Download Diana Muranko

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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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,
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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.
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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 handmotions. 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
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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)
Tu (you- informal)
Il/elle (he/she)
Nous (we)
Vous (you-formal)
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 subjectverb 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.
Another added feature to the faire post-test was an opinion question. The first
part of the test monitored verb vocabulary recall. This extra opinion question was asked
to explore the other area of questioning: Do participants reflect that there is one specific
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method that is effective for learning a new verb? Participants were posed with the
following statement and had to choose one method out of the four:
Out of these choices, the best way for me to learn verbs is:

To see them on the overhead

To hear the teacher’s explanation

To sing

To make hand motions to act out the verb
By adding this opinion question, it helped to show what participants perceived about their
personal learning styles. It was designed to show if the participants’ opinions about
learning matched their overall performance when recalling the verb vocabulary.
Procedures
The testing was spread over two weeks by spending two testing days per verb,
with a couple days of break in between the verb change. After the first day’s presentation
of a new verb, a post-test was administered. On the following day, another blank copy of
the same post-test was given to observe the verb recall between Day I and Day II. I
presented the verb vouloir first, the verb faire next, and the verb pouvoir third over the
two week period. This order was specifically picked, due to the similarity between the
verbs vouloir and pouvoir. By introducing faire as the second verb, it helped to split up
the two similar verbs so the data would not be biased.
On the first day of a new verb, I showed the conjugation on the overhead
projector to the class. Students were allowed to comment on any patterns that they could
detect and I marked them with different color markers on the transparency. Then, I had
the students repeat the verb out loud. After reading and repeating, I showed 4 example
sentences with the new verb conjugated in the present tense within the context. This was
the control part of the experiment. (See appendices A, B, and C.)
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After the overhead presentation described above, I did not add any extra verb
information to share with the class about the verb vouloir. For the verb faire, however, I
did a demonstration of a song that used all conjugated forms of the verb (to the tune of
“The Itsy Bitsy Spider”) and set of hand-motions that accompanied the French lyrics of
the song. Students could read the song lyrics on the overhead. The students and I
practiced the song and hand motions 2 times together. For the verb pouvoir, I played a
15-second music clip from a CD so the students could review the tune to the song, since
it may not have been as well-known. Students recognized the tune from the radio, since
it was fairly current song that was released within the last couple years (“Boulevard of
Broken Dreams” by Green Day). I sang the pouvoir verb song once as a demonstration
(without the CD accompaniment) and then the students and I practiced the song 2 times
together. (See appendices A, B, and C.)
Before administering the post-tests for the verbs, I had the students focus on
another classroom activity, such as playing a vocabulary game. This happened for 10
minutes after I presented the new verb in class. I decided this would truly test their shortterm memory and show how effective the music and motions would be upon recall
performance. The short, 10 minute “interruption” activity was never verb-related. I
wanted to have a time delay between the verb presentation and the post-test. After about
10 minutes, I passed out the verb post-test to the students. They had to complete 8
sentences, using the correct form of the verb in the context of the sentence. I had the
participants turn their tests over and draw until everyone was finished. Testing lasted
about 5 minutes; tests were collected at the same time from all students. (See appendices
A, B, and C.)
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On the following day, students received a second blank copy of the same post-test
and were asked to fill it out again, without having reviewed the new verb in question.
The Day II post-test was given at the beginning of class, before anything else was
introduced in class. This second post-test was to monitor if the students’ ability to recall
the verb had changed over a 24 hour period.
Data Collection
The data was collected and analyzed after all verb post-tests were completed. ttests were run to compare all Day I and Day II data. As mentioned above, the Day I data
was collected the day the verbs were first presented and Day II data was collected at the
beginning of the following day. The t-test program was used because it compared the
