Effects of music on English language learning outcomes in high school

¶ … Music on Vocabulary Competence, Writing, Reading Comprehension and Motivation in English Language Learning in High-School

EFFECTIVENESS OF MUSIC ON VOCABULARY

The Effectiveness of Music on Vocabulary Competence, Writing, Reading Comprehension and Motivation in English Language Learning in High-School

Most English language learners in high schools show poor vocabulary competence. The main reason for this is the limited level of exposure to the language. It is generally understood and practically acknowledged that words form the basic unit of language structure. Therefore lack of sufficient vocabulary constrains students from effectively communicating and freely expressing their ideas.

Vocabulary competence is critical to developing reading comprehension skills. Lack of vocabulary development is detrimental to the development of metacognitive skill that is important in comprehending advanced texts. Comprehension is a major component of development of vocabulary, reading to learn. Therefore, reading comprehension it is quite challenging for students lacking adequate knowledge of meaning of words.

In addition, inadequate vocabulary is an impediment for students in the process of learning. Students who lack exposure to new words are unlikely to acquire the necessary skills in achieving fluency and this is most likely to lead to poor academic performance. There has been a clear establishment of the fact that academic achievement is dependent on growth in vocabulary acquisition (Beck, McKeown, & Kucan, 2002). Furthermore if students lack knowledge of vocabulary expansion, they are most likely to lose interest in learning. Therefore emphasis is laid on learning vocabulary, a job many students consider tedious. Many English language learners find themselves uninterested in learning the language because they find it a dry and challenging to learn. Consequentially, many students, despite the fact that they attend the lessons, develop a dislike in learning the language thereby losing interest in either learning or speaking it properly.

Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of using music on vocabulary competence, writing, reading comprehension and motivation in English Language Learning in High school students as a part of the learning process in the classroom. Many teachers of English as a second language as well as the learners consider vocabulary as a critical factor in learning the language. Therefore it is important to develop creative and interesting ways of teaching vocabulary in English class.

Thesis Statement

Incorporating music in English as second language class is effective in enhancing vocabulary competence, writing, reading comprehension and motivation in learning English as opposed to the traditional teacher fronted instructional methods.

Research Questions

1. Is there a significant difference in vocabulary competence between mean scores before and after the test for those embracing music as an English language teaching method?

1. Is there a significant difference in writing between mean scores before and after the test for those embracing music as an English language teaching method?

1. Is there a significant difference in reading English between mean scores before and after the test for those embracing music as an English language teaching method?

1. Is there a significant effect of using music to enhance motivation in learning English in high school students?

Setting of the Study

This study will be conducted within the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD). Educating more than 50,000 students early, SFUSD is the eighth largest school district in the State of California a state with the largest English language learners in the country (Batalova & McHugh, 2010). It will target specifically high school English language learners' in the bay area. To satisfy the objective of the study, these students will be selected from Lowell High School and Balboa High School and those chosen will be organized into groups of experimental and control.

Historical Background

The State of California has historically attracted immigrants since the gold rush era. Since then, the state has witnessed an influx of immigrants from different parts of the world. There are more than one million children in the state lacking English proficiency who attend schools in the state constituting a quarter of the total school population. Moreover, California's population is 12% of the United States of America; the schools contain over 40% of the number of speakers of English as a second language (Macias, 2000). This is a representation of the cases in each of the Counties and Cities in the State including San Francisco.

The Lau v. Nichols, 414 U.S. 563 (1974) was a turning point in the education for the English language learners in San Francisco. There were ramifications for the schools found to be non-compliant with the Supreme Court's ruling for equal educational access to ELL students. Under the Lau Remedies, schools were required to submit specific voluntary compliance plans to the Office for Civil Rights. Most of these plans incorporated bilingual instructional methods, which was adopted in many public schools and later dropped due to the diverse and large influx of immigrant in the eighties (Hakuta, Yuko, & Witt, 2000).

