The use of Pixar animated movies to improve the Speaking skill in the EFL classroom

Jhon Alexander Aconcha Vasquez

Introduction:

To date, English learning has been considered a valuable and important skill that has found
numerous ways of being taught and approached. However, as time goes by traditional ways
have lost their reliability as students’ interests have evolved. “Some of the long-established
materials are Course books and CDs, which turn out to be artificial and not very engaging for
students” (Madiyoh and Putro, 2018). The result of using these more traditional methods
ended up having not very motivated learners, they would also get bored with each lesson, and
this resulted in having contempt for the language that was being taught. All of the above
inevitably forces teachers to look for innovative resources in the classroom environment. In
this context, the researchers have found a contemporary alternative for the traditional
methods that finds its relevance in the foreign language learning field. An alternative that
could be encountered as a multimodal way of approaching ELT. In this case, audiovisual
tools, as they seem to be an extraordinary inclusion in English learning settings. Ashcroft,
Garner, and Handingham (2018) mentioned that for language learners audio-visual materials
like movies are a very helpful extra tool in the classroom. In search of an audiovisual
resource that could enhance students’ motivation and learning outcome, the authors of the
study considered movies as a way of bringing diversity, as stated by Iranmanesh & Darani
(2018) “As movies are interesting and motivating to almost all learners and make the class
atmosphere different from the traditional classes, students like them and prefer that movies
are integrated into their classes”. Because of their freer, more child-like, and entertaining
nature, animated movies might also encourage students to be more creative and innovative,
and that is another reason to support their integration, “Animated cinema thus becomes an
instrument of creative learning that, through its ability to represent situations, allows us to
contemplate images that enliven thought, enhance imagination and activate inventive
capacity, the very basis of creative work.” (Santos, 2014 cited in Álvarez, Cutillas & Núñez,
2020). This research is also heading to connect movies with the improvement of the speaking
skill, as numerous investigations showed a positive effect of using audiovisual material for
enhancing the oral skill and magnifying the size of the vocabulary. Movies have shown to be
a great integration to contextualize students and also to get them to perceive and identify
more about what is around the language, as the cultural aspects and the variation of dialects.
That said, this research study aims to understand the way in which the speaking skill in the
students’ English acquisition can be improved through the use of Pixar animated movies. The
previous objective will be of great help in analyzing the matter of our research by providing
us with valuable and reliable data about the use of movies as a learning resource. The
research study will also focus on a more practical approach that will intend to identify the
students’ attitudes and opinions towards the inclusion of movies in the classroom.

Body

Research conducted has shown that integration of movies in the EFL (English as a foreign
language) classroom motivates students and keeps them interested, Kabooha (2016) found
that when the educators used methods such as films, the students ended up being more
motivated and interactive than when professors applied traditional methods like textbooks. At
the same time, researchers have stated that although movies and other audio-visual media
have been popular among teenagers and young adults, in 2010 undergraduate students
between the ages of 8 and 18 spared roughly four and half hours a day to watch films and
television, an increase of nearly half an hour from five years earlier in 2005 (Kaiser Family
Foundation, 2010 cited in Kenna & Waters, 2017). Taking this into account, it is noticeable
that when the students are taught under teacher-centered methods and lecture-based lessons,
their English speaking skills are poor. As Nita, Emzir, and Dewanti (2020) affirm in their
study, “most of the lecturers still use learning models that have not been able to stimulate
students to be active in learning interactions'', which leads to the students being bored,
distracted, and lacking in motivation. Motivation, then, plays an essential role in L2 learning,
which is the reason why teachers should not neglect it or turn a blind eye to it. If a teacher has
a motivated learner in their classroom, the learning-teaching process will be much easier and
fruitful. However, what is a motivated learner? Ur, 1991 (cited in Syahrozi, Rochsantiningsih,
Indriyani and Handayani, 2019) defines it as a student who is disposed to make an effort in
the proposed activities in order to reach progress. As long as motivation and interest remain,
students’ learning will keep growing significantly. The fact of having the students in the class
be motivated and determined will be of great help in their development and the teacher’s
labor. Eventually, such factors might even help in the development of other important skills in
the student, and regarding this Álvarez et al (2020) claimed that students were enabled to be
more creative by audiovisual stimulation and by being allowed to express themselves. It
encouraged their ability to observe, reflect, and analyze.

Therefore, the contribution in the classroom by the inclusion of animated films becomes
evident, however, motivational factors are not the only ones improved by this resource, but an
enhancement in skills of the English language, such as the speaking skill, can also be
evidenced due to that motivation created in the student. So as to achieve a better speaking
skill, one of the strategies that teachers or language instructors can use is listening to native
speakers talking in a real context, which means using movies as a tool to help the students
acquire correct pronunciation and intonation. As Stempleski, 2000 stated, cited in Iranmanesh
& Heidari, 2018, “Films are such valuable and rich resources for teaching because they
present colloquial English in real-life contexts rather than artificial situation; an opportunity
of being exposed to different native speaker voices, slangs, reduced speeches, stress, accents,
and dialects.”. By having an intensive exposition to the different slangs, voices, and dialects,
students will be able to obtain a reference that is closer to what English really sounds like in
everyday usage, making films a very appropriate teaching material (Rao, 2019). Although
movies are an evident help in the speaking skill, animated movies can also increase a
student’s grammar, pronunciation, register, and intonation, as well as his/ her oral
comprehension (Rasyid, 2016).

