Vocabulary development of ESL students using English subtitled movie clips

Abstract

As the English language proficiency level of students in Malaysia is still worrying, there is a need to find out the causes of such issue and to solve them effectively. One of the causes found to be the lack of vocabulary knowledge that students possessed. Hence, this study aimed to determine the effects of using English-subtitled movie clips for vocabulary development on public secondary school students. This study adopted a mixed-mode approach combining quantitative and qualitative methods. For the quantitative study, a quasi-experimental design was employed that consisted one class of Form 1 students as participants. The experiment was done three times over a period of two weeks where English-subtitled movie clips were shown in the lessons. The results showed that there was a significant increase for each session. However, there was no significant increase over time between the three sessions. As for the qualitative part, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 6 students. It was found that the students had positive perceptions on using English-subtitled movie clips to learn vocabulary and that they would learn better if there was guidance from teachers when using the material. Nevertheless, the results from this study suggest that using English-subtitled movie clips can be an effective option for teachers to utilize in their lessons.