A SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDY OF IRANIAN TEACHERS’ ATTITUDE TOWARDS USING SOCIAL MEDIA AND TECHNOLOGY TO INCREASE INTERACTION AMONGST STUDENTS INSIDE OR OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM

Internet and Social media is a ubiquitous phenomenon affecting many areas of life, including education. Various disciplines have used some forms ofsocial media in their personal as well as professional lives, the English Language Teaching (ELT) teachers are no exception. Many studies on the area have beenconducted such as those reviewed by Inayati (2013), and Tess (2013). However, despite the fact that Iran is among the high users of a number of social media,such study in Iran is still scarcely found in International journals. Therefore, this paper addresses the issue by studying how Iranian ELT teachers perceive socialmedia in relation to their teaching as well as their general attitudes towards this type of media. A number of ELT teachers in recent popular social media (telegram, whatsapp) were surveyed with regards to their attitude and perception of social media use in teaching English.Analysis of the survey results showed that generally, the participants indicated positive attitude towards the employment of social media in ELT. Inaddition, most participants also showed high awareness of the educative potentials offered by social media in ELT practices, and several factors whichcould potentially hinder the actual use of social media were also identified. Some implications were drawn based on the findings of the study, some of which are related to the aspect of education management.

Keywords:

English Language Teaching , Social Media , Technology- Based Interaction(TBI)