THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING PICTURES IN INTRODUCING NEW VOCABULARY TO THE YEAR FIVE PUPILS.

by

Abdul Aziz Bin Mohd Taha, Nirmala D/O Muniandy, Harbinder Singh

Institut Pendidikan Guru, Kampus Bahasa Antarabangsa

Abstract

This study aimed to determine the effectiveness of the use of pictures in introducing new vocabulary in English. The sample consists of 10 year 5 students at a school in Klang. Two teaching sessions were conducted in this study. In the first lesson, the students were taught using traditional methods, which are described in oral vocabulary. The second lesson was conducted by using images. All data collected through tests, interviews and journal entries. The results showed that pupils more brilliant when using pictures than using traditional methods. Pupils are also available to give more attention to the teaching and learning process and actively involved when pictures were used. Results from this study shows that the use of effective image in introducing new vocabulary is successful, but should be supported by other aids to explain words that are not concrete.

English is an important second language (L2) and is widely spoken

and used in the countries which were typically ex-colonies of the United Kingdom or the United States including Malaysia, India, Philippines and Nigeria (Thirusanku & Melor, 2012). For the past fifteen years, Malaysia is one of the Asian countries that has been adopting a bilingual system of education. In the case of Malaysia, the national language is Bahasa Malaysia and the government has agreed on English language as an additional language to be in the education system. The system aims at establishing a balance between national and international needs and challenges manifested through linguistic educational policies (Gill & Kirkpatrick, 2013). With reference to the Malaysian education system, English is placed as the L2 (Gill, 2002) inline with the education policy.

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English language is made a compulsory subject at all levels of education implying its existence “side by side with strong indigenous languages, wide use in speaking, and intranational outstanding, sometimes official functions, as the language of politics, the media, jurisdiction, higher education, and other such domains” (Thirusanku & Melor, 2012, p. 2). Reflecting on the Malaysian pluralist society, the learners are commonly bilingual, trilingual or even multilingual.

Nevertheless, the deficiency in English competence among Malaysian learners is still the major concern among educators. The socio cultural backgrounds of Malaysian pupils comprise with different cultures and belief and most prominently have different level of proficiency and knowledge of English. Most of the pupils who lived in urban area used with English language as their first language as they could master the language at home. It is in contrast with pupils who lived in the rural area or outskirt of the town, which is predominantly Malay. Most of them will communicate in their mother tongue. In addition, David and Haji (2000) and David and Nambiar (2001) mentioned that the students who came from rural area hardly have the knowledge of English because of the limitation of vocabulary and communication.

There have been great emphasis and effort by the Ministry of Education Malaysia to improve the standard of English among primary school students. In 2011, the Malaysian government introduced a new student-centered standard curriculum and teaching methodology called Kurikulum Standard Sekolah Rendah (KSSR). The aim of KSSR is to change the current climate of teacher-centered, passive education to one of student-centered, active education in which the content is delivered through games and activities. It also proposed that English language teaching and learning should be diverted from examination-oriented skills and more focus should be paid to the communicative and authentic skills in the language. Beyond that, students will have greater exposure to the language and vocabulary, for example via an expanded, compulsory English Literature module at the secondary level. International research indicates that more exposure time than the current 15-20% is required for students to achieve operational proficiency.

In addition, Nation (as cited in Nation and Waring, 1997) emphasized, “Vocabulary knowledge enables language use, language use enables increase the vocabulary knowledge, knowledge of the world enables the increase of vocabulary knowledge and language use and so on” (p.6). This contextualised approach to learning vocabulary through authentic interaction, which in line with the KSSR objectives which is to, promotes the English usage through authentic language use. However, the teaching of vocabulary has been undervalued in the field of second language acquisition (SLA). In second language learning (SLA), vocabulary skill is important to help the language learner to understand or acquire the language better in its context.

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What is my research Issue? I will be focusing on the effectiveness in introduction of new vocabulary

using pictures. This is to expand their vocabulary in order to write descriptive compositions using pictures and explicit vocabulary teaching strategies. According to Hatch & Brown (1995), vocabulary the list of words that speaker of a particular language use. As language teachers we use different types of teaching aids to explain the meaning of new words. Using pictures is one of the teaching aids that teachers depend on in their teaching. Harmer (2001:134) states “Teachers have always used pictures or graphics – whether drawn, taken from books, newspapers and magazines, or photographs – to facilitate learning”.