Since the Lau, the San Francisco school system still struggles with proper implementation of programs for English language learners. Despite SFUSD adapting various programs in a bid to advance education of ELL, vocabulary learning has been a neglected area in teaching the English language. Learning vocabulary is a complicated issue that needs to be adequately addressed in all English classrooms and specifically English language learners' class. Therefore more studies are needed in this area.

It is critical for second English language learners to acquire a large word bank as a long-term goal (Nation, 2001). Teaching vocabulary needs to be an integral part in the SFUSD English language learners Curriculum. It is therefore critical to further explore the challenges faced by ELL students and provide innovative ways of improving the teaching as well as learning vocabulary. A good starting point would be to explore effective strategies that can be adopted in instruction other than multilingual techniques. As a result, this study is conducted to examine the effectiveness of using music to enhance the English language learning among high school students in the SFUSD.

Importance of the Study

The application of conventional method in teaching English language has proved to be ineffective in language acquisition. Students find this dull and boring, thereby affecting their learning spirit. It is important for the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) to incorporate new and interesting ways of instruction in order to meet the demands of the challenging world. This will assist students of varying ability by enabling them master language structure and vocabulary.

This study will be a significant endeavor in promoting new creative ways of instruction in English language classes and motivation for both teachers and learners. The study will specifically be beneficial to the learners and instructors of English as a second language when applying effective learning in their classroom setting particularly in different concepts related to the use authentic instructional tools. By understanding the learner's needs as well as the benefits of quality education, the instructors will be assured of a competitive advantage over their first language learners.

Scope of the Study

The overarching aim of the research is to examine effect of music in enhancing vocabulary competence, writing, reading comprehension and motivation as opposed to the traditional teacher fronted instructional methods. The study will be limited to the SFUSD high school students. It seeks to investigate four issues and examine their correlation with the use of music as an instructional tool in high school English class. There are different instruments used to investigate the issues and to capture data about the scope and relative effectiveness of music in an English class.

Definition of Terms

Plus Level: To describe the result above average score in English proficiency degree.

Base Level: To describe the result of average score in English proficiency degree.

Minus Level: To describe the result below average score in English proficiency degree.

Lau Remedies: A set of guidelines given in 1975 that transformed schools' legal functions into pedagogical directives.

Phonetic Qualities: The sounds of human speech qualities in linguistic. In phonetics, the speech sounds produced by the vocal cords.

Syntactic Qualities: Conforming to the quality of syntax. In linguistics, the study of the rules that govern the ways in which words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences. Syntax is one of the major components of grammar. Syntactic is the arrangement of words in a sentence.

Semantic Qualities: Regarding quality of signifiers. Semantic is the study of meaning, and the study of linguistic development by classifying and examining changes in meaning and form.

CHPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

Introduction

This chapter includes the content of English Language learners, Using Music to Help English Language Learners, Words and Music, Theoretical View, Effect of music on the Mind, Music and Language Development.

Using Music to Help English Language Learners

One of the ways through which the English language has spread around the world is music. Many non-native English speakers, especially those who did not learn the language in class were first exposed to it through Popular Music (Xmarabout, 2010). Music has been found to have a positive influence in the atmosphere of language classes; students usually find lessons with music enjoyable making them more effective than the traditional teacher centered method.

According to Medina (1993) use of music is a sure way of teaching and has been proven to foster language acquisition and production. Music assists English language learners thereby making them more successful in acquisition (Jalongo & Bromley, 1984). They assert in the article Developing Linguistic Competence through Song that it is ideal in introduction of new words, cultural aspects as well as accents. This makes it a useful instructional tool in an English class room. Music contains language that is natural, easy to acquire and enjoyable, it can, therefore, be selected to suit particular needs and interest of learners, such as relating the lyrics to everyday real life situation.

