The Relevance of Using Games for Teaching Noun Phrases in English Language Teaching Class

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-44889/v1

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The Relevance of Using Games for Teaching Noun Phrases in English Language Teaching Class

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-44889/v1

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Game-based learning makes learners collaborative, communicative and interactive. Strategic games improve the functioning of the brain. Gaming creates a dynamic atmosphere and develop skills while emotionally connecting the learners to the subject matter. The research paper focuses on the use of games inside the classroom and favours games to be a good teaching method for teaching noun phrases. It suggests the use of experimental method where a pre-test and a post-test will be used for data collection. It has suggested five language games for teaching noun phrases for analysing the impact of games for teaching noun phrases and their impact on language comprehension and language production. It also highlights the further scope of research.

Educational Philosophy and Theory

Special Education

collaborative

communicative

dynamic

interactive

strategic

Noam Chomsky once said “The truth of the matter is that about 99 percent of teaching is about making the students feel interested in the material. Then the other 1 percent has to do with your methods. And that’s not just true of languages. It’s true of every subject.” Language is essential for communicating ideas, build friendships, economic relationships and cultural ties. It distinguishes the differences and celebrates the uniqueness of cultures. It shapes one’s perception of a society’s culture. Language improves organization and adeptness. It unfastens one’s minds to a mystical world of desire and dreams. Language advances our minds, and disposition.

English is the fourth most widely spoken official language in the world and the primary language for international affairs, global trade, commerce, tourism, technology, higher education, governance, employment international relations. Skinner once stated “Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.” Games allows the learners to uniquely learn and use the English language creatively and innovatively. They design useful and meaningful contexts for language use, and comprehension of its pedagogical value. Games motivate, lower learners’ stress, and ease real communication. Linguistic games focus on accuracy, creativity and productivity, while communicative games presuppose successful exchange of information and ideas. Games burgeon interpersonal skills, cooperation, curiosity, creativity, communication and discussion.

Games smoothens language acquisition, motivation, interaction, fast and effective learning. Games stimulate and encourage active participation, alongwith language acquisition. Learners realize the need of using a language for transparent communication. Games lower anxiety while facilitating reasoning and recall power. Games escalate learners’ achievement, communication, vocabulary, or other language skills. Vygotsky emphasizes “A child’s play is not simply a reproduction of what he has experienced, but a creative reworking of the impressions he has acquired.”

Understanding and teaching noun phrases

A significant purpose of academic language is to clearly describe complex ideas (Schleppegrell, 2004). Complex thought requires complex language. As the academic levels rise, noun phrase complexity increases to express complicated and difficult concepts. Noun phrases express the ideas clearly and creates a more specific meaningful context. Knowing how words are put together to make meaning is important (Derewianka, 2011). Individual words function within a group, expressing the relationship between words. Complex noun phrases are a crucial academic language feature to be understood by the learners.

Use of games in teaching noun phrases

Noun phrases play a pivotal role in sentence construction. Without knowledge of noun phrases, learners cannot produce comprehensible sentences. The lack of nouns will eradicate any subject or object from sentences. Noun phrases often function as verb subjects and objects, as predicative expressions and as the complements of prepositions. Noun phrases allow learners to wrap enough information into a few words, facilitating word count, and making the writing more concise. Noun phrases represent wholesome ideas. Knowledge of noun phrases facilitates text reading, and chunking information. Learners must be guided to improve sentence construction and deconstruction of noun phrases.

Teachers can use games to allow learners identify complex noun phrases while learning academic content. A valuable game permits identification of complex noun phrases. Strategies can be designed for identifying the head noun in a complex noun phrase, constructing and deconstructing noun phrases, and using academic noun phrases to replace or condense the verb phrases. Games should be designed for identifying the head noun, constructing and deconstructing complex noun phrases, while exploring the potential of noun phrases to provide detailed meaning by starting with a noun and adding as many modifiers as students can, using a simple graphic organizer to illustrate the parts of a noun phrase, and break down complex noun phrases. This brings clarity to the content. Games can be designed for using noun phrases to replace or condense verb phrases.