Within the usage of films lies the possibility of finding oneself, as language teachers, in a
place of uncertainty given that there are several types of films and making the selection of
those that best suit the students’ needs and/or interests will be a difficult choice for the
teacher. Within the framework of this research, it is intended to employ animated films since,
due to their variety, they can be adapted to the different needs that arise in the classroom.
Animated movies then, find themselves a place as they are a versatile resource with which
EFL students would have a better perception of what they are watching, as Brown (2010)
noted in her study, the students could understand more easily animated films or films that
leaned mostly on facial expressions and/or gesticulating to relate the story and move forward
to it. Due to this, it was anticipated that students could understand the essence of the story,
but perhaps not the finer details, due to the mere reliance on body language. In addition to
this, animated films could also work on learners in different age ranges, Hofmann (2018)
alluding more specifically to Pixar animated movies stated that “They are easy to understand
and fun for kids, they have some rebellious potential for teenagers and young adults, and they
offer adult viewers another reading by using intertextual references or referring to more
sinister topics”. Clark (2013) explains in his book for what reason Pixar movies are popular,
he mentions that Pixar understands that the most important stories resonate with people
because they appeal to some core truth about the human condition. Regardless of whether
those stories are told through the eyes of toys, or monsters, or robots. They're able to really
empathize with their audience, and that makes a really good story.

When it comes to the selection of the material that teachers are going to use, one
characteristic necessary is the accuracy of the content that is going to be shown to the
students, the teacher might face a challenging situation as it is not an easy task to make the
choice. It is important to choose appropriate movies in such a way that they are not too
complex for the level of understanding to the target students and the content should not prove
to be offensive to the students. (King, 2002 cited in Kabooha, 2016). Another decision that
comes to mind during the process of carrying the investigation out is whether the best viable
option is to watch the films using or not the subtitles. About this matter, in a study conducted
by Hayati and Mohmadi (2011), the results revealed that the students were in favor of the use
of subtitles, as it enhanced their capacity to notice, comprehend, spell and recall new English
material. And further on, the next step to take is choosing the language in which the subtitles
should be in, L1 or L2. As Milterer and McQueen (2009) stated on the subject “
Native-language subtitles appear to create lexical interference”, which inhibits students from
perceiving the language being spoken as a whole. This means that they receive two sources of
input at the same time, the subtitles being in L1 and the spoken language in L2. On the other
hand, “foreign-language subtitles assist speech learning by indicating which words (and
hence sounds) are being spoken.” Milterer and McQueen (2009), this consequently not only
facilitates the learning of the speaking skill but also general language abilities. Which makes
this a fundamental resource for the students undergoing the investigation.

Despite the adaptability that animated films offer, giving a place to these in the classroom can
sometimes be a difficult task for educators and effective strategies are required for including
them. Taking the case of Champoux (2001), he proposed that teachers could offer students
the theoretical and methodological context required and then present the scenes as a video
case. After that, students should give the scenes an individual examination, or they can
practice in groups if they prefer so. By using this approach, students can take a critical stance
towards the material being shown, and not use it without a purpose. Researchers on the
subject have stated that “using films as supplementary material is by far the most fruitful role
for the medium as a result of the recent shift from the structure/grammar-based syllabus
towards process/task-based ones, which favors the bringing-in of film scenes as bases for
different tasks and activities” (Badock, 1996 cited in Eken, 2003). That said, films bring a
new, more enjoyable experience to the classroom and help professors to distance themselves
from using the traditional methods which have been proven to discourage and disinterest
students from learning a foreign language. Moreover, there are various other strategies
proposed for including movies in the classroom, one mentioned by Yalcin (2013) is that the
teacher ought to watch the film along with the students frame by frame and ask them to
search out the unusual, curious, or different actions, perspectives, beliefs, and body language
they could observe during viewing it. From that, students can remark on several cultural
aspects that were obvious or noticeable when watching the movie and these inputs can guide
to a further explanation in regards to the diversity giving the appropriate space to compare
cultures, or to debate beyond matters of language.

Animated films can bring great advantages within their integration in the foreign language
learning classroom, not only because of the evident contribution that we have already
mentioned, as it serves as almost direct exposure to the target language, which benefits in
enhancing language skills, but also because of the impact they have on students, and mainly
in young people. “These stories are packed with great role models and messages, making
them great choices for kids under 12 while still earning the love of grown-ups, tweens, teens,
and adults'' (Müller-Hartmann, 2007). Therefore, using Pixar Animated Movies as a tool for
teaching a language would be very effective because not only would it integrate students with
various likes but it would also engage them with the film regardless of their age.
Furthermore, when children or teenagers are exposed to animated films, they can clearly hear
idiomatic and daily-life expressions and this, at the same time, shapes and builds confidence
in the pupils at the moment of trying oral production. Iranmanesh & Heidari (2018) affirmed
that when learners are able to memorize the common idioms they become better speakers and
negotiators since the use of idioms is common among native and highly proficient english
speakers and it is difficult to express themselves or write in a skilled way without using
idioms.
Conclusions

To sum up, in this literature review the researchers highlighted several features about the use
of audio-visual tools, drawing a bond between animated films and their application in the
EFL classrooms. To start with, traditional methodologies such as the use of CD’s and
coursebooks often cause the students to get easily bored and scatter their attention, which is
why there was a need for a different and innovative purpose. In addition, the integration of
animated films can also be of great help when trying to acquire and improve the speaking
skill, as it uses a colloquial day-to-day language. However, to choose the right movie depends
on the age and likes of the learners, and this might even represent a challenge for the
educators, taking into account that the best choice is to display subtitles in L2. Similarly, it
was shown how the correct integration of movies with accurate strategies can make these a
great supportive aid on the learning process. The usage of movies can help to develop and
carry out a process/task-based approach to the curriculum. In general, Pixar animated movies
are a strategic and brilliant inclusion in the classroom environment in order to help in the
improvement of the speaking skill.

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