Students' Perceptions of Short Video Apps in Sustaining their Interest in Learning English

Abstract

The widespread use of smartphones and the Internet in contemporary culture has further integrated technology into everyday life. As a result of this growth, short videos have emerged, changing the way people use technology and transforming it into a new kind of entertainment. With the popularity of smartphone apps like Tik Tok and YouTube, short video applications have emerged as the primary sources of information and entertainment for today's youth. Numerous studies have demonstrated that incorporating video clips into the classroom may aid students in learning English more successfully because of the nature of fragmented learning, where information and knowledge are acquired piece by piece as they slowly understand the topic at hand. However, as most of the research has been carried out in the classroom, more information needs to be debunked and ascertain about how students feel about using short videos to supplement their fragmented learning outside the classroom. This study aimed to investigate students' perceptions of using short video apps to sustain their interest in learning outside the classroom. Snowball sampling has been conducted at one university in Selangor, and the results of this study indicate that most students enjoy watching short videos in their spare time. Most students believed that watching short videos helped them improve their English language skills (listening, speaking, reading, and vocabulary), mainly when the material was in English. The study also found that student's interest in learning English was sustained using this fragmented learning approach, so it can be concluded that students can sustain their interest in learning English by watching short videos of English content.