Enhancing Young EFL Learners' Vocabulary Learning Through Contextualizing Animated Videos

Abstract

Practicing target language contextually integrated with animated video in the classroom influences the way students use the language in their everyday situations. Contextualized animated videos as learning media based on young learners’ characteristics can be appropriate for stimulating them to acquire vocabulary. This study attempts to examine the effectiveness of utilizing animated videos as learning media in learning vocabulary for enhancing young EFL learners' engagement in classroom activities. The study used experimental research in which participants from two groups (experimental and control) were involved. The context-based learning strategy is utilized to introduce new vocabulary items to the participants in the control group. While the new vocabulary items were presented to the experimental group's participants through context-based learning integrated with animated videos. The analysis of the data revealed that the participants who underwent vocabulary learning through context-based learning integrated with an animated video in the vocabulary learning treatment significantly outperformed those who underwent vocabulary learning through the context-based learning method. Integrating animated videos into vocabulary teaching proves its effectiveness with the four word classes of the content word type. It was very effective in learning verbs and adverbs compared to being learned via a context-based learning strategy separately. Hence, integrating animated videos is not just appropriate to facilitate vocabulary learning for young learners but also increases their motivation to engage in classroom learning.