Learning vocabulary is an ongoing process that takes time and practice.

Nakata (2006) acknowledged that vocabulary acquisition requires continual repetition in order for effective vocabulary learning. In my experience, English teachers tend to feel that using pictures in teaching new words makes the process enjoyable and memorable. In fact, pictures are able to attract students’ attention and deepen their understanding of vocabulary.

Pictures can also help pupils with abstract words, as associating the

words with a concrete object make these words easier to remember. In addition, Harmer (2001:135) states, “one of the most appropriate uses for pictures is for the presenting and checking of meaning. An easy way of explaining the meaning of the word aeroplane, for example, is to have a picture of one”. Of course, not all new words can be taught using pictures but most concrete vocabulary can.

Nation (1990:51) lists a number of basic techniques through which teachers can explain the meanings of new words, all of which can be used in the young learner classroom. Some of these techniques involve the use of pictures from a variety of sources - pictures from computers; photographs; drawings or diagrams on the board; and pictures from books. It will be interesting in this study to see the effectiveness of pictures that the teachers use.

What have I learnt about my research Issue? After conducting observations to my students’ homework, examination

answers and interview sessions, I can see there are many factors that contribute in introducing new vocabularies to the students.

The teacher should consider the learner’s needs in the first place. Allen

(1983) pointed out that it is useful to provide the learner with words for ‘classroom language’ just at the early stages of the course. It is important for the teacher to predict what words the student needs to know for talking about everyday life, people and things surrounding them. “When such words are learnt, the new language can immediately be put to use”. (Allen 1983: 108).

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“I have started a mini programme to promote English speaking atmosphere in the classroom. I have pasted simple instructional sentences and basic greetings in the classroom. I think they should understand the meaning in each card because I have explained the meaning to them. I hope my students can try to speak in English after this.”

(Reflective Journal No: 54, 3rd April 2014)

I have always promoting the policy to only use English in my lesson. Even my students gave answers in their mother tongue, I will translate the answers for them or make their friends to help them rephrasing the answer in English. The mini programme was actually introduced to cater the average and weak students in decreasing the anxiety of learning English. Most of my students have the high anxiety level because of they have doubt within them. That is why they do not bother to try to speak in English even for a basic conversation and greetings. It was more upsetting when the previous teacher also translating the words into their mother tongues. So, when they are able to use English in the classroom and communicate with their peers, there are needs to acquire new vocabulary.

One of the criteria affecting the teacher’s choice is the frequency in which

the particular item is used in common language. In general, “The words which are most commonly used are the ones we should teach first.” (Harmer 1993: 154) However, most frequent words do not usually convey much information, being so-called ‘empty’ words (i.e. grammar words) and to be able to communicate, learners need considerable amount of words bearing some meaning. (McCarthy 1992: 82)

“My students already memorise the sentences in the cards. But other

than sentences provided, they do not speak in English. They will always converse in their mother tongue and cause the class to be noisy. In answering question, most of them are eager to answer but they always use their mother tongue because they know I will accept their answers and translate it into English.”

(Reflective Journal No: 54, 3rd April 2014)

Another aspect to consider is coverage. As Harmer (1993: 154) stated, the words covering more things are likely to be taught before words with only one specific meaning. E.g. the word ‘book’ will be taught before words ‘notebook or exercise book’. McCarthy (1992: 84) also speculates on the range of an item. It is generally advisable to avoid the vocabulary with a restricted range, since the wider range an item has, the more useful it is likely to be.

Besides that, “learnability” is another factor influencing the order in which

chosen vocabulary will be taught. There are a lot of reasons why words might be easy or difficult to learn. Of them all, let me mention that complicated spelling, pronunciation or meaning might be a reason for a word to be difficult to remember. Generally, concrete things are more learnable then abstract ones; therefore they are always taught first. (McCarthy 1992: 86)

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As Hill (1990) pointed out, “the standard classroom” is usually not a very suitable environment for learning languages. That is why as a teacher, I have to search for various aids and stimuli to improve this situation. Pictures are one of these valuable aids. They bring “images of reality into the unnatural world of the language classroom.” (Hill 1990: 1). Pictures bring not only images of reality, but can also function as a fun element in the class. Sometimes it is surprising, how pictures may change a lesson, even if only employed in additional exercises or just to create the atmosphere.

