Introduction
In today’s world, educating people become easier with the help of the technology if we use it wisely. Thanks to technological improvements ,there is a huge variety of materials to benefit from ; while we teach we also learn through several apps and we have the chance to be more effective in our professional life. Especially in teaching, language teachers should aim to provide high-quality teaching material which is engaging, interesting and up-to-date. A teacher's primary responsibility is to cause students to learn, help the learners’ mastery, increase the proficiency) of "language skills’.
When we say ‘language skills’ , besides reading and writing, technologic materials have much more things to do with listening and speaking skills. Therefore, there is a wealth of empirical research indicating that instruction focused especially on listening and speaking has greatly benefited many ESL(English as a second language)/EFL(English as a foreign language) students to improve their FL(foreign language) productive skills around the world by means of technology.
Some researchers (e.g., Al-Seghayer, 2005; Brett, 1995; Egbert & Jessup, 1996) have presented strong evidence that multimedia have useful effects on language learning because of their rich and authentic comprehensible input. Although all kinds of authentic materials are commonly accepted as helpful for learners, watching films in English might be one of the richest ways of presenting authentic input.
Today the internet, technology and the media, and the use of English in face-to-face as well as virtual social networks provide greater opportunities for meaningful and authentic language use than are available both in and out of the classroom. Media provide teachers and students with creative and practical ideas. They enable teachers to meet various needs and interests of their students. They also provide students with a lot of language practice through activities using newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, movies, books, Internet, etc, and tasks which develop reading, writing, speaking and listening skills. They entertain students and encourage reading English in general, both inside and outside the classroom, promoting extensive reading by giving the students the confidence, the motivation and the ability to continue their reading outside the classroom. Media ‘inform, amuse, startle, anger, entertain, thrill, but very seldom leave anyone untouched’. (Shirley Biagy, 1996)
Learning happens everywhere ,not just in the classroom.. Students should learn how to stimulate language immersion, being surrounded by the language every day provides endless opportunities for learning and practice. From this point of view watching tv shows/movies can be really helpful for learning a new language (English). Research into the online informal learning of English has already shown it to be a widespread phenomenon involving a range of comprehension and production activities such as viewing original version television series, listening to music on demand and social networking with other English users.It has been emphasized that language learning is not limited to the classroom, but can take place at any time and in any place, including the home and the community.
In this paper, we are going to investigate upsides and downsides of watching tv shows/movies while learning a new language and how can we use effectively these materials. Our main question is: ‘Is it possible to learn a language (English) through watching movies, TV series, etc.?’
Literature review
1-Learning in and outside of the class
1.1-Learning in the class
General impression of the teachers is that movies have a positive effect on students’ language learning process. They believe that using movies combined with the readers helped students to become active participants in the classroom activities. Teachers claimed that movies can enhance the interaction among students in class; they improve learners’ communicative competence and provide students with more opportunities to use English. They also claim that they faced difficulties while selecting suitable movies for different proficiency levels and that watching a movie might be very time consuming. Almost all teachers received positive feedback from students when they involved movies along with the reading activities and as a result students were participating in the classroom debates and vocabulary activities as well as written assignments related to the movie review. (Ismaili, 2013)
While using a film in the classroom to help our English, Gaafar(2009) have paid attention to the accent, voice, body language, choosing of the words, training ear and the eye, lifestyle, plot idea, summary, what is going on, why and how, and many other things depending on the aim we have put to ourselves. The overall aim has always been to maximize comprehension and learn more English.
Gaafar stated that other ways of using films in the classroom are: Segmenting the film, pre-watching, while-watching and post-watching activities, which are very useful as close exercises, quizzes, related readings, web sites, film presentations, discussions, research work, etc. Gaafar also stated that documentaries are also educational. Through them, students can learn about languages, cultures, science, etc. Some of these documentaries, if carefully selected may be used successfully in the classrooms and be a part of the curriculum. They may help students to better understand the subject.
1.2-Learning outside of the class
Learning happens everywhere, not just in the classroom. The point of out-of-school learning is to overcome learning disabilities, development of talents, strengthen communities and increase interest in education by creating extra learning opportunities in the real world. In a study performed by the UCLA National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST) it was proven that out-of-school learning increases the interest in education and school itself.
Contrasted with the rather negative experiences many have of learning English in the classroom, it is perhaps not surprising that large numbers of students believe that much of their language competence is gained in out-of-school settings. In the Swedish Schools Inspectorate’s student questionnaire, one of the items asked participants (n=2,868) to indicate where they believed that they had learnt most of their English. Of the responses received, substantially more than half believed that they had learned more, or at least as much of their English, outside of school. (Henry, 2014)
2-Using authentic materials in EFL learning
Authentic materials are resources created for native speakers of the target language. They bridge the gap between classroom language use and real life language use by bringing familiar linguistic situations and materials right into the classroom. According to Akira(2013), authentic resources can be a good opportunity to expose students to English culture in the EFL classroom and increase their cross-cultural awareness.
