Second Language Verb Recall by Music and Motion

Second Language Verb Recall by Music and Motion

Anonymous

Kent State University

This study examines the effects of music upon memorization of verb vocabulary in a foreign language classroom. In a group of 40 first-year French students, there was a series of 3 irregular verbs taught within a two-week period. The first verb (vouloir) was taught only with visual support from the overhead projector. The second verb (faire) was taught with a song and hand motions. The third verb (pouvoir) was taught with a song. After each of the three diverse verb presentations, students took a post-test of 8 fill-in sentences to show how well they recalled the verb from earlier in the class period. Post-tests were given on 2 consecutive days to see if recall changed over a 24 hour period. Students were also asked to reflect upon which learning methods were most effective for learning new irregular verbs in-class. The results suggested that students recalled the verb better when it was presented with the combination of music and hand motions. Students had the least amount of recall when the verb was only presented on the overhead. The results are interpreted as being supportive for music to be used as a teaching tool in the classroom; hand motions are also an added tool to consider as well. Further investigation is recommended to determine whether students would perform better in recall tests when song and hand motions are used to teach a lesson, versus when song and pictures are used to teach a lesson.

“I like to learn by songs in class because they get stuck in my head.” This was a comment that one of my students made after learning a new irregular verb in class this year. Sometimes it is hard to get certain tunes out of our heads; mostly this is perceived as a “bad” thing. For educators, however, this is something to rejoice about, because music can be a powerful teaching tool in the classroom. Music helps its listeners to both acquire and retain vocabulary that was sung and performed. This study will examine the role of music as a teaching aid and its affect on vocabulary recall in a foreign language learning environment.

Traditionally, there have been many diverse studies pertaining to music use in a classroom setting. Among the differences, the research suggests that there are many benefits to be gained overall for the learner, although this is still a relatively new area of exploration in second language acquisition studies. There are many studies about music use in other academic settings, but not as many in a foreign language setting. First, I will discuss the formative studies that observe music in the classroom. Then, I will propose how I would like to expand upon this research.

Music is an interesting teaching tool because it appears to stimulate learning environments. In some studies, music has been passively applied as background noise, while learners set out to study new vocabulary. De Groot (2006) found that a learning environment with music in the background is beneficial to memory and retention of foreign language (FL) vocabulary words, in comparison to a silent learning environment without music. In her study, she played classical music in the background, while the Dutch foreign language students learned new English vocabulary. The experiment yielded very positive feedback that suggests background music stimulates the brain for learning. On the other hand, Furnham and Bradley (1997) discovered that pop music was harmful to overall vocabulary recall when it was played in the background of a learning environment; it appeared to be too distracting. The difference in musical choice (classical vs. pop) could have made an impact on this study. And, their study was not implemented in a second language classroom like De Groot’s study, so that also could have made a difference.

In other studies, music takes on a more active role. For example, Haley (2004), a proponent of Gardner’s multiple-intelligence theory, wanted to observe if students that were more “musically inclined” would learn better by music presentations. He ran an experiment to test out the multiple intelligence theory on groups of students across the United States. In the pre-testing phase, he had all students determine their own individual strong and weak intelligence areas among the following: linguistic, logic-math, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, spatial, interpersonal and intrapersonal. Students with high musical intelligence were given the task to learn material by musical rhythms, tones, and patterns. The results suggested that when the instructor used music methodologies to present the new learning material, it was very helpful for students with high musical intelligence. Also, it was suggested that musical and linguistic intelligences were complimentary to one another; individuals that demonstrated high levels of musical intelligence also demonstrated high levels of linguistic intelligence.

