6.b) Improving your English by watching videos.

Video

Of all the materials that can develop your listening comprehension, videos and DVDs are the ones that come closest to reality, as they allow you to see people’s lips moving, gestures, facial expressions and the context in which each action occurs. Because of this they are very effective in helping you learn better and they are very motivating.

According to Robert Merabian, an American psychologist, about 80% of communication is non-verbal. So, if you watch videos you have a better chance of understanding what you hear because of all the visual clues and the fact that they put language into action. Also, videos allow you to make comparisons between your culture and those of Englishspeaking countries.

Watch programs specifically produced for teaching English which use controlled language more suited to the level you are at. The dialogues they have will probably contain structures that you have already studied.

You can also watch movies, sitcoms (seriados) and other programs recorded from TV.

The advantage of using a recorded program is that you can watch it as many times as you want or need.

Do not worry if the level of the language is higher than yours. Because of the nature of movies, it is not possible to classify them by course level, but as a film has many, situations, you can work with parts that are appropriate for your level.

Tips

Try to watch movies that you have seen before. Concentrate on dialogues appropriate for your level of English. Choose one or two scenes and watch them several times.

Techniques to help you work with the video you have chosen

Watch part of the video with the sound off – this will make you concentrate on the action and prepare you to listen to dialogues. You can predict what is being said through the images you see, summarize what is happening out loud or in writing and check your guesses when you watch the video with the sound on.

The pause button – lets you take notes of details and describe people and places.

Closed captions – (subtitles in English) – allow a level of comprehension you may not achieve by listening only.

Listening without the picture – (if you want to do this, just temporarily disconnect the video cable) – before you watch the video you can try to imagine what is happening in the scenes you listen to. Imagine the scene and the action mentally and check to see if you were right when you watch the video with the picture.

Types of practice

You can use videos to practice listening or for other activities which practice oral production or writing skills. Some suggestions are:

Speaking Practice

Prepare a presentation about what you watched, tell the story to a friend or record your presentation on tape. Sitcoms, like Friends, sometimes have their scripts available on the Internet. You can print out a specific dialogue and work with it as a language exercise. For example, you could blank out some words (one in every 10 or 15) and try to fill them in as you listen to the sequence, then correct your work by comparing it to the original script.You could “stand in” for one of the characters (using your own words) while watching part of the dialogues without sound.

Vocabulary

Try to write down a few words and expressions that call your attention. Look up their meanings in the dictionary if you do not know them and put them in a vocabulry notebook so you can refer to them whenever you want.

Writing

You could write a review of the movie for a magazine or an article about the characters for a gossip column.

Congratulations! You have just done an excellent exercise. If you like these suggestions, go to www.cellep.com “Dicas” and print out your copy!

Bibliography

Stemplesk, S. and Tomalin, B. 1990. Video in Action – Recipes for Using Video in Language Teaching. Prentice Hall