There are several benefits of employing authentic materials for language learning and teaching. First, they can provide examples for learners of how to communicate in real life situations through exposing them to the sorts of messages they will likely face in everyday conversation. Second, authentic materials can help the leaner focus on the language skills they truly need and ignore skills they may not need for their job or studies. (Woottipong, 2014)
Akira(2013) suggested that when conducting activities with authentic materials, it is important to select appropriate materials considering the difficulty of the materials and the proficiency of the learners. The material needs to have, for example, an instructive, informative, or communicative purpose. This definition classifies textual and visual items such as poems, manuals, recipes, newspaper articles and films/TV series as authentic. (Rossi, 2013)
Film, with its contextualised images, language and action, has been regarded as an engaging ‘authentic’ source of learning as opposed to print texts, which provides students the opportunity to ‘live’ in a ‘different’ culture. Feature films are authentic artefacts in the sense that they are produced by native speakers for a native speaker audience. So films are useful for foreign language students, with teacher guidance, to learn what messages native speaker characters convey by their language and action. (Truong&Tran, 2015)
Woottipong(2014) also remarked that results of Manekuul(2002)’s study using authentic video materials enhances student’s listening comprehension ability due to the combination of visual images and sound which stimulate student’s perceptions.
3-Using Movies/TV series in EFL learning
Some studies have examined the benefits of using multimedia tools for teaching English as a second language. First, teachers can employ movie-based instruction to improve students’ listening and speaking skills. Second, teachers can increase students’ interests and learning motivation by incorporating movies in the reading activities. Last but not least, activities derived from the films, such as dictation, group discussion, and oral presentation, can also enhance students’ listening and speaking skills. (Ismaili, 2013)
Gallacher in Adnan (2014) says that a good idea is to choose scenes that are very visual. The more visual a video is, the easier it is to understand-as long as the pictures illustrate what is being said. Since, using a movie which has more visual images stimulates student’s perceptions directly, while written words can do this indirectly. Movies are more sensory experience than reading — besides verbal language, there is also color, movement, and sound (Ismaili, 2013).
Smithikrai (2016)’s studies have shown that movies are also an excellent tool for developing a variety of positive characteristics and behaviors. Thus, based on research to date on effects of teaching with movies, it was hypothesized that positive characteristics and behaviors can be enhanced in university students through a systematic movie-based teaching course, that is positive characteristics and behaviors would significantly increase for participants in the teaching- with-movie course but not for participants in the control group.
Besides the movies, TV series are equally effective in L2 learning. Hanf (2014) describes the use of a multi-episodic television series linked to a cognitive strategy called ‘resourcing’ ‘ which involves the viewer taking notes on words or expressions they wish to learn or understand. To do this they make use of textual captions/ subtitles. Captions refer to a script in the target language (e.g. English) that allows learners to visualize what they hear.
According to a study which was carried out by Kung(2013) it was clear to observe that almost all participants were satisfied with their improvements through TV series-based instruction. Participants also said that watching popular TV series would encourage them to study English harder in order to know the story and characters more. Next, almost three quarters of participants (20 females and 18 males out of 52 totally) believed that TV series gave them ample opportunities to learn from the L2 input, making them more aware of the language uses in actual environments.
4-Motivation in English Language Learning
Motivation is one of the most important factors in determining successful second-language acquisition. Films and TV shows are an integral part of students’ lives so it makes perfect sense to bring them into the language classroom. Spolsky (1990, p. 157) stated that motivated students are likely to learn more and learn more quickly than students who are less motivated.
Watching films can motivate ESL learners since it’s already an integral part of their everyday life. Ushioda (2013) argues that teachers working in settings where English is part of the social fabric of young people’s daily lives are now facing very real challenges in providing learning opportunities that can generate and sustain interest and motivation.
We the teachers should try to exploit students viewing habits as a starting point for developing more active literary skills. The teachers need to know the interests of the students and what they like most to watch in order to keep high their motivation, undertake different duties, fulfill various assignments and feel the success. (Gaafar, 2009)
The movie-based experimental class was livelier and the students were more interested in following the lesson carefully, contrary to the other class were reading was presented through graded readers only (Ismaili, 2013). For instance, according to Woottipong’s (2014) study, while watching movies, the class was more attentive and the students were more interested in following the lesson carefully. This might also be because the atmosphere was more relaxed and therefore more conducive to learning.
Movie- viewing experiences further created more student-teacher and student-student discussions. Movies draw students’ attention and captured their interest. The benefit of using the movies in teaching and learning is unquestionable. (Ismaili,2013)
Discussion
How Movies Help
These findings show that movies/TV series can help learners both in and out of the classroom in various ways while learning a target language. Here are some of them;
With the help of authentic materials, learners can get used to the sounds and rhythms of the language, and this can help them to improve their pronunciation and also provides them cultural insight.
Learners might notice certain words and phrases that often used. So, the learners may acquire those words and phrases unconsciously.
They help to solidify language that the learners have been learning elsewhere. For instance, if the learners have learned a word in a textbook and hear it later in a movie, that might help them to stick in their mind.
According to previous findings, motivation is the key to learning a new language. For example, the one loves American movies, so, that passion for the culture is going to motivate him/her to keep learning.
Why Movies Don't Help
However, some researchers’ previous findings and our recent reviews and studies showed us there are some disadvantages of solely watching movies/TV series while learning a new language;
Watching a movie is a passive experience, with no interaction.”We have noticed that some researchers’ studies of young children’s learning showed that those who learned passively (through watching TV) improved far slower than those who interacted with a real person.
The materials ought to be comprehensible for the learners’ current level. According to Krashen, the level needs to be ‘slightly beyond’ the learners’ level of competence.
Movies can be very long. This factor is not following the SMART rule in terms of effective time using.
Learners can lose their focus.”During that long time of period, they would be spend a lot of the time more focused on the subtitles and the story line than the target language that is being spoken.
According to our reviews, solely watching movies/TV series are not enough by themselves to acquire a new language. We concluded that, at any stage in learning a language, it is important spend time working on a good balance of the four skills(reading, writing, speaking, listening).