The mass media in the Education

The Use of Mass Media in Classes of English as a Second Language

Learning a second language has become an important aspect in our society. The fact of knowing a second language is a very important tool nowadays because it is considered a useful tool that allows the opening of better opportunities in all the field of life.

It is important to train and improve the four basic skills needed to be able to master a second language. These four skills are important when learning a new language but, depending on the context and the need of each apprentice, these skills can be trained different.

That is the case of the oral communication skill; which probably might be the first of the abilities that people develop not only when learning a second language but also when they are learning their native language. It is well known that the most important aspect in a toddler is the acquisition of his mother tongue without giving importance to the formal structures of the language. However, there is great emphasis on the importance of the sounds and meaningful words found in the near context of the toddler; for example: mum, dad, toy, more, etc, that have meaning according to the baby’s context.

That is the same case of a learner of a second language (L2). The important aspect is to involve the student in the context of that second language, and for this to happen, it will be necessary to immerse the student in a whole world full of ideas and meanings through the typical words and the sounds of the second language. To do this, the educational system has designed a lot of different tools to acquaint the student with the different aspects of a second language. One, and perhaps the most important tool, is the use of mass media in the classroom; which has been changing due to its rapid evolution and constant adjustments to people’s needs.

All of this allows us to think and create resources and methods using the new technologies and tools; in order to create new spaces and contexts for the students to acquire and develop their skills better. As oral skills are the most important aspect of learning a second language; the main goal is to make the students more willing to speak by using tools such as the television, music, the news, the Internet in order to generate topics of discussion and analysis.

Therefore, it is necessary to do a deep analysis of how the use of the mass media permits a pertinent learning environment in order to generate participation and how the development of a series of activities permits and promotes the use of spoken English.

Moreover, it is important to understand the impact of the contents of the mass media on students and how this generates in them the necessity of producing and building up their own speech and opinions. This is useful because it drives them to participate and create a debate and forces them in a certain way to use and ask for the vocabulary needed in order to express them self accurately.

The use of mass media in the second language learning process has become a very important part of education. Using a series of technological tools allows the teacher to recreate a more natural environment for the students to generate and produce what is expected of them in terms of coherence and pertinence and it allows the students to gain experience about the use of the language in a context different from the classroom.

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