Definition of Terms INTRODUCTION

The students’ perception on the use of Yahoo Messenger is really strong since they experience it by themselves. The experience occurs when they have a chat with native speakers using Yahoo Messenger. It will be different if the perception is received from the other person. The students are really doing the conversation with the native speakers using the Yahoo Messenger. Their perception on the use of the Yahoo Messenger is based on their experience when doing the conversation. The students will have positive perception if their first impression of using Yahoo Messenger is good. On the contrary if the students’ first impression on the use of Yahoo Messenger is bad, they will have negative perception. Then, it can be inferred that the students’ positive perception toward the use of Yahoo Messenger encourages the improvement on the students’ speaking skill. On the other hand, the negative perception will discourage the speaking skill improvement. During the process of shaping the perceptions, an individual might be influenced by some factors which possibly obstruct his or her perception. According to Warga 1983: 210-213, the factors influencing perceptions are stated as follows: a. Stereotyping Stereotyping is a kind of judgment. Everyone will have different perception from the others since each person has different point of view to stereotyping. Stereotyping can influences perceptions because of an individual’s restricted amount of information about what he or she has experienced and observed. b. Self-concept An individual may think that he or she is qualified, intelligent and patient. This belief on his or her qualification may take an important role as it affects how an individual perceives what he or she is facing. The way how an individual sees and feels about him or herself is called self-concept. c. Situation Situation cannot be separated from perceptions since the habits familiar with an individual and expectations desired by an individual affects his or her perception. For instance, when someone has been accustomed to one situation, he or she will find some difficulties if he or she faces another situation which he or she never experiences. d. Needs If an individual finds needs of what he or she has experienced and observed, he or she must shape positive perception in his or her mind. However, when he or she does have certain purposes of what he or she has experienced and observed, he or she can shape the perception more naturally. e. Emotion Emotion has significant influences on perceptions as strong emotion tends to block out stimuli. It means that when an individual is angry. He or she tends to send away the situation that is opposite to his or her emotion. An individual cannot feel two emotions at a time. The dominant one will exist. In order to form a perception, there are three steps needed in process of perception; those are the awareness or attention to the incoming stimuli, recognition and interpretation of incoming stimuli into some messages and translating or deciding on the appropriate action or behavior in response to the message. Thus perception is a form of behavior that allows individual to interact with and adjusts to the varying demands of environment.

2. Computer-Assisted Language Learning and the Internet

According to Levy 1997: 1, “Computer-Assisted Language Learning may be defined as the search for and study of applications of the computer in language teaching and learning.” CALL has been made possible by the invention and subsequent development of the computer. For educators, the rapid and continuing introduction of new technology into education has outpaced the ability of teachers and developers to evaluate it properly. Yahoo Messenger is considered as one of the new technology. Levy 1997: 171 states that, “from the point of view of conceptualizing CALL, the traditional bounds of the classroom and the class group are broken.” Teachers and their students are now able to reach beyond the learning environment as it is defined locally, and thereby native speakers of the target language are able to become active participants in the learning process. This is the significant advance. Computer Assisted Language Learning cannot be separated from the use of internet. Nowadays, most of the computers are already connected to the