Music has the ability to offer enjoyable communication including listening and vocabulary practice. In the same line, Campbell, Campbell, and Dickinson (1996) states that singing along help learners remember vital information as well as making learning lively, music provides positive influence in classroom setting.

According to Orlova (2003), there has been an active consideration of inclusion of music in the methodology of teaching English as a second lanuage. In her article, Helping Prospective EFL Teachers Learn How to Use Songs in Conversation Classroom, She reveals that in the past decade, she has used songs in teaching English and that the use of songs in language classroom increases students attention as well as their desire to learn. She agrees that music offers a multifaceted approach to language and can applied to reinforce and improve spoken word as well as listening comprehension, vocabulary and phrasing. In his article Music in the ESL Classroom, Beare (2010) is supportive of the same notion. He reports that the use of music at the beginning of a class introduces new words to the students steering them to think in the desired direction. This gives them an outline of the lesson. Lo and Li (1998) also suggest that this technique is a break from the normal routine. They assert that learning English through songs introduces ease in the classroom favourable in enhancing the four skills.

There are different ways in which music is used in language teaching. Instructors worldwide report high levels of success in the incorporation of music in the English as a Second Language (ESL) class. According to Huy Le (2007), there is a great value attached to the use of music by both students and teachers of ESL. Domoney and Harris (1993) also reiterate the importance of incoporating music in the English class adding that music improves their teaching and brings life to their classrooms. It is also critical to examine the outcomes of empirical research about the effectiveness of music in ESL classrooms. Brand (2007), in his study Music, Asia, and English: Use of Pop-Songs in ESL Instruction concludes that there is overwhelming support for the use of music in instruction spoken English. He further elaborates on the use of music lyrics to sensitise the Chinees ESL on the benefits of intercultural comminication. He continues that the main objective of learning English is not just to speak it, but to interact with other people, especially from different cultural settings.

Words and Music

There are factors that are directly related to the aspect of enjoyment in learning language through music. It introduces many options for the learners in gaining knowledge. According to Smith (2002), the theory of multiple intelligence, which proposes that people have different intelligence working in unison but in varying strength in different people, is applicable. He further claims that these intelligence manifested in words and numbers are dominant in traditional instructional and learning process. However, music intelligence seem to have been neglected and instructors need to device options of engaging all these intelligence in a bid to increase success in learners. He recommends the use of music and asserts that music can be either be composed or used in relation to the subject in class. The lyrics used introduce new words thereby reinforcing word intelligence, and this triggers involvement of more than one intelligence at a time.

In addition, Aksnes (1996) claims that the introduction of different stimuli in language class such as music is a critical strategy and improves competence, performance as well as perception skills. In the same line, Coromina (2010) supports the fact that music can introduce interesting class discussions, when learners find the music enjoyable, they certainly will want to learn the lyrics to it. Maess, Koelsch, Gunter, and Friederici (2001) reveal that music and language are both processed in one area of the brain, they are both processed the same way. Pryse-Phillips (2003) introduces a set of research results pointing at the fact that listening to Mozart's music enhances short-term working of certain mental functions.

According to Griffee (1990), it is recommended that slow music be used in beginner classess including activities such as putting together a song word puzzle, representing a song as a drawing or even identifing related pictures. In support, Murphey (1992) in his study, The Discourse of Pop Songs, reiterates that music ideal for practicing grammar and syntax, vocabulary, pronunciation, as well as the skills of listening, reading, speaking, writing and translation. He assert that instructors of English language worldwide apply this technique as a teaching method. He adds that music stays in both the short and the longterm memory enabling one to remember quite long pieace of language. Further, music can be used as effectively as any other text. To acquire a language, learner needs to discover phonetic distinctions and their uses. Music as a learning material helps this by introduction of sounds, stress and rhythmic patterns. In addition, it positively affects accent, memory, grammar, vocabulary as well as conversational exchanges (Davanellos & Akis, 1999). Instructors should therefore be confident in application of music in language acquisition process considering the many associated benefits.