“Today I felt very happy than usual because my weak student said that he loves my lesson because he likes to be inside ICT laboratory because of the air-conditioner. He said their classroom is hot usually after recess period. It seems funny but it is important to make them to feel comfortable in the lesson. I can also incorporate ICT in my lesson too.”

(Reflective Journal No: 52, 10th April 2014)

Pictures meet with a wide range of use not only in acquiring vocabulary, but also in many other aspects of foreign language teaching. Wright (1990: 4-6) demonstrated this fact on an example, where he used one compiled picture and illustrated the possibility of use in five very different language areas. His example shows employing pictures in teaching structure, vocabulary, functions, situations and all four skills. Furthermore he pointed out that “potential of pictures is so great that only a taste of their full potential can be given” in his book. (Wright 1990: 6) To be more specific, beside lessons where pictures are in the main focus, they might be used just as a “stimulus for writing and discussion, as an illustration of something being read or talked about, as background to a topic and so on” (Hill 1990: 2)

There are many reasons for using pictures in language teaching. As Wright (1990: 2) pointed out, they are motivating and draw learners’ attention. Furthermore, Wright (1990: 2) refers to the fact that they provide a sense of the context of the language and give a specific reference point or stimulus. Pictures, being suitable for any group of learners independently on age or level, can be used in lots of various ways. As Hill (1992: 2) stated, “What is done is limited only by the preparation time available, the visuals to hand and the imagination of the individual teacher.”

Hill (1990: 1) listed several advantages of pictures, such as availability

(one can get them in any magazines, on the internet, etc.); they are cheap, often free; they are personal (teacher selects them); flexibility - easily kept, useful for various types of activities (drilling, comparing, etc.), they are “always fresh and different”, which means they come in a variety of formats and styles and moreover the learner often wonders what comes next. (Hill 1990: 1)

From my experience, my students always pay attention and are curious

about what are they going to do with the pictures shown. It counts as general methodological knowledge that in learning languages, students should

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perceive the input through as many channels as possible. Therefore it is important to include variety of stimuli in teaching. It is important to find a balance and not to use pictures or visuals only but to combine them with other techniques and different types of stimuli (movement, verbal stimuli, sound, etc). Moreover, pictures used for demonstration of the meaning should be repeatedly connected with the spoken and subsequently also written form of the word or chunk of language.

What is my research question? i) To what extent do English teacher can use pictures effectively in teaching new words to Year 5 pupils?

Who were my research participants?

The participants of my action research are the pupils from Year 5 of Sekolah Kebangsaan Telok Pulai, Klang. By having a small number of respondents, I was able to focus more in assisting them to complete the instruments that will be used since this strategy requires me to scaffold them with effective questioning techniques so that students are able answers the questions given within the framework outlined. Table 1 shows the respondents involved in my research. Table 1 : Research Respondent

NO. STUDENTS GENDER

1 A Male

2 B Male

3 C Male

4 D Male

5 E Male

6 F Male

7 G Female

8 H Female

9 I Female

10 J Female

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These pupils were the suggested pupils by their English teacher, Mdm Noor Asyikin based on their previous results in Year 4 and Ujian Persediaan 1. Moreover, the students have a weak English language usage level and understanding to the target language. The reason why I intent to implement this action research to them is because they are my pupils for the third phase of practicum. Hence, it is easier for me to monitor and conduct the activity with them. Besides, I have selected only 10 students to become my respondents of my research. They were also selected from their examination results in Ujian Persediaan 1.

How did I collect my data? For my action research, I have chosen 4 instruments to collect my data. I

will collect my data through multiple methods namely reflective journal, observation, written tests, and interview. Eikeland (2001) emphasized the importance of using more than one method of data collection to ensure the validity and reliability study.

Gronlund (2006) also agree with this statement because of the findings of

an instrument should be supported by other instruments. Thus, triangulation of data will make research results more accurate and authentic (Rosinah, 2011).

