Using YouTube in the EFL Classroom1

This paper addresses various ways teachers can use the video website YouTube.com (or other online streaming video websites) to teach English and stimulate learner autonomy. If students and teachers have access to the Internet, YouTube can be a valuable tool through which multiple foreign language skills can be taught. Using YouTube both inside and outside the classroom can enhance conversation, listening, and pronunciation skills. YouTube videos can also be utilized as realia to stimulate cultural lessons, enhance exposure to World Englishes, and promote authentic vocabulary development. Even reading and writing activities can be structured around YouTube videos. In-class lessons and activities will be detailed, as will homework and projects requiring the use of online streaming videos. For EFL teachers, it is often a struggle to utilize potentially useful technology, promote student autonomy, and create stimulating lessons. If students and teachers have adequate access to the Internet, however, there is a vast online audiovisual resource generally well known to students that can function effectively in multiple ways for a variety of English classes. The resource, YouTube.com, is an online video repository in which nearly any digital video file can be stored and exhibited free of charge. Started in February 2005, YouTube hosts videos that are cumulatively currently viewed more than 2 billion times each day (“Timeline,” 2011). While issues involving copyright infringement and obscenity standards have often made the website controversial, the vast array of diverse content and its organic community interactivity make YouTube a tremendous resource for a multitude of educational endeavors. This paper seeks to give teachers a few starting points on how the site could be used, as well as to suggest a loose framework for online video use into which SLA and CALL researchers can conduct further research. First, a brief review of existing literature will be presented, followed by descriptions of potential YouTube applications that have been implemented. The paper will conclude with a discussion of potential limitations that might come with using online video technology and suggestions for future research. Reviewing Extant Literature Through the Lens of YouTube The two primary benefits to using YouTube in the classroom are the exposure to authentic English as well as the promotion of a learning style that is more autonomous and studentLanguage Education in Asia, 2011, 2(1), 113-119. http://dx.doi.org/10.5746/LEiA/11/V2/I1/A09/Watkins_Wilkins