Effect of Music on the Mind

Stansell (2005 ) concludes that there is exists a correlation between music and language, which is a challenge without a discrete intelligence. According to Gardner, there are eight distinct domains of intelligence; verbal-linguistic, mathematical-logical, visual-spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical-rhythmic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic (Gardner, 1998). Though linguistic and musical intelligences work as a unit giving a stronger outcome. In addition, he asserts that language intonation is reliant on music perception among most individuals.

Carroll (1993), in the book, Human Cognitive Abilities: A Survey of Factor-Analytic Studies formulates a close connection between music and mind. In this book, fluid intelligence, crystallized intelligence, general memory and learning, broad visual perception, broad auditory perception, broad retrieval ability, broad cognitive speediness, and finally processing speed are determinants of one's musical prowess.

Examining Zatorre's Music, the Brain, and Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination, it portrays the human brain as a network comprising of the left posterial and parietal whose major function is to process phonology among most musicians (Zatorre, 2000). In addition, the right side of the brain is responsible for pitch discrimination. This originates from the right prefrontal cortex, right superior temporal gyrus, and the right frontal lobe (Zatorre, 2000). In line with this, musicians are having increased aptitude in foreign language learning due to an advanced ability in perception, processing, and reproducing learnt accents. Furthermore, the brain is responsible for scanning and filtering out background noise resulting in visual images among musicians.

Richards asserts in, Music and Rhythm in the Classroom that music, rhythm, and movement all are vital since they form a link between the right brain's processing of music and rhythm and the left brain's processing of verbal information (Richards, 1993). In this article, she reveals that emotional response to music, occurring in the paralimbic and neocortical regions, is delinked from both the view of the music, and from other types of emotional reactions. Thus, processing of music extends to both sides of the brain as opposed to claimed divisions between these two regions.

Palmer and Kelly in their study Linguistic Prosody and Musical Meter in song reveal that most musical works are devoid of natural stress and duration elements, always characterized by amplification of vocals by musicians (Palmer & Kelly, 1992). Thus, for music to be made correctly, the phrase structure and musical structure must coincide, which does not happen in most cases. Besides, the 4-beat of songs should coincide with linguistic altercations to ensure compatibility of music and language. This is vital as it helps increase memory of words and phrases whenever they are sung by musicians. In their publication, Palmer and Kelly agree that learners always comprehend word stresses and memory when songs played match in stress and accent (Palmer & Kelly, 1992). The authors further stress the fact that, words paired and rhymed correctly hold songs together thus, improving the mind's ability to recall the song.

Steinke, Cuddy, and Holden in their work Dissociation of Musical Tonality and Pitch Memory from Nonmusical Cognitive Abilities points out at the fact that musical intelligence is independent on the language but at a different level (Steinke, Cuddy, & Holden, 1997). They further note that it is the compatibility of music and language that makes it possible for them to cooperate. In addition, perception of tonal structure and pitch memory are unrelated to performance on tests of nonmusical cognitive skills. In the contrast, these researchers ascertain that listening to music listening and performance engage elementary sensory motor encoding and symbolic representations among the musician and listeners.

Rauscher, Shaw, and Katherine ascertain that music is a way that can be used to increase the work of the brain (Rauscher, Shaw, & Ky, 1995). In their study, Listening to Mozart Enhances Spatial- Temporal Reasoning they outline that classical music can potentially improve test scores among students listening to it. This research confirms that music distortions during a listening spree via methods such as electronic-gating is capable of opening new pathways in the brain, thus providing a wider perception of incoming information, creating desire to communicate with and learn from others.

In The Mozart Effect for Parents: Unlocking the Potential of Your Child, Campbell explains the positive effects of listening to music in regard to students' academic improvement as well as its impact on the social connection. Music assists learners develop a rare intellectual potential of learning different languages, getting along with others and spiritual potential of hearing and trusting the inner voice as well (Campbell, 2003).

