Why Use Media to Teach English?
Media is short for mass media, designed to enlighten, entertain and educate the masses. As online degrees and telecommuting become increasingly common, including media in mainstream instruction is increasingly necessary. Educators must be diligent, however, to ensure that high standards and educational goals are met and that media and technology are not used merely to engage students.
-
Multiple Learning Styles
-
Much of media appeals to visual and auditory learning styles, enabling students to learn through seeing the action of the film or play and hearing the language, word choices, culture and rhythm. According to Rita Dunn, director of the Center for the Study of Learning and Teaching Styles at St. John's University, learning styles encompass four fundamental stimuli: emotional, sociological, physical and environmental. In the case of the Internet generation, the online medium strongly appeals to sociological and emotional stimuli.
Education for Global Society
-
As nations become closer through business avenues and the sharing of resources, the world is becoming more of a shared society. Through the use of media, teachers are able to connect their students with the world abroad. The Internet provides a direct route to videos, pictures, music and languages of other cultures, tying them to their far-flung cousins. Museums, Harvard lectures and peace ambassadors are only a click away.
-
Edutainment
-
"Edutainment" has emerged in response to challenges to create an academic culture that is fun and appealing to students while encouraging them to delve deeper. This method can encourage students to apply their personal knowledge and creative problem-solving capabilities to knowledge-testing formats in comfortable mediums, such as games.
Fewer Battles
-
Outside the classroom, students in online communities are constantly engaged in connective interaction, whether it be informal texting or sharing knowledge of areas of interest, such as celebrity news and sports. Media experiences shape how students desire to learn and their opinions about subject matter.
Students are more likely to learn when information is introduced in a comfortable, natural way--Internet, music, movies and advertisements, among other media--as noted in Angela Marx's "Popular Culture in the Classroom: Teaching and Researching Critical Media Literacy." Lessons are lingering in all types of media, and are easily tied to learning goals such as main idea, symbolism and analysis.
Writing
-
Students are writing more than ever via texting, instant messaging and chat rooms. A new language is evolving, according to a plethora of studies, including the Pew Internet and American Life Project. When you correlate students' writing assignments to beloved outlets, students feel more connected and comfortable.
Lessons such as comparing and contrasting are easily implemented with media, including movies and television. Music is an excellent medium as well, especially for English-as-a-second-language students, as documented by Dr. Suzanne Medina. This is partly because of the repetitive pattern, modern idioms and interesting vocabulary.
-
References
Resources
- Photo Credit spinning globe on white background image by Matthew Antonino from Fotolia.com