The first instrument that I use is a reflection journal entry. Date, time and journal entries recorded in the record books and teaching me my personal journal. This is because, in order for our inquiry or case study to be affective, we have to gather data (Harmer, 2007). Therefore, the journal entries help me in observing the effectiveness of the use of pictures in introducing new vocabulary to my students. I wrote noteworthy points that I have gathered before, while and after carrying the research in a form of reflective journal. According to Wilson (2009), writing a research journal is a very effective way of keeping control of the information the research generates. Thus, it works as one of the sources of data so I can keep track of the progress of my research which to be included in my final report. Harmer (2007) also allots that journals are powerful reflective devices, which allow teachers to use introspection to make sense of what us going on around them.

The second instrument is to collect all the acceptable data through observation to validate my study. I have to obtain realistic evidence for my intended action research. In collecting the data through observation, I have prepared an observation form. This observation form was design based on the students’ behaviour in the classroom. Through this method, it allows me to actually see what is happening during the teaching learning activities as well as provides full view of the classroom at time of observation. It has also been supported by Ahmad Syamil (2001), which states one of the purposes of observation method is that it can record the frequency of changes in

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behavior before and after a treatment or action is carried out. I also have recorded the lesson of the day so that I can watch it again to write the report.

My third instrument is interview method. Interviews can be used to collect facts, e.g. information about people's place of work, age, etc., but such questions are usually no more than opening items, which precede the main substance. In my research, this method used to identify student responses about the technique used in my research. This method can help my students to communicate with me at ease because they are able to communicate easily and effectively. This is also supported by Mohamad Najib (1999), he said an interview conducted can get face to face feedback with the subject. This means that I can collect not only information but can see the emotions and feelings of the subject during the interview conducted. I have conducted a series of interview before, while and after the activity conducted and also help me to get pupils’ opinion and perspectives.

I also have implemented test as my instrument. The rationale of choosing

this instrument is because the test scores obtained reflect the number of questions that can be answered by the students. This is supported by Hunt (2003), which states that the performance of students in the test is the most appropriate way to identify the level of skills learned. In addition, the test is also well suited to detect weaknesses of pupils. Through test scores, teachers can identify all errors committed by the pupils; in return determine the cause of the weakness of students in a skills test (Heritage, 2001).

To increase the validity of the test, the item designed based on the research objectives. It was then sent to my mentor teacher, Mdm Nor Asyikin because of her experiences in the teaching arena as an English teacher and her qualification in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL). She is also one of the UPSR English markers.

As a result of discussions with her, I have learned to prepare questions

based on Bloom's Taxonomy. She also gives examples of questions from the question bank, which was built for the state level. She also suggested conducting the test in a formative form to enable me to get the results quickly and easily. This is because, formative questions have items that are not a lot but can be expanded in many forms. An example, it might be other than to state the meaning of words, but students may also be asked to fill in the blanks with suitable answers. This can help students to reduce their anxiety levels when answering questions.

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What is my recommended Intervention? My research was conducted for 2 weeks. The implementation of my

research is based on the daily lesson plan that I have prepared. This lesson plan builds on Unit 4: Animals and Us.

Two lessons have been conducted in the title and the same skills but

in different sub-units namely the second Pest and Pets. In the first lesson I have used the traditional method, which is mean to explain the vocabulary orally to the pupils and asked them to copy in their exercise book. The focus will be on the reading comprehension lesson. I have highlighted the vocabulary words from the comprehension text and explain verbally to the pupils.

Through the lesson, I have divided the students into groups. I have

used collaborative learning strategy to create an interactive learning environment among students. According to Scott and Ytreberg (1990), children are motivated to learn when other children around them. Thus, cooperative learning can be beneficial for young learners as it allows them to form a greater comprehension that leads them to understand a topic. They have to work together to answer comprehension text that includes vocabulary words of the day. During working together, they may argue with their friends whereby they will re-evaluate ideas and able to look certain issues from multiple angles. Through this process, they have to use the target language and may acquire or learn new vocabulary from their friends. Those who remember better will try hard to convince their peers to accept their answer.

“The objectives of the lesson were achieved. But I have to repeat so many times regarding the meaning of the words. Some of them also reluctantly copy down the words inside their exercise book. Most of them took a longer time to write all the 5 words. The students were not really interested and often off task. This is maybe because of the fasting month. It makes the students feel tired. The group work seems to be not functioning well. Some students also went to the toilet to wash their face.”

