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Films and videos in the EFL classroom
If you’re looking to expand the role of film and video in your EFL classroom, what better way to expand students’ communication skills, grammar and vocabulary than by using popular film clips? Try using these seven tips to boost student motivation while enjoying a favorite pastime of children and adults alike, watching short scenes or clips from popular movies.
1. Use pre-watch activities
Before the video, familiarize your students with the topic and grammar through preview activities. A variety of these may include riddles, photos and pictures, short games such as “focus” or TPR activities, a story or anecdote, or trigger the learners’ schema in various other ways.
2. Ask students to complete a graph as they watch
While watching a short video or movie segment, you can have students fill in the key information in a box. Items such as character names, occupations, family relationships, clothing, and settings can be easily recorded in this way. This allows students to focus more on communicative aspects and less on writing.
3. Select a repeatedly demonstrated grammar point in the movie clip
There is no need to leave grammar out of a video-based lesson or stage. If a usable grammatical point or structure is repeated or highlighted during the movie clip you plan to use, all the better. Just remember to pre-teach that grammar or structural element, even a class or two before the video, so it’s recognizable in context.
4. Have a list of six to eight lexicon
Select a list of six to eight or ten vocabulary words, idioms, and expressions from the movie or video clip that you plan to use. Pre-teach them during the preview stage of the lesson. When students hear them in context during the video viewing session, the lexicon will have additional impact.
5. Make use of visual information
A popular movie clip is an audiovisual experience, so use it as such. As students watch and listen to general and detailed spoken information, include visuals so they can also skim and scan. How much? How much? When? Where? Whose? How and Why are good starting points for capturing visually presented information from the movie clip or video segment.
6. Let students select their preferred movie clip
It can be quite a dilemma. There you have maybe two or three or more movies to choose from, but you’re not sure which one your students would prefer. So I have an idea, you choose, let them do it. Take three movies, for example, show students just the first five minutes of each, and then let them choose which one they would like to work with. If you have a clip in mind from each of the movies, show each clip and give them a choice. You can build your activities and lesson stage plans with the confidence of having the interest and motivation of your students.
7. For post-viewing discussion:
If not addressed during preview activities, now is the time to talk about favorite actors and actresses, similar plots and stories from other movies, and what results might be different or better for what was seen. Scenic recreations, altered dialogues and plot twists that students can think of. Be imaginative, be creative, be bold or even funny, but have them communicate about their experience.
Prepare for worksheet
You can prepare a one or two page worksheet to be photocopied and used by the students for the video session. Alternatively, students can copy the format into their notebooks. Just be sure to plan your pre-, in-view, and post-viewing activities well and your video-based lesson in English is sure to be an award winner.