Some of the research about music in the foreign language classroom also focuses on motivation and how to create a multi-sensory learning environment. In the studies done by Huy Lê (1999) and Lems (2005), music that was chosen for the classroom instruction yielded a lot of positive feedback from the test subjects. In Huy Lê’s study, Vietnamese students were presented with American pop music selections in English. They learned several English lessons by reading, listening, speaking and writing about the music selections played in the classroom by the researcher. The majority of the students said that it helped connect them better with the foreign culture and it helped their listening abilities. The only negative feedback was that some of the lyric content was a little racy for their Vietnamese culture. In Lems’ study, she discussed how to incorporate music in an adult ESL class. Lems emphasized that music can aid in teaching listening comprehension and cultural material. It was also mentioned that music can also help students to practice their L2 reading abilities when lyrics are presented to the learner. Students can engage in writing activities as a post-discussion of the song and lyrics. She also found that music selections in another language helped her students to connect with the foreign culture. She said that music breaks beyond cultural borders and that is why it is such a useful tool for instruction. Lems also commented that music was a good motivator for learners; music would stimulate the brain to be ready for learning.

Music has also been brought into the foreign language classroom through a teaching model called “Suggestopedia”. The model was created in Bulgaria by Georgi Lozanov and was implemented during the 1970’s and 1980’s (Omaggio-Hadley, 1993, p. 117). The belief behind the methodology was that “relaxation techniques and concentration would help learners tap into their subconscious resources and retain greater amounts of vocabulary and structures than they ever thought possible” (p. 117). In a study conducted in a German I classroom in Iowa by Prichard and Pullen (1980), it was found that music was used in the beginning of the class to relax the learning atmosphere; it was later synchronized along with the German vocabulary review. Higher levels of vocabulary recall occurred after a week-long session of suggestopedia presentations by the teacher. Suggestopedia is not as commonly used now because the method is very dependant on the instructor’s preparation and personality. Prichard and Pullen (1980) implied that suggestopedia only works for educators that find it natural to incorporate music and drama in the classroom.

As shown above, music can be used as a tool to teach vocabulary. In some studies, the researchers wanted to see in post-test assessments if music affected vocabulary recall. Medina (1990) explored the use of music along with story illustrations in English in an ESL classroom. She used 48 second-grade students from the same school Los Angeles as her test subjects and she divided them into four test groups. All students had low English proficiency. In the first test group, the students heard a story through song, with no pictures to accompany the story. The second group heard the story read out loud, with no illustration to the story. The third group heard music along with seeing vocabulary pictures of words represented in the story. The fourth group heard the story read out loud with the accompaniment of the pictures of vocabulary words. The results showed that students in the third control group that had the story accompanied with both music and illustration had more vocabulary gain overall than the other test groups during the post test. All in all, many studies suggest that when music is partnered with another medium to teach vocabulary, such as illustrations in the case described above, the success rates of learning and memorizing the vocabulary are higher.

Along the same line as the Medina study, Schunk (1999) created tests of music and sign language to accompany vocabulary in English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom. Her study was inspired by the idea that there is a growing population of students in the United States that have limited English proficiency, due to immigrating families from other countries. For this growing population, there is a need for English language acquisition so the students can integrate academically, socially, and economically. Schunk wanted to see if music partnered with sign language would help ESL students acquire and recall language better. She observed 80 K-2 students from 3 different elementary schools. All children that participated were identified as belonging to either of the most minimal classes of English fluency: nonspeakers or limited English proficient (LEP). There were four types of testing conditions that she observed with vocabulary instruction: singing and signs, text with signs, sung text, and a control group of spoken text only. For the sign test, she had 20 targeted vocabulary words for the students to learn; for the singing test, she had 3 songs for the students to learn. Both sets of tests incorporated appropriate vocabulary for the learning contexts. The results showed that the tests with signing or singing yielded significant improvement in recognition of vocabulary words from pre-test to post-test.

Both Medina (1990) and Schunk (1999) found results that suggested that music was an aid to vocabulary recall in English as a Second Language (ESL) setting. Medina partnered music with pictures; Schunk partnered music with sign language. Those studies have helped to lay some beginning groundwork that I would like to support further. I think that researching these implications in an FL classroom could be very important as well. This is still a relatively new area of research in second language acquisition studies. There would be several benefits for foreign language educators to learn more effective ways of presenting new vocabulary to students and have them remember the vocabulary well. In addition, all of the studies mentioned earlier focus on using music to memorize noun-related vocabulary. I think a logical new challenge would be to explore the vocabulary of verbs. In a first year foreign language classroom at middle or high school level, students can not graduate to the next level of language learning until they have general mastery over verbs and verb use. In order to produce language in the form of written work or spoken words, there must be some knowledge of verbs. That is why this study can continue to build upon the foundation that Medina and Schunk have started.

