『地域政策研究』（高崎経済大学地域政策学会） 第 13 巻

第２・３合併号

2010年11月

63頁〜 71頁＜研究ノート＞

Brain Function and Language Learning

Marie COSGROVE

Abstract
It is said that Japanese people use the creative (pictorial) side of the brain to study language.
When the author was learning Japanese the writing system kanji was easy to study because it
was like a picture.
However the listening exercises mainly used tape or CD without any picture such as in avideo, DVD and as a result took a lot of eﬀort to practice. At that time the author always would
have liked to see what was being listened to. Now in teaching English language, video is readily
available and can be easily accessed by students on the Internet. In previous action research by
the author using CD-ROM it was shown that students enjoyed studying listening with video andthat such study obviously improved students English language ability. (collaborated research)
This paper will show that increasing the amount of video and self study for students using
the connection between visual and auditory links in the brain is very eﬀective and enjoyable forstudents.

The emphasis is on “Do it Yourself” by watching video.

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Marie COSGROVE

Recently the Governor of California known well as a hero ofaction movies and not at all for his pedagogic prowess announced
that the State of California would stop using paper textbooks infavor of online resources in the school curriculum. Japan Times
2009 Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger says textbooks are
outdated and an unnecessary expense in the world recession.
Figure 1 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8090450.stm
In 2008, 2009-10 the author had a chance to teach 3 classes
using online resources and no textbook. The course consisted ofFigure 1

42 videos following a story of two families from two countries.

This course has online study guides and quizzes that students can access freely. As in previously
published papers, http://ltsig.org.uk/newsletter-archive/38-1999-2003/99-summer-2003.html,
like CD-ROMs, the students can study at their own pace and in their own homes or use theuniversity computers. http://jaltcall.org/cjo/10̲2.pdf “In truth,the most eﬀective learning will
occur during the process of carrying out the research for oneself ” Wray, 2009
The requirement is online Internet access which most students have. This is a prerequisite
to ultimate enjoyment of the course as shown in the graphs made from the questionnaires given
to the students at the end of the course in 2009. The majority of students enjoyed the study.
The minority did not have Internet access at home and as a consequence the enjoyment
decreased. But the beneﬁts were obvious to even these students. Class size also played a factor
in the enjoyment as the smaller the class the larger the enjoyment. Perhaps access to the teacher
increases in smaller classes.

Data Collection
There were 12 and 13 questions on the questionnaire. The ﬁrst four relate to the actual
content of the course
Circle the answer of your choice
１．Which do you prefer?
Pocket book with Internet video study
OR
Textbook with CD
２．Did you enjoy the Internet video study?
Yes

No− 64 −Brain Function and Language Learning

３．Have you ﬁnished watching all 42 videos in the story?
Yes

No

４．Have you ﬁnished all the prints in your clear pocket folder?
Yes

No

In the class with the smaller number of students (Figure 2) the preference for theInternet video study and no textbook is obvious and the number of students who enjoyed
the story very much the majority. As this was a vast amount of homework and a lot ofwriting it is surprising to have so many positive answers.
What is even more surprising is that the students ask for more study questions Andkeeping up with the demand for study prints keeps the author quite busy.
Even a writing class would not do as much writing as these students did in a year for
homework. Watching the videos and answering the comprehension questions must take a
lot of their time but they obviously enjoyed it.

Figure 2

The larger class showed more negative answers but still the majority enjoyed thismarathon study. Some students had to share computers with family and could not haveenough access to satisfy their needs. Others were not used to doing so much homework.
(peer requested homework maybe not their choice)
５．Do you want to be a good speaker of English?
Yes

No− 65 −Marie COSGROVE

６．Do you think English will be useful for you in your future?
Yes

No

７．After watching the video story do you feel you would like to go to another country?
Yes

No

８．Do you have more conﬁdence in your English ability now?
Yes

No

Figure 3

Looking at Q3 in Figure 3 the vast majority ﬁnished the 42 videos in the story and halfﬁnished all the writing of answers to the homework.

Figure 4− 66 −

Brain Function and Language Learning

Another larger class with a similar result in preference for the Internet study andenjoyment. However more students ﬁnished all the 42 videos and slightly more ﬁnished all
the homework questions.
The vast majority of students want to be able to speak English and think English ability will
be useful for them in the future. Again the vast majority would like to go to travel abroad but
surprisingly in the largest classes more students lacked conﬁdence in their English ability than in
the smaller class. For conversation practice to be really eﬀective for students smaller class size
may be more desirable.
Many students think video is good to improve listening ability and about half think it is good
to learn vocabulary. Whether students can measure, by themselves, how much they have learned
is something to study further but it has been evident through testing that they certainly learnt alot of new vocabulary and lexical items through many hours of online home study.
９．Have you watched any other videos in English on the Internet such as
Passport

You Tube

YesNews videos

Sports videos

No

10．Do you think watching English videos is the best way to learn listening skills?
Yes

No

11．Do you think watching English videos is the best way to learn new vocabulary?
Yes

No

12．Have you enjoyed the conversations with a partner in this class?
Yes

No

13．Do you have Internet at home?
Yes

No

The enjoyment of communication with a partner is high in the smaller class and seems toshow that the smaller group is the ideal for conversation practice. Even so the vast majority
enjoyed pair work.
Question 13 was to determine if students had Internet access at home. It seems that many
did have Internet access.Although some students said they had to share a computer with otherfamily members so they could not use to their own satisfaction or to study as much as theywanted to.

