail.com |

## Appendix

## Technology Acceptance Model

This  survey  is  to  understand  your  attitude  toward  the  use  of  Telegram  in  the  course  in  this study. Please read  the following  statements carefully  and answer  them as  sincerely as possible by putting a checkmark. There is no right or wrong answer.

| Items                    | Sub Items                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            | Strong- ly dis- agree   | Dis- agree   | Neu- tral   | Agree   | Strong- ly dis- agree   |
|--------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------|--------------|-------------|---------|-------------------------|
| System Characteristics   | (SC1) I think Telegram provided a realistic learning environment for doing the activities (SC2) I think Telegram provided a simulated English learning environment (SC3) I think I felt more comfortable in using Telegram to comment on the points given by my teacher or other members comparing to a face-to-face situation (SC4) I think Telegram gave me an opportunity to interact with my teacher and classmates more than before.                                                                                                            |                         |              |             |         |                         |
| Material Characteristics | (MC1) I think the videos and other materials posted by our teacher and other members made me learn better how to REFUSE in English (M C2) I think the videos and other materials posted by our teacher and other members can help me immerse in a learning atmosphere. (MC3) I think the videos and other materials posted by our teacher and other members were useful for improving my oral proficiency (MC4) I think the videos and other materials posted by our teacher and other members helped me to learn the important points of each unit. |                         |              |             |         |                         |
| Perceived Ease of Use    | (PEU1) Telegram provided clear guidance about my work. (PEU2) I think operating Telegram does not take too much time. (PEU3) Learning to use Telegram for my class activities was easy. (PEU4) Interacting with my teacher and other members through Telegram was convenient and not stressful.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      |                         |              |             |         |                         |
| Perceived Usefulness     | (PU1) Learning via Telegram helped me to speak English appropriately (PU2) I think that Telegram can improve my outcome with regard to learning English. (PU3) Learning through Telegram increased my desire to use English REFUSALS more appropriately. (PU4) The comments and feedbacks provided by my teacher and classmates via Telegram were really useful                                                                                                                                                                                      |                         |              |             |         |                         |

| Attitude Use         | toward   | (AT1) I like using Telegram to learn English. (AT2) I had a positive attitude toward using Telegram in this course. (AT3) I feel that using Telegram is a good method to learn English. (AT4) I will register in other online classes that use Telegram as a means of posting course materials                                                   |
|----------------------|----------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Behavioral Intention |          | (BI1) If I access to Telegram, I will continue to use it to learn English. (BI2) Using Telegram helped me to become more willing to communicate in English. (BI3) If I have access to Telegram, I will continue to write my messages in English (BI4) When I use Telegram, I have more self-confidence to take part in conversations in English. |

Adopted from: Haghighi, H., Jafarigohar, M., Khoshsima, H., & Vahdany, F. (2019). Impact of Flipped Classroom on EFL learners' appropriate use of refusal: achievement, participation, perception. Computer Assisted Language Learning , 32 (3), 261-293. https://doi.org/10.1080/09588221.2018.1504083.