Stansell (2005), cautions that music should not be overemphasized among children to the point that it makes them lose focus on academic studies. According to the study conducted from Campbell, teachers should also focus on music as a teaching method in the classroom as opposed to mainly focusing on books. It is important to have a structured inclusion of music in language class to facilitate targeted results of language acquisition. In this context, learners are able to enhance their vocabulary acquisition (Stansell, 2005 ).

Music and Language Development

Jourdain concludes that music and language are correlated in his book Music, the Brain, and Ecstasy (Jourdain, 1997). The book states that despite the fact that the mind is capable of communicating via several symbols and gestures, music and language operate in greater detail within the mind (Jourdain, 1997). According to his publication, he stresses that language is a representative of the outside world in a symbolic way while music recaptures experiences within the body. Music does this by mimicking experiences of interior feeling in a world of turbulent flow (Jourdain, 1997). He further notes that music and language are dependent on each other in learning human expressions. Thus, the interconnectedness of musical and linguistic factors ensures music understand vocabulary and phrases; tasks governed by linguistic intelligence. This is seen in multilingual musicians having high musical abilities while those with single and thick accents sing in standard dialects.

Loewy in her article, Integrating Music, Language, and the Voice in Music Therapy, mentions that music is volatile and fragile in language classrooms, factor therapists must be made aware of. Currently, most language acquisitions have majorly focused on problem solving and social interaction, among students while ignoring singing and dance; which are also equally important (Loewy, 2004).

Fawn Whittaker supports the use of music in educational settings (Whittaker, 1981). She alludes that the use of music in classroom settings assists students in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. By presenting students with songs, their perceptions are refreshed helping them focus on the rhythm and learn the lyrics. This has been found to be effective as it results in out-of-class associations that are vital during language learning among students. Using music reduces schoolwork monotony among students by giving them the opportunity to learn patterns via memorizing song lyrics without even noticing it (Whittaker, 1981). This method has been found to be effective in reinforcing complicated grammar concepts for mature language learners in a bid to grasp the language.

In their article, Opus 2: Learning Language through Music, Macarthur and Trojer focuses on reciting text in tune with a rhythm, extracting words from lyrics to practice them mentally, and even making the text's tune into a corresponding movement that the students are able to perform. The use of these techniques in learning, strengthen musical methods for English language learners. This is likely to increase students' motivation while reducing inhibitions of performing and speaking.

Leung applauds music and language though among the deaf, autistic, and other disabled persons. She discusses the effects of teaching and training children regarding pitch, tone, accent, and contours of language. These factors according to her help in facilitating perception of receptive language and production of expressive language among them (Leung, 1985). Thus, music language and spoken language become very critical in aiding speech therapy among children. In addition, musical teaching methods focus on having fun with the language by utilizing social interaction among the students and peer discussion as well. Therefore, by integrating music into a more naturalistic way of learning language, students develop several cognitive abilities. In line with this, it is clearly seen that incorporating music in classroom studies assist learners with vocabulary acquisition as well as mastery of language-relevant information (Gfeller, 1986).

Most instructors propose that using tunes, rhyme, and categories to organize study material clarifies most tasks making them appear simple. Therefore, many agree that music enables language to stay in the memory, but, music in the classroom is still a sideline issue in most academic settings. The use of linguistic sources of that are not school based, is less daunting and well organized, than classroom reading filled with music, songs, and art are beneficial for most learners (Medina S.L., 1990). In addition, students acquire language by understanding languages relayed via songs from different language settings. This ensures that the students take several aspects of the learnt languages in the languages. Thus, their language proficiency increases the more they become exposed to songs from different languages helping them have successful communication skills (Krashen, New York).

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

Introduction

In the following section of this chapter, the study is explained research design, sampling, methodology, instruments, data collection plan, observations, journal entries, data analysis plan, and limitations of the study. The researcher collected data from an experimental and control group to explore the differences between mean scores before and after the test by embracing music as teaching method.

