Innovation in Language Learning

This study attempted to investigate the effects of using captions with an English language film on the listening comprehension of intermediate level university students learning English as a Foreign Language. Two intact classes took part in the research as experimental and control groups. These intact groups included a total of 42 preparatory school students of various majors in a state university in Turkey. In order to ensure that all the participants had the same level of listening proficiency at the beginning of the study, a standardized listening proficiency test – a sample First Certificate in English test designed by Cambridge University Press – was employed to the subjects. The findings of independent samples t-test on subjects’ scores on this test demonstrated that all the subjects in both experimental group and control group had the same level of listening proficiency. First 24-min segment of the film ‘Matchstick Men’ was administered as the viewing material. Experimental group participants (n=22) watched the movie segment with captions, whereas the subjects in control group (n=20) watched the same segment without captions. The English language dependent measure consisted of a 16-item content-specific multiple-choice listening comprehension test. The results of independent samples t-test procedures revealed that the students in the experimental group outperformed their peers in the control group. As a result, it was concluded that captions proved to have a highly positive impact on pre-intermediate level EFL students’ listening comprehension of a movie segment. Additionally, subjects’ perceptions of captioned film as an instructional material were investigated by administering a questionnaire. According to the outcomes of qualitative data, it has become obvious that subjects found captioned movies as a beneficial and entertaining instructional material for learning a language. All in all, these findings demonstrated that captioned films present an invaluable experience to pre-intermediate level EFL students with respect to listening comprehension.

Key words: authentic materials, movies, captioning, listening comprehension, EFL learners