(Reflective Journal No: 70, 8th July 2014)

During the production activity, I have distributed a task sheet to pupils. Pupils are required to write a sentence using the vocabulary they learnt on that day. I walked around the classroom to observe students in completing the task given. From the observation I have gathered relevant information of my research to analyse my data. The observation also carried throughout the lesson and recorded in a form of observation checklist to be transformed into a narration. At the end of the lesson, I have conducted a test called pre-test.

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Then next lesson was conducted using pictures to introduce the vocabulary to the pupils. Again, I asked them to sit in their respective group and distributed the comprehension task and vocabulary task with pictures in it. I have introduced the new vocabulary explicitly before introducing the text. First, I have introduced the words and asked the meaning of the words. Then, the students need to guess the meaning of the words based on the pictures given by removing the blocks in the power point presentation. To consolidate the meaning, I have explained the meaning using actions. They have to take turns in guessing the meaning.

“The students were very happy today because we have our lesson in

the ICT Laboratory. They were all excited! Everyone participated well because I used LCD throughout the lesson. They are also happy because they do not have to copy down the words. Some of them claimed that it was more fun to with picture. It is easier to remember because the pictures are big enough and attractive. Students enjoyed so much because they saw me explained using actions. Some of them even copy the same action. Everyone is excited to talk about his or her pets. They already exchanged information before the lesson even started.”

(Reflective Journal No: 73, 11th July 2014)

The pupils need to write the word and meaning in the task. Then, they need to write individually using the same vocabulary at the production period in the lesson to reinforce the vocabulary. Finally, I have conducted a test to compare the result from the new strategy. (Appendix 4)

“Most of the students can answer the questions pretty well. It was

maybe the topic excites them but for me it was a huge achievement when the weak student can at least write three basic sentences from vocabulary introduced earlier. They may not score the highest but they progress the greatest. Congratulations kids! ”

(Reflective Journal No: 75, 15th July 2014) By the end of the research, I have compared the result of the test of

the strategy proposed in order to gather empirical evident to my research. I have collected the pupils’ work to be used as sample in analysing my data that will be appended in my research report. Apart from that, I have used reflective journals in recording the progress of the research throughout the stipulated timeframe. The reflective journal will record the students’ achievement based on the strategy that will be implemented

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What were the results of my study? The results of pre-test and post-test is calculated as a percentage.

Table 3 shows a comparison of the students' test scores.

Table 3: Comparison of Test Scores Pre and Post-Test

STUDENTS MARKS DIFFERENCES (%) PRE-TEST

(%) Traditional

Method

POST-TEST (%)

Pictures Method

A 50 100 50 B 50 50 0 C 35 90 55 D 50 50 0 E 50 100 50 F 30 90 60 G 0 100 100 H 65 100 35 I 45 100 55 J 35 95 60

Min 41 87.5 46.5

According to the table, the mean score for pre-test was 41%. A student got zero marks for being absent from school during the tests conducted. In addition, none of the students obtained full marks in the pre-test. This indicates that the students have not mastered the English vocabulary with traditional methods. For the post-test, the mean scores were higher than the mean for pre-test by 87.5%. It increases by 46.5%. However, there are two students who remained in the same percentage of marks. This picture shows that the method helps students to introduce new vocabulary in English.

To show more clearly of the results of this study, a more detailed analysis has been design. Table 4 below shows an analysis of the test scores of students in the pre and post-test in five categories: Excellent (Grade A), Good (Grade B), Satisfactory (Grade C), less satisfactory (Grade D), Poor (Grade E). This category has been constructed based on a grading scale School Examination Analysis System (SAPS), which was adopted by all schools in Malaysia.

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Table 4: Performance analysis of pre and post-test

Achievement Level Pre test Post test

Bil % Bil %

Excellent (80% - 100%) 0 0 8 80 Good (60% - 79%) 1 10 0 0 Satisfactory (40% - 59%) 5 50 2 20 Less Satisfactory (20% - 39%) 3 30 0 0 Poor (0 % - 19 %) 1 10 0 0

Figure 1: Students’ achievement marks in the pre-test and post-test in the

grading scale.

