How Drama Affects Students’ Development Of

How Drama Affects Students’ Development of Second Language Learning and Their Personality 051075 Kanako Fujii

Summary While English become one of the important subjects at school, the numbers of students who don’t like studying English are still increasing. One of the reasons is that they lose their way to learn English at the same time to lose their confidence to learn. Since our motivation is highly related with our learning, teacher should motivate or inspire them to learn English. One of the effective ways is to do drama activities which will not only give them opportunities to use English, but also give them courage or confidence to speak out English.

Research Questions 1. What is the students’ goal or needs in learning English? 2. What are the benefits for their life through learning English? 3. How has drama affected students’ English learning and their life?

The Experiment Subject: 12 graduated students, 15 senior students, 10 junior students, 4 sophomore students and 4 freshmen at Notre Dame Seishin University.  EDC: 23 people who have done drama in Seishin’s English Drama Club  Non-EDC: 22 people who have not done drama before.

Instrument: I asked graduated students, freshmen, sophomore, junior and senior students at Notre Dame Seishin University. There was no time limitation to complete the questions. The subjects were allowed to respond to this questionnaire anytime, anywhere. After I collected the questionnaire, I analyzed those responses by dividing them into two groups, EDC and Non-EDC groups.

Results Firstly, I would like to look at what is the students’ goal through learning English and is there any differences EDC students and Non-EDC students. Table 1: Data for the students’ goals Question 1 Non-EDC EDC a. to be able to speak English like a native English 7.7% 10.3% speaker b. to be able to communicate with people from other 30.8% 32.4% countries h. to be able to understand what a native speaker said 10.8% 14.7% j. be able to develop confidence in English 4.6% 10.3% k. to be able to know more about the world 10.8% 7.4% l. to be able to widen your views 12.3% 7.4% m. Other 3.1% 0%

From these results, we could see that students desire to improve their communication skills in English is not for their career but for interacting with other countries people. Moreover, the percentage of each Non-EDC and EDC subject who reported that their aim is to improve their personality (choice j, k, and l) is higher than the percentage of the subjects who reported their aim is to improve their English skills (choice c, d, e, f and g). Therefore, we could say that students learn English not only for improving their English skills but also for improving their personality.

Secondly, I would like to look at their perceived benefits for learning English.

Question 5 Non-EDC EDC a. make friends 4.5% 0% b. go to overseas 4.5% 11.4% c. to widen my view 31.8% 20.5% d. gain knowledge about other places 27.3% 9.1% e. enjoy to watching movies 6.8% 4.5% f. to communicate with people regardless of race 13.6% 13.6% g. gain confidence 4.5% 13.6% h. to express my feeling or thinking without hesitation 2.3% 6.8% i. to widen my options 4.5% 20.5%

From these results, we can see both EDC and Non-EDC subjects feel benefits for learning English especially when they (c) widen their view or (d) gain the knowledge about other places. In other words, we can say that both Non-EDC and EDC feel that improving their personality through learning English such as played a greater role than improving their English skills.

Then, I asked EDC students about benefits of doing drama. Table 9: Data for benefits of their English learning with drama Question 11 Non-EDC EDC a. Using English with situation or contents 18.2% 12.8% b. Giving us opportunities to practice practical 9.1% 12.8% English c. Talking with friends in English 0.0% 2.6% d. Become more positive to learn 27.3% 17.9% e. Be able to speak English phrases like a song 0.0% 2.6% f. Be able to learn and practice how to pronounce 9.1% 12.8% and stress g. Learning and improve pronunciation 9.1% 12.8% h. Feeling familiar to English as a communication 0.0% 7.7% tool i. Managed to remember English words 9.1% 7.7% j. Knowing about English or English culture 9.1% 2.6% k. Speaking English with confidence 9.1% 5.1% l. Enjoying learning English 0.0% 2.6%

From the result of question 11, we can see the benefits of drama for learning English. I divided sentences in question 11 into three groups, benefits for motivation, benefits for understanding meaning, and benefits for understanding form in order to look at how drama affect our English learning.

1. Benefits for motivation 3. Benefits for understanding language form d) Become more positive to learn, g) Learning and improve k) Speaking English with confidence, pronunciation, l) Enjoying learning English i) Managed to remember English word 2. Benefits for understanding language meaning a) Using English with situation or contents b) Giving us opportunities to practice practical English c) Talking with friends in English e) Be able to speak English phrases like a song f) Be able to learn and practice how to pronounce and stress h) Feeling familiar to English as a communication tool j) Knowing about English or English culture

Benefits of drama Understanding of form, 4%

Undertanding of meaning, 23%

Improve their motivation, 73% We could see the EDC students have gained their confidence through doing drama activities and improved motivation to learn English.

Conclusion From the results of questionnaire, we could see drama is effective to improve not only student’s motivation to learn English but also, their personality. Moreover, these two developments are the common aim for learning English in both EDC and Non-EDC subjects. In other words, to use drama is suitable to teach or learn English in EFL classroom so that students are able to develop their personality and find self-fulfillment.