Research Design

The research will be implemented in eight phases each with specific tasks. The first phase involves literature review where the researcher reviews literature related to the scope of study. The second phase involves collection of the deductions from the literature review pertaining to the pending research. The third stage involves development of the study objective and the research questions. This also involves planning of the research methodology as well as the instruments the researcher intends to apply. In the fourth phase, the researcher selects suitable popular English music intended for use in the study. Here the music selection criteria involved music that has comprehensible lyrics, bearable tempos. The fifth phase involves inclusion and planning of activities associated with vocabulary acquisition based on the selected music. These activities include singing along, following up words, phrases in the music, cloze test creation of own lyrics, melody. The sixth phase involves the lessons which involved collection of qualitative data through constant observation, writing of journal entries by the students as well as vocabulary tests. The seventh phase involves data analysis using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences program. This includes an independent sample t-test and paired t-test to confirm the difference between the two groups. Qualitative data is analyzed based on the constant observations and the student's journal entries. Finally, the eighth phase involves a report ascertaining whether the research questions have been answered.

Sampling

In this study, a total of 60 students will be selected from two or more of the 104 public high schools in the San Francisco bay area as participants. To strengthen the sample group so as to avoid invalidity misrepresentation, the study will use two heterogeneous groups. Therefore the only difference being that one is experimental exposed to treatment of music and the other control exposed to traditional instruction methods. The two groups will consist of 30 students each. In order to facilitate qualitative data collection, 6 students are to be selected from each group making 12 the total selected from the sample. They are to represent three levels of English proficiency namely plus level, base level and minus level. The reason for this criterion is ensures that the instructors give adequate attention to all of them and not just the ones in the minus proficiency level. This will also ensure that the participants in the experimental group are given adequate attention when exposed to music.

Methodology

This study uses popular English music as the independent variable, which is the treatment given to the experimental group. The study uses competence in vocabulary that include reading and writing as the dependent variable and is the difference in the mean between the scores before and after the tests for the two groups. The study is a quasi-experiment that adopts both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. The study focuses primarily on the two groups, experimental group and a control group. Quantitative data is derived from the treatment performed on the experimental group. The effective application of popular English music in enhancing vocabulary acquisition among high school students is then explained by the empirical data collected. Data from the qualitative method then facilitates constant observation were student are tasked with writing of journal entries, throughout the period of study.

Instruments

This research will apply three types of instruments: test of vocabulary, constant observation and journal entries. The application of these measuring instruments will promote the use of various data collection methods as well as various sources of data for accuracy, validity, reliability and credibility of the collected data and information. The quantitative method facilitates the general picture of the issues while the qualitative method applied to the selected 12 provides detailed information of the research.

For the scores before the exposure to the treatment, a test of vocabulary was administered. This facilitates the pretest score. This test confirms the students' vocabulary competence level in the two groups. The other vocabulary test will be conducted after the sixth week of exposure to the treatment as a post test. This will determine the difference between the mean scores.

There will be a constant observation of the students' vocabulary acquisition and this will be guided by the study objectives and questions. These will be done weekly in both groups and each observation will take 60 minutes. Class activities will be recorded in the order of occurrence documenting students' class performance throughout.

The students will be asked to write journal entries about the lessons they received and their reaction on these lessons. These feedbacks will assist in the identification of any change that will have taken place after the implementation of music to enhance vocabulary acquisition.

Data Collection Plan

This study will be administered at the beginning of the school semester. First, the students will be given a vocabulary test to serve as a pretest. Two weeks after the administration of the pretest, the study will then go on for eight weeks. The experimental group will be exposed to treatment using music. The implementation of the instruction will include selection of materials related to the English syllabus. Control group on the other hand will not get any treatment process. The group will only be exposed to the traditional class instruction method for eight weeks. The group however will undergo instructions that are vocabulary based including knowing and guessing meanings of new words. The two groups will be observed by the researcher in the process, examining the instructions process, students' responses. At the end of the eight weeks of the study, a vocabulary test was administered to the students in the two groups to serve as a post test.

