Exploring Effectiveness in Teaching English through Movies

Chong, won Park

Article

Journal of English Teaching through Movies and Media 2009;10(1):27-51.
Published online June 30, 2009.

Exploring Effectiveness in Teaching English through Movies

Abstract

In understanding student achievement from teaching English through movies, some quantitative studies yield positive results. However, paucity of literature shows the balanced view between what the researchers claim to be ideal and what the learners view to be an optimal learning environment. By adopting the quantitative to qualitative continuum model, the results of quantitative analysis indicate that the teacher researcher was effective in teaching students through movies. However, close and in-depth analysis of the raw data indicates that not necessarily all of the teacher researcher's students show improvement. To better understand the group of learners who rejected the researchers' hypothesis, an in-depth case analysis was conducted. Regarding the most important factors facilitating or hindering both the learning environment and the achievement, a participant voiced interest or motivation, teacher's passion, feeling of linguistic improvement, the identity of the school, successful human relationships, a hopeless feeling, and learner autonomy. Unlike the previous studies where learning process and product were considered exclusively and in a linear fashion, this study describes how learner's identity interacts with other factors and affects learning success or failure in a wholistic manner.

Key Words: teaching movies;qualitative and quantitative continuum;a profile technique