significant differences between the dependant variables: the vouloir, faire, and pouvoir
presentations. A Pearson Correlation test was run on the opinion questions to see if there
was any correlation significance between student opinions about individual learning
styles and student recall performance.
Results
The first research question asked about student’s ability to recall vocabulary
better with music. The mean scores for each verb were collected and compared between
Day 1 and Day 2. (See Table 1.) The data reveal that learners were able to recall each
verb differently. The vouloir test, where the verb was presented only on the overhead,
rendered the lowest average recall scores on Day 1 and Day 2 with the scores 3.95 and
3.71, out of a total of 8 points. The faire test, where the verb was presented with both
music and hand-motions, had the highest average recall score in Day 1 with a score of
6.37. The faire average dipped down to a recall of 3.75 on Day 2; however, the faire Day
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2 average was still higher than both of the vouloir test day averages. Last, the pouvoir
test, where the verb was presented only with music, showed the mean scores of 5.63 and
5.19. All three testing verbs experienced a lower average of recall in Day 2 in
comparison with Day 1. (See Table 1.)
Table 1. Student Mean values for Student Recall for each verb tested
Overhead only (vouloir)
Music and Motion (faire)
Music (pouvoir)
Means
Day 1
Day 2
3.95
3.71
6.37
3.75
5.63
5.19
There were two t-tests run for the Day 1 and Day 2 data (See Tables 2 & 3). The
t-test was chosen to compare the significant difference between the vouloir, faire, and
pouvoir test variables. The t-tests further complimented the mean scores of recall. On
Day 1, the t-test showed that students performed significantly better in recall tests with
the verb faire (22.65) in comparison with the others verbs. The vouloir test showed that
students recalled significantly less than the other two verbs. Therefore, both the recall
mean scores and t-test supported the idea that the scenario where students learn with
music and hand-motions helped the overall recall of the verb better than the other two
learning scenarios. The tests also supported the idea that when information was
presented only visually, like with the verb vouloir, the overall recall of the verb wasn’t as
successful as it could have been. Verb recall was more likely if another teaching method
was added, such as music or hand-motions, along with the visual presentation.
Day 1
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Tables 2 & 3. t-test results for Day 1 &
Day 2 student recall
t
p
Vouloir
9.21
<.001
Faire
22.65
<.001
Day 2
Pouvoir
20.21
<.001
t
p
Vouloir
9.56
<.001
Faire
8.85
<.001
Pouvoir
17.34
<.001
Table 4. Correlations of student
opinions
Day 1 recall
vouloir
Day 2 recall
vouloir
Day 1 recall
faire
Day 2 recall
faire
Day 1 recall
pouvoir
Day 2 recall
pouvoir
opinion: see
overhead
opinion: hear
explanation
opinion: sing
a song
*
*
*
opinion: use
hand
motions
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
A Pearson Correlation test was run to compare the relationship between the two
sets of data: students’ opinions about their learning styles and students’ actual recall
performance for each verb that was taught. Vouloir was taught only via the overhead
projector; faire was taught with music and hand motions; and pouvoir was taught with
music. The results showed that there was no significance among the data collected. The
students’ opinions about which was one of the best learning methods (seeing, hearing,
singing, or using gestures) did not support how well they performed on the verb recall
tests. Furthermore, students that claimed to learn better visually did not perform
significantly better on the vouloir recall test. Along those lines, none of the students
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claimed that learning by using hand gestures was the best; the performance recall results
declared that faire rendered the highest recall results on Day 1.
Discussion
The findings from the study yielded some diverse responses to the research
questions that guided this experiment. First, in reference to all of the Day 1 data
collected, it was found that students did remember some of the verb conjugation vouloir
when it was shown visually on the overhead and discussed in-class. According to the
mean scores of vouloir recall, the average participant remembered fewer than four of the
eight conjugations (Table 1). Verb recall was much better, however, when extra teaching
methods were added to the visual presentation. When the verb pouvoir was presented
with music accompaniment, the students were more likely to recall it. And better still, in
the testing of the verb faire, where both music and hand-motions were introduced to
accompany the verb presentation, the recall abilities continued to strengthen among the
participants. These results endorse DeGroot’s (2006) study, where he found that learning
environments with music were beneficial to foreign language vocabulary retention and
memory. DeGroot explained that music aided in retention because it was a brain
stimulant.
The t-test scores for Day 1 also indicated that there was a significant difference in
recall performance between each of the teaching methods (Tables 2 & 3). The highest
recall levels occurred when participants learned a verb accompanied by music and hand
