The Role of Music in Second Language Learning

Somaye Piri

Abstract


Through the ages, art has been an expression means for conveying various ideas especially intangible ones. Among numerous types of art, music has been an important aspect of every culture with which we use to express our thoughts and feelings. However, its role in learning a language and especially learning a foreign language has not received great attention in educational research. Music due to its affective power in reducing pressure and stress will enhance language learning environment. In this regard, the present study was conducted to examine the relative effectiveness of the use of songs (lyrics and music) on vocabulary acquisition. Using an experimental approach, results of this study showed that varying degrees of the use of songs would yield different English language achievement. The subjects who were exposed to the most music obtained higher achievement.


Keywords


Music; Song; Vocabulary acquisition; EFL/ESL Learning

Full Text:

PDF

References


Ayotte, S. (2005). The acquisition of verb forms through song. (Doctoral dissertation, Michigan State University). Dissertation Abstracts International, 65, 3356A.

Eken, D. K. (1996). Ideas for using songs in the English language classroom. English Teaching Forum, 34(1), 46-47.

Halpern, S. (1999). Sound education: Creating the optimal learning environment. Retrieved from http:www.soundrx.com/monthly/sound_education.htm.

Hazel-Obarow, S. (2004). The impact of music on the vocabulary acquisition of kindergarten and first-grade students (Doctoral dissertation, Widener University, 2004). Dissertation Abstracts International, 65, 452A.

Jolly, Y. (1975). The use of songs in teaching foreign language. Modern Language Journal, 59, 11-14.

Jourdain, R. (1997). Music, the brain, and ecstasy: how music captures our imagination. New York: W. Morrow.

Jowett, B. (trans.). (1994). Plato’s republic. Project Gutenberg E-text # 150.

Maess, B., & Koelsch, S. (2001). Musical syntax is processed in broca’s area: an meg study. Nature Neuroscience, 4, 540-545.

Medina, S. L. (1990). The effects of music upon second language vocabulary acquisition. Paper presented in National Network for Early Language Learning, (6), 6-8. (Eric Document Reproduction No. ED 352 834)

Mora, C. F. (2000). Foreign language acquisition and melody singing. ELT Journal, 54(2), 146-152.

Stansell, J. W. (2005). The use of music for learning languages: A review of the literature [Topic Notes]. Illinois, the U.S.: University of Illinois, Office for Mathematics, Science, and Technology Education. Retrieved from http://mste.illinois.edu/courses/ci407su02/students/stansell/Jon_Stansell_The_Use_of_Music_in_Learning_Languages.pdf

Wilcox, W. B. (1996). Music cues from classroom singing for second language acquisition: Prosodic Memory for Pronunciation of Target Vocabulary by Adult Non-native English Speakers. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Kansas, Witchita.




DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3968/10449

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2018 Somaye Piri

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Share us to:   

 

Online Submission: http://cscanada.org/index.php/sll/submission/wizard


Reminder

How to do online submission to another Journal?

If you have already registered in Journal A, then how can you submit another article to Journal B? It takes two steps to make it happen:

1. Register yourself in Journal B as an Author

Find the journal you want to submit to in CATEGORIES, click on “VIEW JOURNAL”, “Online Submissions”, “GO TO LOGIN” and “Edit My Profile”. Check “Author” on the “Edit Profile” page, then “Save”.

2. Submission

Go to “User Home”, and click on “Author” under the name of Journal B. You may start a New Submission by clicking on “CLICK HERE”.


We only use three mailboxes as follows to deal with issues about paper acceptance, payment and submission of electronic versions of our journals to databases: caooc@hotmail.com; sll@cscanada.net; sll@cscanada.org

 Articles published in Studies in Literature and Language are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC-BY).

 STUDIES IN LITERATURE AND LANGUAGE Editorial Office

Address: 1055 Rue Lucien-L'Allier, Unit #772, Montreal, QC H3G 3C4, Canada.
Telephone: 1-514-558 6138 
Website: Http://www.cscanada.net; Http://www.cscanada.org 
E-mail: office@cscanada.net; office@cscanada.org; caooc@hotmail.com

Copyright © 2010 Canadian Academy of Oriental and Occidental Culture