Effects of integrating children’s literature and DVD films into a college EFL class

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of the use of children’s literature and DVD films on EFL adult language learning. A total of 89 non-English majors enrolled in two Freshman English classes participated in the study. The study employed a quasi-experimental, pretest/posttest comparison group design. The participants in the experimental group were exposed to the children’s literature and DVD films. In the control group, the participants were exposed to the English Language Teaching (ELT) textbook. The experiment was conducted for two hours per week over two months. Then the reading comprehension sections of the Elementary GEPT posttests were administered and their outcomes were compared with those of the pretests. At the end of the course, the questionnaires were administered to the participants in the experimental group to elicit their perceptions about the various aspects of the use the children’s literature and DVD films. The findings of the study revealed that alternately, reading, viewing the film, and discussing a children’s fantasy novel significantly increased the scores on the reading comprehension subtests over the control group with exposure to the ELT textbook.