The research paper aims at answering the following research question:

Do games facilitate the teaching and understanding of noun phrases in secondary level in schools?

Games

Games are activities that one engages in for amusement or fun.

Noun Phrases

Noun phrases are words or group of words containing a noun and functioning in a sentence as subject, object, or prepositional object.

Secondary Level of Education

Secondary education is the stage of education following primary education.The next stage of education is usually college or university. Secondary education is characterized by transition from primary education for minors to tertiary, post-secondary, or higher education for adults.

English language teaching class

English language teaching class is the place which involves the practice and theory of learning and teaching English for the benefit of people whose first language is not English.

A research article titled A Research on Applying Game-Based Learning to Enhance the Participation of Student proved that adding game elements in operating system courses can increase the level of attraction of courses to students, and the students would be willing to spend time in courses because they want to win, thus fulfilling the purpose of elevating learning motivation (Lai, Lee, Jong and Hsia). A research article titled Students’ perception of Kahoot!’s influence on teaching and learning presents outcomes of research that examined students’ experience using a game-based student response system, Kahoot!, in an Information Systems Strategy and Governance course at a research-intensive teaching university in New Zealand. The findings suggest that the use of educational games in the classroom is likely to minimise distractions, thereby improving the quality of teaching and learning beyond what is provided in conventional classrooms. Other factors included the creation and integration of appropriate content in Kahoot!, providing students with timely feedback, and game-play (gamification) strategies (Licorish &Daniel, et al.). A research article titled Game-Based Learning in the Social Studies Classroom proved that the students learning through the use of a computer-based game would have increased achievement and exhibit more motivation to learn. (Magnacca, S)

Purpose of the study

The research paper aims at analysing the impact of using games in teaching noun phrases to secondary school learners.

Sample of the study

The data would be collected from grade VIII of two CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) board schools.

Instrument

The researcher aims at designing five language games for teaching specific noun phrases to learners of class VIII of two CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) board schools.

Instructional Design

The researcher has devised five language games for teaching noun phrases. The researcher will evaluate the impact of these language games in teaching noun phrases to secondary school learners. The tool will gauge the impact of using language games in helping learners comprehend noun phrases and produce sentences using them. The games are Communal Collaboration, Formal Fitting, Target Typhoon, Associated Amalgamation and Measurable Substantive. The researcher will evaluate the impact of these language games in teaching noun phrases to secondary school learners. The tool will gauge the impact of using language games in helping learners comprehend noun phrases and produce sentences using them.

In Communal Collaboration the learners are evaluated on understanding collective noun phrases. The teacher divides the learners into several groups. Then he or she shows some images of groups of objects or animals to the learners. The learners need to construct collective noun phrases from the clues given using their previous knowledge. The teacher may facilitate by giving suggestions in between and helping the learners to guess the correct collective noun phrase. The students in each group will then need to make a sentence clearly implying the meaning of the collective noun phrase.

In Formal Fitting the learners are evaluated on understanding proper noun phrases. The teacher divides the learners into several groups. Then he or she shows some images of people, places, objects and things to the learners. The learners need to identify proper noun phrases from the clues given. The teacher may facilitate by giving suggestions in between and helping the learners to guess the correct collective noun phrase. The students in each group will then need to make a sentence clearly implying the meaning of the proper noun phrase.

In Target Typhoon the learners are evaluated on understanding object noun phrases. The teacher divides the learners into several groups. Then he distributes two sets of cards with groups of phrases, to the learners. The learners need to distinguish the subject noun phrases and the object noun phrases from the clues given. The teacher may facilitate by giving suggestions in between and helping the learners to guess the correct collective noun phrase. The students in each group will then need to make a sentence clearly implying the meaning of the subject noun phrase and the object noun phrase.