motions. The medium middle verb recall levels occurred when participants learned a
verb that was accompanied by music. The lowest recall levels occurred when
participants learned a verb just visually via an overhead projector. When the t-tests were
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run with the collected data, all results came up highly significant where p < .001. The
recall results that occurred in my post-tests had some similarities to the results found in
other studies conducted previously. When Schunk (1999) tested ESL students for
vocabulary acquisition gain, she tested students visually, with song, with sign language,
and with a combination of song and sign language. The verb conjugation recall results
from the vouloir, faire, and pouvoir tests echoed similar results to her study. She found
that the most effective vocabulary gains occurred in vocabulary testing that incorporated
the use of sign language. She also discovered that the highest mean gain score for
vocabulary recognition occurred when sign language was combined with singing.
As for the data collected for Day 2 recall performance, there were more mixed
results from the post-tests. First, all verbs were forgotten a little bit between Day 1 and
Day 2 post-tests; this is reflected in the average mean scores of recall data from Day 2
(Table 1). The focus of this study was on the short-term recall of the verb that could be
demonstrated in the Day 1 data. The Day 2 data indicated the idea that information can
be lost over a day if not practiced. However, one factor proved to be quite surprising:
the verb faire was most successful from Day 1 and experienced a greater drop in recall on
Day 2 than the other two test verbs.
The decline in the recall of the verb faire on Day 2 was most likely caused by
many factors. Before I administered the Day 2 post-test, I announced to the participants
that they would be taking a second post-test of the verb faire that we had learned the day
before. Upon mentioning the plan, I saw students informally demonstrate that they
remembered many of the hand gestures used in the faire song from the day before.
Looking back in many of the post-tests, I found that many students also remembered the
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singular conjugations (the je, tu, il, and elle forms), but stumbled upon the plural ones
(the nous, vous, ils, and elles forms). There is a more notable spelling pattern in the first
half of the verb (fais, fais, fait, fait) than in the second half of the verb (faisons, faites,
font, font). Also, when referring back to the lyrics of the faire song, the first half of the
lyrics was concrete expressions that were easier to demonstrate with hand gestures. For
example, the beginning of the song starts with “je fais la cuisine” which means “I do the
cooking”. For this part of the song, a mixing gesture was used to accompany the concept.
Later into the song, however, the concepts were a little more abstract and the gestures, by
consequence, were too. For example, “vous faites des progrès” means “you’re making
progress”; for this part of the song a thumbs up gesture was used to accompany the
concept. This may have played a role in the Day 2 recall of the verb faire as well.
The verbs vouloir and pouvoir experienced less of a decline in recall between Day
1 and Day 2. This also may have been caused by a couple different factors. For
example, the two verbs are quite similar; they are “twin” verbs. Once you know one of
them, the other one is easier to figure out by letter substitution. For example, the letter
“v” in all of the conjugated forms of the verb vouloir changes to the letter “p” for the
conjugated form of the verb pouvoir. Also, there were at least two participants that
commented that the verb song for faire had too many lyrics. That may have affected the
overall recall as well between Day 1 and Day 2. Pouvoir, on the other hand, was just the
verb conjugation within the lyrics of the song.
All in all, it is important to note that both testing days of the verb faire resulted in
significant data. Day 1, as mentioned before, showed the highest recall performance of
any of the three verbs. Although the Day 2 recall score was lower, the overall results of
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the music-motion recall test were significantly higher than the visual recall test. This
supports the research questions from the beginning. When the verb vouloir was taught
without the aid of music, it was less memorable. When music was partnered with another
teaching medium such as hand gestures to teach the verb faire, it was much more
memorable. Pouvoir, too, was more memorable because music was used in the
presentation. This idea is further supported by the Medina’s (1990) study of second
language vocabulary acquisition. She found that when music was partnered with picture
illustrations of vocabulary, the students had the strongest vocabulary gain in comparison
with other non-music scenarios. Her results modeled the same ideas that my research set
to further support.
Another interesting discovery that was made during this research was that the
participants did not know which teaching method was most beneficial to them. On the
faire test, the students were tested for recall of the verb and then were asked an opinion
question. Participants were posed with the following statement and had to choose one
method out of the four:
Out of these choices, the best way for me to learn verbs is:

To see them on the overhead

To hear the teacher’s explanation

To sing

To make hand motions to act out the verb
Figure 1. Student opinions
Out of these options, 55% of the students said that they learned best when seeing a verb
on the overhead. 15% said that they learned a verb best when hearing the teacher’s
explanation. 30% of the students said that they learned a verb best when getting to sing a
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song with it. None of students said that they learned best when using hand motions to act
out a verb.
A Pearson Correlation test was run with the opinion question data results and the
recall data discussed earlier. The finding was that there was no significant relationship
between student opinion and student recall performance. The students believed that they
would do their best by learning visually, by an overhead projector presentation. The
popular opinion was not reflected in their verb recall performance with any of the verbs
used. In fact, as far as the Day 1 data shows, the best recall was found with the verb that
was presented with music and hand motions. Interestingly enough, students did not think
that method would help them the best at all; 0% students reported that as a preferred
learning method. On Day 1, the poorest recall performance among the participants was
with the verb vouloir, where students saw the verb visually on the overhead and heard the
teacher’s explanation behind the verb. Yet, 70% commented that those methods would
be most effective to helping them learn a verb best. When the students were asked
informally if they had ever taken the “multiple intelligences” or “learning styles” test,
only 2 out of the 40 participants were aware that such tests even existed. In the end, it
appears that the students were not aware about their own learning styles.
Conclusion
This study provides more support for the use of music as a teaching tool in the
classroom. By testing three irregular verbs in three diverse manners, the data collected
verified the research questions. When new information was presented only on the
overhead, some students benefited from learning that way, but not the majority.
According to the data, it was much more valuable to use music to present the information
19
to students. These results further support the studies run by Medina (1990) and Schunk
(1999) to show that music is a strong, influential teaching tool. In all of our studies, we
discovered that music, when partnered with another teaching medium such as hand
gestures or picture illustrations, aids vocabulary acquisition more with a partner than it
would if it were used on its own. The scenarios where music wasn’t used as a teaching
method yielded the weakest vocabulary acquisition and recall results among the
participants.
These findings have important implications for both the foreign language
classroom as well as the general classroom. First of all, based on this study, music does
improve recall of newly learned information. For the vouloir, faire, and pouvoir tests, the
verb recall was only tested on a short-term basis. Imagine the recall results if the songs
and hand motions were practiced for a longer time period!
Teaching by song or by hand motion also helps to keep new information separate
from old information learned in the classroom. This year, the 40 test participants had
learned 10 irregular verbs before learning the 3 verbs in this set of testing. One student
commented that she liked the different presentations of verbs because they helped to keep
the verbs separated in her brain, rather than all mixed up together in a tangled mess. I
found, too, that when grading their verb recall post-tests, it was very rare to find a verb
conjugation of a previously learned verb from earlier in the year. The songs and hand
motions added a “mental divider” between each verb for the students, separating each
new verb from older verbs in the brain, like files in a file cabinet.
Another benefit to using music or hand motions to teach vocabulary in the foreign
language classroom is the fact that they help the teacher to meet many of the diverse
20
learning styles of students. It is important for teachers not to be entirely “visually” biased
in their presenting methods. It does not benefit students to present information only
through the overhead, blackboard or textbook. Some students are auditory learners or
tactile, hands-on learners, for example, and may not adapt to learning only through visual
cues. By singing music in class, an educator can reach all of those learner needs by
showing the lyrics on the overhead (visual), singing the song (auditory), and using
gestures to compliment to the lyrics (tactile).
It is important to note that while educators should practice diverse teaching
methods, they also need to be aware that students may not have a grasp on which
teaching method works best for them individually. For example, in the opinion of the
students in this study, it was not as helpful to learn new information by music or hand
motions. They reported that their best mode of learning was through overhead
presentation. The results from the verb recall post-tests indicated the opposite, thus the
students were not aware of their own learning styles. It might have been helpful for all
of them to have taken a “learning styles” test before my instruction all of the verbs. In
Haley’s (2004) study, he explored the implementation of a multiple intelligence test
among many students across the United States. After students had identified their
individual learning strengths, they took more ownership over their learning and felt more
empowered in school. It is undetermined at this time whether individual learning style
knowledge would have affected the overall recall performance in the participants of this
study. That would be a recommended pre-test addition to future studies along this topic
area.