Observations

During the study period, the researcher will observe the two groups for 12 sessions. Both the experimental and the control groups will be observed using a checklist comprising of four parts. Primarily, the observation will be carried out to investigate the changes in the students' vocabulary competence as a result of the exposure to music as a teaching tool. It is expected that during the music sessions the experimental group will be divided into smaller groups. It is also expected that during the activity periods, the students will be enthusiastic as they enjoy listening to music. There are expected challenges as well because the students are to be subjected to unfamiliar activities such as guessing word meanings and others previously mentioned. The activities are expected to proceed without major issues and are expected to reveal positive changes in motivation as well as vocabulary competence. The students are expected to respond positively to the tasks at hand including provision of oral responses. On the other hand, the control group is expected to show slow improvements almost minimal. They are expected to take longer to enhance their vocabulary competence through the normal activities such as comprehension reading, grammar exercises aimed at improving their vocabulary. In addition, they are expected not to show increased motivation.

Journal Entries

There are a total of 12 students selected from the sample who are expected to write journal entries. Six of the entries expected from the experimental group and six from the control group. The journal contents are expected to cover their reaction towards the instruction methods they are exposed to. It is expected that the journal entries from students in the experimental group will reveal motivation and excitement towards their class. They are expected to show the ability to learn new words as well as their meanings through the music context. They are expected to enjoy listening to the music. The reputation of the music is expected to enable them capture the words thereby enhancing their competence of new words. On the other hand, the journals from the control group are expected to reveal less enthusiasm. Despite the fact that they are expected to learn some new words, they are expected to reveal monotony in their class.

Data Analysis Plan

The data collected will be divided into two and analyzed separately. Quantitative data will be analyzed using SPSS program. The data that will be collected from the pretest and the post test will be subjected to calculations as scores. These scores will be processed using the SPSS. The results of the two tests will be computed taking into consideration their differences focusing on each student. The researcher will use an independent sample test in comparing the mean score of both groups. In addition, the t-test will be used to check the change between the pretest and the post test scores and whether there will be a significant difference between the scores of the two groups.

The qualitative data analysis will be subjected to constant observations of instruction processes as well as the journal entries. The students in the two groups will be observed, evaluated and assessed in performance of vocabulary using a checklist consisting of parts of the dependent variables in the research. These observations are intended to give helpful data on the students' competence of vocabulary as a result of expose to music. There will be 12 journal entries from the students comprising of 6 from each of the groups. In them the students will be required to write their reaction to the instruction method presented to them and if they benefited from the method by improving on their vocabulary acquisition.

Limitations of the Study

The study does not extend for a longer period due to time limitations. This reduces the validity of the study because the researcher is unable to draw more valid results.

In addition, the inability to accurately transcribe the qualitative data through the constant observations is a limitation with which the researcher will have to struggle.

The third limitation is the cost implications which limited the validity of research as well.

Chapter IV: Results and Evaluation

The main purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of using music on vocabulary competence, writing, reading comprehension and motivation in English Language Learning in High school students as a part of the learning process in the classroom. Many teachers of English as a second language as well as the learners consider vocabulary as a critical factor in learning the language. Therefore it is important to develop creative and interesting ways of teaching vocabulary in English class. A qualitative study was appropriate for the research for the reason that the objective was exploratory (Creswell, 1998). The significance that was recognized to the singularities of teaching was examined with hermeneutic methods (Creswell, 2002).

In order to give a reply to the answer of the three research questions, mean scores and standard deviations were computed for each of the two groups on each of the three dependent measures at the ending of study. All three of the dependent measures are considered to be the evaluation of the sight-reading, the evaluation of the playing abilit, and the