Teach English in Ersheng Zhen - Chongqing

songs in the classroomSongs have supplied many teachers of English with help in their classrooms. Songs are a valuable tool in any teachers' arsenal. Not only do songs help a student learn words in English, they can set the mood of an activity, as well as having a calming effect on the students? mood. The use of them has and will always be something that is easily accomplished inside of any classroom. There has been research conducted that reports on people scoring better on standard IQ test after listening to Mozart. This is greatly known as the Mozart Effect and though it's been proven/unproven by countless follow up testing, as teachers of English as a foreign language, there's no denying that music works in the classrooms. Teachers can use song for a variety of reasons. It can and does stimulate discussions, encourage creativity, and can be a topic lesson of teaching the words of a song. At Christmas time, in countless non english speaking countries, you can hear both children and adults singing 'We wish you a Merry Christmas' in English. When I hear it sung here in italy, I can see the pride on the singer's face. Seeing this brings home the advantages of using songs in the classroom. The pride of the person who has learned to sing it, as well as the pride of the parents and friends as they watch, is what gives a teacher satisfaction. Kevin Schoepp of Sabanci University, Istanbul, turkey, states in his article 'Reason for Using Songs in the ESL/EFL Classroom' that songs present opportunities for developing 'automaticity' which is the main cognitive reason for using songs in the classroom. He cites Gatbonton and Seglowitz (1988) definition of automaticity as "a component of language fluency which involves both knowing what to say and producing languages rapidly without pauses". Songs do this by definition. They put you in a position once you learn the words to be able to sing them fluency and without the stated pause. When I learn an Italian song, it doesn't matter that I don't understand it word for word. I am able to sing it fluency and correctly. So why wouldn't every teacher use music as a teaching tool? Perhaps because they don't understand or truly believe in the benefit of music. Maybe they think their students are too old to have music involved in their lesson plans. Possibly they don't have the equipment or power to play music on. It doesn't matter why the teacher doesn't use music. In my opinion, all teachers should incorporate music in their teaching. Even if it's having music playing softly in the background during the time students are arriving to class. Everyone loves music and just for its welcoming factor, it should be used. Some good exercises of music would be playing a part of a song and having the students make up the next part of the lyrics. Worksheets can involve fill in the blanks, word and title word searches, and crossword puzzles with the lyrics. A great activate phase activity would be having the students in groups come up with a song of their own. Also one where they draw a film strip that acts out a part of a song. They don't have to be artsy, stick figures are happily accepted, just have to have fun and associate their drawings to the words of the song. There are so many other activities open that are available to a creative teacher. The teacher just has to want to use songs and be open to the power that songs can give him in his class.