In Associated Amalgamation the learners are evaluated on understanding referential noun phrases. The teacher divides the learners into several groups. Then he distributes two sets of cards with pictures, to the learners. The learners need to relate to the pictures and combine them to make referential noun phrases. The teacher may facilitate by giving suggestions in between and helping the learners to guess the correct collective noun phrase. The students in each group will then need to make a sentence clearly implying the meaning of the subject noun phrase and the object noun phrase.

In Measurable Substantive the learners are evaluated on understanding quantified noun phrases. The teacher divides the learners into several groups. Then learners are distributed sets of cards with pictures, to the learners. The learners need to quantify the objects in the picture. The teacher may facilitate by giving suggestions in between and helping the learners to guess the correct collective noun phrase. The students in each group will then need to make a sentence clearly implying the meaning of the quantified noun phrase.

Experiment and Analysis

The experiment will be conducted on a group of 80 learners from grade VIII of two CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) board schools. It will be carried in two phases – a pre-test and a post-test. During the pre-test, the sample group will be tested with the teaching of the figures of speech without using any language games. During the post-test, the same sample group will be taught the figures of speech using language games. The data will be collected from both the tests and compared with each other.

Hypothesis

The hypotheses of the research will be divided into two categories – the null hypothesis and the alternative hypothesis. The null hypothesis states that there is no significant difference between learners being taught noun phrases without games and the learners who are being taught noun phrases using games.

The researcher will restrict her research zone only to two CBSE board (Central Board of Secondary Education) schools and only to grade VIII. The research will only evaluate the comprehension and the production abilities of the learners from the perspective of analysing noun phrases through games. The research is conducted in middle school. However, the researcher is unsure about the reduplication of the research results in a higher grade or in a lower grade.

Games create a friendly atmosphere, and develop linguistic skills like understanding noun phrases. Games provide a welcome break from the usual routine of the language class. Games sustain the effort of learning noun phrases. They encourage interaction, communication, active learning, analysis, synthesis, evaluation, foster a more positive attitude toward the classroom experience, more attention, better attendance, and better participation. Games improve retention of complex linguistic structures, decision-making skills, and comprehension of complex linguistic structures like noun phrases. Games aids the successful learning of noun phrases as they are based on specific time allocation, clear relevance to the material, appropriateness, and the learners’ enjoyment through their active linguistic engagement.

CBSE- Central Board of Secondary Education

I declare that this research paper has been composed solely by myself and that it has not been submitted, in whole or in part, in any previous research paper. Except where states otherwise by reference or acknowledgment, the work presented is entirely my own.

Availability of data and material:

The materials and the modules used in the research paper have been designed by the researcher herself.

Funding:

The data collection process will be funded jointly by the researcher and the university.

Competing Interests:

The researcher has no competing interests to declare.

Author’s Contributions’:

The author, AR has designed five games for teaching noun phrases to learners.

Acknowledgements:

I am grateful to my research guide, Dr. Sumanjari for suggesting me with topics for writing the research paper.

Lai, et al. (2012). A Research on Applying Game-Based Learning to Enhance the Participation of Student. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259609399_A_Research_on_Applying_Game-Based_Learning_to_Enhance_the_Participation_of_Student
Licorish, S.A., Owen, H.E., Daniel, B. et al (2018).Students’ perception of Kahoot!’s influence on teaching and learning. RPTEL,13,9 . https://doi.org/10.1186/s41039-018-0078-8
Magnacca, Shannon, "Game-Based Learning in the Social Studies Classroom" (2013). Instructional Technology Education Specialist Research Papers. 7. https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/edu-papers/7

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The Relevance of Using Games for Teaching Noun Phrases in English Language Teaching Class

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Version 1

Abstract

Introduction

Understanding and teaching noun phrases

Use of games in teaching noun phrases

Operational Definitions

Games

Noun Phrases

Secondary Level of Education

English language teaching class

Review Of Literature

Methodology

Purpose of the study

Sample of the study

Instrument

Instructional Design

Experiment and Analysis

Hypothesis

Further Scope

Conclusion

Abbreviations

Declarations

Availability of data and material:

Funding:

Competing Interests:

Author’s Contributions’:

Acknowledgements:

References

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