The Impact Of Using YouTube In EFL Classroom On Enhancing EFL Students' Content Learning

Abstract

Information technology has opened up prospects for rich and innovative approaches to tackle educational issues and provide solutions to the increasing demands for learning resources. YouTube, a video-sharing website that allows users to upload, view, and share video clips, offers access to new and dynamic opportunities for effective and non-traditional patterns of teaching and learning. In Saudi Arabia, this technology has not been exploited much for educational purposes. The present study aims at experimenting the impact of integrating YouTube technology into English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction on enhancing EFL college students’ learning of the content of the course: “Observation in Schools 2”. This course is one of five courses taught in the program “Elementary School Teacher of English” which aims at developing certain observation skills for effective teaching in elementary school. Such skills could include using particular frames or lenses to gain insight about the classroom and teaching and learning, and developing methods of observing and recording. For the purpose of the study, a quasi experimental design was adopted. Based on such design, two groups of second year college students at the Department of Curriculum and Instruction in the Faculty of Education at Princess Noura University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, were randomly assigned to the experimental and the control groups of the study. There were forty- five students in the control group and fifty-one in the experimental group. A pre-posttest covering the theoretical background of the course "Observation in School 2" was developed to be administered to all subjects of the sample before and after the experiment.  Subjects of the experimental group were instructed the theoretical background of the course through the use of YouTube videos about observing the classroom, combined with discussion and power point presentation. Students of the control group were taught the same content through the usual lecture-based method. Instruction was provided to both groups by the researcher and took place throughout the second term of the academic year in 2011 for a period of 6 weeks, 2 hours per week. Statistical procedures were applied on the data obtained using a t-test, and major findings yielded results favourable to the use of the YouTube technology. The study shows positive gains for the experimental group students’ outcomes as a result of the integration of video technology in instruction. Thus, it was recommended that YouTube should be considered as an effective instructional tool for enhancing content learning of EFL college students and as an important teaching resource in classrooms.