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Marie COSGROVE

Studentʼs Comments
ビデオを見て学ぶと言う新しい勉強方法を知ることができて楽しく授業を受けることができた。
I could come to know a new way of studying using video so I could enjoy taking this class
他のビデオも見たい
I would like to watch other videos.
もっと多くコンピュータルームを使いたかったです。
I would have liked to use the computer room much more（）
宿題を増やす Please give us more homework
ビデオの話がとても面白くて、英語に興味を持てた
The video story is very interesting so I became more interested in English
Figure 5 6 Students using their own datacollected in answer to video comprehension
questions, requested by peers and supplied by
the author (teacher). The students use 40 clear
pocket folders containing the answers to thequestions on the prints supplied. The answers
written by the students are to be obtained bywatching and listening to the video story manytimes and at the students own pace. The total
Figure 5

doing ﬁll in the blank pop tests

concentration on the task is obvious. Nobody

noticed the photograph being taken they were so deep in concentration to ﬁll in the blanks in thestory test paper using their clear pocket folders..
The studentʼs evaluation of these clear pocket folders is seen in the Questionnaire Question
1 answers (ﬁgures 2,3and 4). The vast majority preferred them to a textbook. Because the pages
are clear it is easy for teachers to check the students are doing the work. It is also easy for themto review the work already ﬁnished or ﬁnd the spelling of names etc….
They take pride in the work they are doing and are not afraid to ask questions about
anything they do not understand. In previous work with CD-ROM the only requirement was acomputer but using Internet online study the students need to have Internet access. Recently− 68 −

Brain Function and Language Learning

most students do have Internet access at home
but those living alone may not. It is importantto regularly check the availability of Internetaccess. Of course universities provide Internet
access to students but there may not be
suﬃcient time spent in the university becauseof part time jobs, club activities, travel time
between university and home etc…
therefore it is necessary to verify studentʼsFigure 6 Students totally engrossed indoing pop tests

situations through results of Pop tests etc..
Listening tests are also given to check ifstudents are really listening to the video as much as necessary to improve their listening skills.
The pop test of one of the 42 videos requires students to watch and listen and answer about 10
listening comprehension questions. As reported by Shimo 2002 p15, Japanese students feelthey cannot get enough listening practice in Japan. Some of the students who studied the 42
videos reported their best score on the TOEIC test was in the listening section of the test.

Figure 7
Student engrossed inlistening practice at own
pace in own home

Figure 8Student using ipod for extra studyon the go− 69 −Marie COSGROVEDiscussion
When the author was studying education to become a teacher in the NSW Education
department in Australia she remembers being taught that students learn through their senses
and so it is best to utilize as many senses as possible in teaching methods. As a language student,
studying Japanese again the author felt a gap when listening to tapes and CDs and this was thelack of visual material. Learning by only listening to tapes and not being able to see was very
frustrating. If only one could see what was happening it would be much easier to listen to long
unfamiliar Japanese passages or stories.
Recently with the invention of robots mimicking brain function this means that a lot of study
is being done on how the brain works. According to .Wennekers 2010 study the visual andauditory paths in the brain are joined or linked together. This means that usually we recognize
sounds also by sight. “the laminar microcircuitry of the neocortex which is involved in higher
brain functions such as seeing and hearing.”
http://colamn.plymouth.ac.uk/colamn-project/
http://www.pion.ac.uk/~thomas/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10685138
Wennekers wants to model speciﬁc physiological features of the way that neurons in one part ofthe brain communicate. This seems very logical and a reason why we should encourage visual aswell as auditory learning for students of language. The author also has made a homepage forstudents to help them ﬁnd other ways to use the Internet to study English and it is also possible
to study other languages by Internet. http://home.att.ne.jp/gamma/mari-at-oz
Empowering students by giving them the video and making them responsible for their own
learning means they can study when they want at their own pace. “Empowering students,student autonomy, means studentʼs accepting responsibility for their own learning” Agota et al(1999)

Conclusion
From previously collaborated research using video in CD-ROM format it has been shownthat students enjoy video study and as a way to improve listening ability it obviously improves
their language ability as well as listening ability.
http://www.tcue.ac.jp/homel/c-gakkai/kikanshi/ronbun12-3/content12-3.htm− 70 −

Brain Function and Language Learninghttp://ltsig.org.uk/newsletter-archive/40-2009-2013/195-winter-2009.html
Therefore the author hopes, for the enjoyment and rapid language assimilation ,withincreased listening ability, of students, that video on the Internet will be utilized much more bylanguage teachers in Japan.
Using clear pocket folders makes it very easy for teachers to check their students work as
they walk around the classroom and for students to review the vast amount of data they havecollected during their enjoyable study. (ﬁgure9)

Figure 9

student's ﬁle-clear pockets are easy to see（マリーコズグローブ・高崎経済大学地域政策学部非常勤講師）

References
Agota Scharle, Szabo Anita (1999), “Learner Autonomy: A Guide to Developing Learner Responsibility” (Cambridge Handbooksfor Language Teachers
Cosgrove Marie E (2002) “CD-ROM Internet and Student Autonomy” JALT CALL Newsletter Vol 10/2
Cosgrove Marie E (2003) “Student autonomy, Internet and CD-ROM”, IATEFL CALL Journal
Cosgrove Marie E (2010) Intensifying Intrinsic Motivation Kogakuin University Research essays 48-1
Cosgrove Marie E (2009) Success and student autonomy TCUE Regional Policy
Shimo Etsuko (2002) “Learning Listening Comprehension Skills in English: The Analysis of Japanese Learnersʼ Beliefs and Its
Implications.” The Language Teacher JALT Vol 26 No 10 p15-18
Wray Allison (2009) A research Network Model in Fitzpatrick, T., & Barﬁeld, A. (Eds.).
Lexical processing in second language learners: Papers and perspective in honour of Paul Meara. Bristol, U.K.: MultilingualMatters.
Japan Times page 5 June 11th 2009

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