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All in all, based on the benefits that I have discussed above, it is important for
educators to put music and hand motions on their priority list to use in the classroom.
Where should the research go from here? The Medina (1990) study shows positive
results from students learning foreign language vocabulary with music and pictures
combined; therefore, the areas of future research that I suggest would be to see if the
combination of music and hand motions delivers better vocabulary recall results than the
combination of music and pictures.
22
Bibliography
De Groot, A. M. B. (2006). Effects of stimulus characteristics and background
music on foreign language vocabulary learning and forgetting. Language
Learning, 56: 463-506.
Haley, M. H. (2004). Learner-Centered instruction and the theory of multiple
intelligences with second language learners. Teachers College Record, 106:
163-180.
Huy Lê, M. (1999). The role of music in second language learning: A
Vietnamese perspective. Australian and New Zealand Association for
Research in Education. http://www.aare.edu.au/99pap/le99034.htm
(Retrieved Feb. 13, 2007)
Lems, K. (2005). Music works: Music for adult English language learners.
New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 107: 13-21.
Medina, S.L. (1990). The effects of music upon second language vocabulary
acquisition. Annual Meeting of the Teachers of English to Speakers of Other
Languages. http://www.geocities.com/ESLmusic/articles/print/article02.html
(Retrieved Feb. 14, 2007)
Omaggio-Hadley, A. (1993). Teaching for Cultural Understanding. Teaching
Language in Context (pp. 383-411). Boston, MA: Heinle & Heinle Publishers.
Prichard, A., Schuster, D. H. and Pullen, C. (1980). Adapting suggestopedia to
secondary school German instruction. ADFL Bulletin, 12: 31-34.
http://www.ade.org/adfl/bulletin/v12n2/122031.htm (Retrived Feb. 14, 2007)
Schunk, H.A. (1999). The effect of singing paired with signing on receptive
vocabulary skills of elementary ESL students. The Journal of MusicTherapy,
36: 110-124.
Slevc, R. and Miyake, A. (2006). Individual differences in second-language
proficiency: Does musical ability matter?” Psychological Science, 17: 675681.
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Appendix A: The vouloir overhead & post-test
VOULOIR (to want)
Je veux
Nous voulons
Tu veux
Vous voulez
Il/Elle veut
Ils/Elles veulent
Vouloir means "to want". Here’s how it can be used when talking
about doing any activity:
(vouloir + infinitive of a verb)
Je veux aller. – I want to go.
Je veux regarder la télévision. – I want to watch tv.
Vouloir can also be used to talk about objects that are wanted:
(vouloir + object)
Je veux un poulet. – I want a chicken.
Je veux un gâteau. – I want a cake.
_____________________________________________________________
VOULOIR Post-test
Fill in the sentence with the verb VOULOIR below:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Il _________________ un gâteau.
Nous _______________ aller à la maison.
Tu _________________ prendre un coca ?
Elles ___________________ un poulet.
Je __________________ comprendre le français.
Vous _________________ du lait ?
Elle __________________ regarder la télévision.
Ils ___________________ des oeufs.
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Appendix B: The faire overhead & post-test
FAIRE (to do/to make)
Je fais
Nous faisons
Tu fais
Vous faites
Il/Elle fait
Ils/Elles font
Faire means "to do" and "to make" in most senses that these verbs are used
in English:
Je fais mes devoirs - I'm doing my homework
Je fais un gâteau - I'm making a cake
Je fais des projets - I'm making plans
Je fais des progrès - I'm making progress
Faire is used in a number of expressions, including some related to:
WEATHER
Il fait froid - It's cold
Il fait chaud – It’s hot
ACTIVITIES THAT YOU DO
Je fais du ski - I ski
Je fais la cuisine – I cook
FAIRE = to do / to make (tune: The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider)
Oh je fais la cuisine et tu fais les devoirs,
Il fait chaud et il fait froid.
Nous faisons des projets,
Vous faites des progrès,
Ils font du ski,
Faire is easy as can be !
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FAIRE Post-test
Fill in the sentence with the verb FAIRE below:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Il _________________ un gâteau.
Nous _______________ du ski.
Tu _________________ des progrès.
Elles ___________________ la cuisine.
Je __________________ des projets.
Vous _________________ les devoirs.
Elle __________________ froide.
Ils ___________________ du vélo.
Circle one below:
Out of these choices, the best way for me to learn verbs is:
 To see them on the overhead
 To hear the teacher’s explanation
 To sing
 To make hand motions to act out the verb
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Appendix C: The pouvoir overhead & post-test
POUVOIR (to be able)
Je peux
Nous pouvons
Tu peux
Vous pouvez
Il/Elle peut
Ils/Elles peuvent
Pouvoir means "to be able to" or “can”. Here’s how it can be used
when talking about doing any activity:
(pouvoir + infinitive of a verb)
Je peux aller. – I am able to go.
I can go.
Je peux regarder la télévision. – I am able to watch tv.
I can watch tv.
POUVOIR = to be able/ can (tune:Blvd. Broken Dreams)
peux
peux
peut
pouvons
pouvez
p-e-u-v-e-n-t
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POUVOIR Post-test
Fill in the sentence with the verb POUVOIR below:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Il _________________ faire un gâteau.
Nous _______________ aller à la maison.
Tu _________________ prendre un coca.
Elles ___________________ acheter un poulet.
Je __________________ comprendre le français.
Vous _________________ acheter du lait.
Elle __________________ regarder la télévision.
Ils ___________________ chercher des oeufs.
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