Use of Songs, Karaoke & Internet
In foreign language learning
Method to motivate language learners created by European partnerships within the projects
“Languages and Integration through Singing”
“French and Spanish language competence through songs”
"Find A Delightful Opportunity to learn Portuguese through
Internet and songs”
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

LIS project: Didactical aspect
The “musical” approach helps to make language learning more effective as it
 increases learners’ motivation and interest
 improves acquisition of language skills
 makes learning process more pleasant
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

,
LIS: Sociocultural aspect
 Cross cultural understanding
 Inclusions in the learning process the most diverse groups of students:
 age
 ethnic or national origin
 social status
 education level
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

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
Intuitive and conscious processes in acquisition of language skills
Use of both hemispheres of the human’s brain: emotion & language exist together in a song
 Real learning happens when there is a switch from the left to the right hemisphere of the brain
 3 components of the song guarantee that the language patterns are transferred to the long-term memory :
Language (lyrics) + Rhythm + Melody
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

Positive effects from using songs on learners’ linguistic and intercultural competences :
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 songs in the language classroom liven up listening activities; they enable teachers to teach grammar and vocabulary in an entertaining and relaxing way; the vocabulary of songs often extends beyond the everyday language;
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 it is a great way how to practice pronunciation and intonation; memorable melody imprints linguistic patterns, grammatical structures and vocabulary;
 through songs learners learn about the culture and people, which also inspires various interesting topics for discussion.
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

 Great diffusion of the Internet and Youtube , especially among youngsters;
 Linguistic education and digital competences are transversal
(they are two of the 8 key competences !) and besides interact among them in the curriculum;
 Schools in Europe must always make forehead to an ever growing number of immigrants . This new situation asks for new didactic and methodological answers and at the same time as also the use of new proper technologies for the target groups
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

It is therefore particularly useful to furnish to the teachers and all those people that wish to learn a foreign language by themselves tools for a rapid creation of communicative skills founded on the
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

Starting from these considerations ..
FENICE + 8 institutions (6 countries in total) submitted 3 projects of European partnership aimed to spread a method for teaching/learning a foreign language based on the use of videos, karaoke and songs.
Result: www.languagesbysongs.eu
a website containing teaching materials that can be used by teachers of IT/RO/RU/FR/ES/PT interested in using songs in their classroom, by their pupils who wish to practise at home and, finally, by autonomous learners.
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

What song to choose?

It is important to keep in mind three factors:
Learners’ profile : age, interests, level of language competence;
 Suitable language material : lyrics should be clear
/acquaintance with idiomatic & colloquial expressions is useful and fun, but they should not impede understanding of the songs/;
 Cultural context : through song, we can learn a lot about the country, culture, history, behavior patterns of people of the particular country or historical period.
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

Teaching/Learning Unit in the concept of the LIS approach
The TLU implies three phases focussed around the song:
 1 phase: approaching which comes before the real work upon the text;
 2 phase: analysis aiming at understanding of how the text works and to train morphological and syntactic rules;
 3 phase: synthesis - going back to the text to check its assimilation and to extend it to aspects of culture and civilization
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

1 Phase Approaching to the text
 Pre-listening activities are related to
 building motivation;
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 cultural learning: introducing one or more texts about the song, its topic and/or about the singer, showing pictures of the singer and other images especially if the captions refer to the lyrics; approaching the text, making its meaning clearer, eliciting the text: keywords, synonyms, antonyms, idioms, words with an evocative effect, Wh questions to favour guessing/elicitation.
 First listening without any particular task
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

2 Phase Analysis
 Initial practicing : during the second listening the learners may be asked to write adjectives, nouns, verbs expressing the thought and emotions caused by the lyrics, find particular words, mark a situation suggested by the lyrics, etc
 Manipulating the text : the text of the song is integrated in various learning activities, such as reading and listened to in order to reinforce sounds and intonation; cloze tests, scrambled sentences, changing from present to past, swapping from the male to the female words, spotting the mistake, etc.
 Establishing conscious links : exercises to favour reflection on grammar
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

After-listening activities aim at
 Use of the vocabulary and/or grammar taught in the song for further practice (e.g. through games, quizzes, crosswords)
 In-depth comprehension: new listening to the lyrics, i.e. going back to text and its perception at a new level of comprehension
 Socio-cultural and intercultural observations: raising awareness of a different culture through discussion, suitable phrases, drawings, images, other texts on the same topic, etc.)
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

Six identically structured parts in Italian, French
Spanish, Romanian, Russian and Portuguese
 Information about the project
 Teaching and learning resources
 Project results
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

 Teacher’s Guidance : theoretical fundamentals of the approach, lesson structure, practical hints on how to create own teaching material
 Didactic handouts present TLU examples elaborated upon a number of songs
 Key to exercises are addressed to learners and allow the use of handouts for self-study
 Lyrics : texts of the songs used in the handouts
 Video and karaoke for songs used in the handouts means support language learning via Internet
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

 Prerequisite : To use the materials at their best students should be at least at the A1 level of the
Common European Frame of Reference
 Testing : The learning materials for Italian, Romanian and Russian have been tested overall by 45 teachers and trainers belonging to 9 countries (IT, LT, MD, RO,
BG, SK, FR, USA) on 1018 students of various ages, a number significant enough to give acceptable results.
15% of students were between 6-14, 20% 15-18 and
15% of students were older than 25.
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

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Project results
Looking ahead: community of language teachers using songs in their teaching practice
Diffusion: In three years, on the basis of ShinyStat statistics, the website has been visited 20000 times by people from 75 countries .
This is the visits’ list of the first nine countries:
Country
Italy
Romania
Slovakia
Bulgaria
Spain
USA
France
Argentina
UK
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership
Visits n °
5026
4547
2362
1401
789
277
149
142
128

EUROINFORM Ltd – Bulgaria (Sofia)
University of Porto Faculty of Arts – Portugal
Fundatia EuroEd – Romania (Iasi)
University of Bucharest – Romania
E-KU Institute of language and Intercultural
Communication - Slovakia (Nitra)
Official Language School - Spain (Malaga)
IES “Ribeira do Louro” - Spain (Porriño)
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership

Thank you for the attention!
Giampiero de Cristofaro
E - mail: fenice.eu@libero.it www.fenice-eu.org
With the support of the Lifelong
Learning Programme of the EU,
Grundtvig Learning Partnership