In this research project, I push the edge of knowledge by exploring the use of music and movement as an aid to vocabulary recall. By researching these teaching methods, I hope to gain more insight on different approaches to foreign language instruction. I also hope that my students will benefit from the multi-sensory approach to learning language. My classroom research will begin with presenting three, present-tense, irregular verb conjugations over a two-week period of time. I would like to compare all of my French students’ recall performance of the verbs, based on three different learning scenarios. The conjugation of the first verb, vouloir, will be presented without music; the verb will be recited out loud to a rhythm. The conjugation of the second verb, faire, will be presented with music and hand motions that accompany the lyrics. The conjugation of the third verb, pouvoir, will be presented with music. After each verb has been presented, all test participants will undergo a recall assessment of the verb. I would like to address these research questions in my study:

1.) Does music aid in foreign language short-term recall?

2.) Does music, on its own, help vocabulary recall more than music partnered with hand-motions?

3.) Do students find music and motion learning strategies effective?

Methodology

Participants

In this study, 40 students from a middle school in Ohio ranging in age from 13-14 years old participated. The test sample was made up of 24 males (60%) and 16 females (40%) total. The participants were chosen because they were all learning the same material in all 3 testing classes from the same French instructor and classroom setting for 41 minutes daily, 5 days a week. All participants spoke English as their native language but elected to take French in 8th grade to count for a high school language credit. None of the students had studied other foreign languages previously in-depth, aside from having introductory, surface-level exposure to French, Spanish, and Latin (3 weeks per language) during their 7th grade year. In addition, none of the students that participated in the study had spent time studying language abroad.

All students, regardless of gender, were assumed as homogenous in this study. All students qualified to take the French course of study in 8th grade based on high reading-ability scores and an English class grade of a C average or above during the previous school year. All students also had the equal training of a foreign language exploratory class as 7th graders, where French was studied for 3 weeks. In other words, all students that participated in this study had previous language training together in 7th grade and had to meet the same requirements to take foreign language in 8th grade.

In order to participate in this study, students needed to have a parent-student consent form filled out and returned to the instructor within a 2 week period. Students were informed ahead of time that their participation would not affect their overall grade in class and that their names would be kept confidential in the study. 40 students returned their forms and nobody dropped out of the experiment while it was being conducted over the two-week period.

Materials

In this study, I wanted to explore if music aided short-term recall of verb vocabulary. Also, I wanted to see if a lesson that employed a music-only learning strategy would cause more improvement in verb recall than music partnered with hand-motions. Lastly, I wanted to find if students would reflect that music and/or hand motions were helpful to them in the learning and recall process. In order to explore these three essential research questions, I created some post-tests that attempted to monitor and create data for each area of interest.

The verbs picked to use in the study were vouloir, faire, and pouvoir. They were chosen because they fit into the current curriculum of our classroom textbook. There were a total of three post-tests created, or in other words, one post-test per verb. Each post-test consisted of eight fill-in sentences. The directions stated that it was necessary to conjugate the verb and fill it into the appropriate sentence, to achieve subject-verb agreement. When creating the post-tests, it was important to keep in mind that the students had been learning verb conjugations since the beginning of the school year and had begun to recognize a certain order for the subject pronouns to be memorized in:

Je (I)Nous (we)

Tu (you- informal)Vous (you-formal)

Il/elle (he/she)Ils/Elles (they)

Usually, the subject pronouns were presented and practiced in a “grid” formation. The post-tests that were developed for this experiment did not assess memorization of the grid. Instead, the post-tests wanted to see if students could remember the grid from the in-class presentation and then manipulate the information into complete sentences. The subject pronouns were listed in random order, not following the “normal” structure as shown above. Students were allowed to write the grid of the verb on the side of the paper if desired, but that was not what was assessed. Correct spelling and matching of subject-verb agreement were the determiners for good recall of the verb. Incorrect spelling or subject-verb mismatches subtracted recall points from the tests. Overall, the 3 post-tests were designed to be similar. The only main differences in this whole experiment were how the verbs were presented in-class.