TEACHING VOCABULARY THROUGH MUSIC

By
Anuar Wahidi Bin Ahmad

ABSTRACT

Songs play an important role in the development of young children learning a second
language. A testament to this is the frequency with which songs are used in English Language
Teaching classrooms all over the world. This research begins by looking at why songs can be
considered valuable pedagogical tools. The technique used in this research are listening,
jumbled-up lyric sentences and gap filling. In particular, this research will discuss how songs
can be useful in the teaching of vocabulary. There are four participants that took part
voluntarily in this research. Two of them are boys and another two are girls from Year 3
students of Sekolah Kebangsaan Kubor Panjang. The results of the study revealed an increase
in students achievement levels, attitudes toward class and retention of new vocabulary words
of the students who were taught using songs. The one month follow-up also indicated that
music enabled children to retain new vocabulary for a longer period of time than those who
were not taught using songs. Hopefully the output of the study will be useful in developing
English teaching especially in vocabulary.