| Summary: | This study explored the attitudes and actions of 50 Thai teen and adult lower
intermediate level English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students at a private language
school in Bangkok towards using English language pop songs for vocabulary acquisition.
The purpose of this was to better understand the educational value of the media in
question, with the intention of developing a guide for materials design that could
support teachers in the creation of their own related classroom activities and
worksheets. This was achieved by using a questionnaire and follow-up focus groups that
asked the students about general attitudes towards English language pop songs and how
they might use them for learning new words. The questionnaire itself was designed with
reference to an earlier study by Schmitt (1997), which had helped to inform the
development of his taxonomy of vocabulary learning strategies (Ibid.). The materials
design aspect of the present study was discussed with reference to a principled
framework for pop song activity development that was adapted from the work of
Tomlinson (2010) and Jolly & Bolitho (2011). The results section of this paper showed
that the participants held an overall positive view of English language pop songs, and
the media motivated them to learn encountered new words, including in a classroom
context. The questionnaire also revealed some similarities between the vocabulary
learning strategy preferences of those surveyed in this research and the Japanese
students that took part in Schmitt’s (1997) investigation. The conclusion of this paper
suggests that the present study offers a starting point for teachers in a similar
educational context to conduct their own research on the topic. It also provides
guidance for the development of classroom materials based on pop songs that
encourage vocabulary learning, and ultimately, learner autonomy.
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