The Effect of Short Stories on Teaching Vocabulary to Very Young Learners (Aged 3-4-Year): A Suggested Common Syllabus

Abstract

In recent decades, teaching and learning English has gained importance not only for adults but also even for very young children. Therefore, games, songs, art-craft activities and short stories have proved to be practical instruments for very young learners; especially, short stories are great tools to teach vocabulary as words are best acquired in a meaningful context. This study, hence, focuses on exploring whether very young learners can learn English effectively through a short story-based syllabus or not. This study was carried out in a preschool in Ankara, Turkey and the participants of the study were 28 preschoolers aged 3-4. The children were chosen randomly and they were classified into two groups as the experimental and the control groups. The units designed on and around short stories were used just in the experimental group; in those units, songs, cartoons, realia were also used to enhance the learning process; but the main focus was kept on short stories and story-based activities. The same vocabulary items were also used in the control group and it was aimed to teach those vocabulary items in both groups in 7 weeks in this study. Pre and post tests were designed and used, and permanence observations were carried out after the study to determine the recall rate of the participants. At the end of the study, the results showed that children in the experimental group could remember more vocabulary items than the others since they learned them in a meaningful and enjoyable short story-based context.