By referring to Table 4 and Figure 1 the student is considered pass if

they are included in the category of Excellent, Good and Satisfactory. They were considered failed if the students fall into the category of Less satisfactory and Poor.

0  

20  

40  

60  

80  

100  

120  

A   B   C   D   E   F   G   H   I   J  

MARKS  OBTAINED  (%

)  

STUDENTS  

PRE-­‐TEST  MARKS  (%)   POST-­‐TEST  MARKS  (%)  

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In the pre-test, there were 4 students who failed. But there is also no students who achieved an Excellent grade. The highest grade achieved was Good in the pre-test. The others belong to the Satisfactory, Less Satisfactory and Poor. Only 60% of passing rate in the pre-test was achieved. However, there was an increasing percentage of the pre-test and post-test by 40%. This proves that pictures can assist students in recognizing new vocabulary. It can also be seen in the percentage of post-test which reached 100% passing grade. It is proved that the method of introducing the English language vocabulary using pictures is an effective method.

The data analysis of this method emphasised on empirical evidence

that I gathered through the implementation of my research. From the session conducted, I managed to gather all the relevant information that suggests the changes of students’ attitude and responses towards both approaches.

“Some of my students cannot complete the test given during the

lesson. Only a few of them managed to complete the test when I used traditional teaching method. But the achievements improved after I have implemented new strategy in the lesson to introduce new vocabulary.”

(Reflective Journal No: 76, 16th July 2014) This is supported by the interview (Appendix 3) that I carried out after

both traditional method and picture method was implemented in the classroom. The transcript below shows the data analysed using interview:

(Traditional Method) Me : Do you like the lesson for today? Student A : It went normal. Me : Why? Student A : I don’t really focused because it is fasting month. Me : Did you remember the words I taught you? Student A : Some..A few of it (Using Pictures) Me : Do you like the lesson for today? Student A : Yes, Mr Aziz! Me : Tell me why? Student A : It is because of the picture, I understand the words. Me : Do you remember the words I taught you? Student A : Yes, because of the pictures and action you do! Me : Which lesson you prefer? This lesson or the previous lesson? Students A : This one!!

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DIscussion Based on my findings, one practical method for implementing these ideas

in a way that can help students acquire and retain new vocabulary will be detailed below. As cited by Thornbury (2004), according to McCarthy pictures have their limitations too. For example in teaching vocabulary, pictures are not suitable or sufficient for demonstrating the meaning of all words. It is hard to illustrate the meaning of some words, especially the abstract ones such as ‘opinion’ or ‘impact’. Therefore, in some cases, other tools are used to demonstrate the meaning and alternatively other tools might supplement pictures. For examples, I did explain the words by using actions after showing the students the pictures. Even tough my students laugh at me but I am glad when they re-enact the actions when they were completing the test. Apart from that, the pictures should be clearly visible and must be chosen carefully.

However, there is always a downside. It can be quite time consuming to

find the right pictures for a specific type of activity for a beginning teacher who lacks his or her own collection. On the whole, this drawback is greatly outweighed by the above-mentioned pros. Furthermore, when the collection of pictures is once made, it can serve for a long time.

Another matter is the question of how to use pictures effectively. It counts as general methodological knowledge that in learning languages, students should perceive the input through as many channels as possible. Therefore it is important to include variety of stimuli in teaching. It is important to find a balance and not to use pictures or visuals only but to combine them with other techniques and different types of stimuli (movement, verbal stimuli, sound, etc). Moreover, pictures used for demonstration of the meaning should be repeatedly connected with the spoken and subsequently also written form of the word or chunk of language.

These strategies are also known as implicit strategies that promote

vocabulary learning naturally through wide reading and daily conversations for example. The important point to note is in using these strategies, there is plenty of exposure is needed. If little exposure is received, the rate of vocabulary growth will be slow. Taking the students’ L2 background into consideration, little English is used at home as the medium of communication is the mother tongue. Hence, there is little exposure and opportunity to learn new words using these strategies. This being the case, the strategies employed by the students were inappropriate to speed up vocabulary learning and expansion of words. By conducting this action research to study the effectiveness of using pictures in introducing new vocabulary, I could see that my students were engaged to the lesson actively. Hence, I suggest this method to be used in any teaching and learning lesson. The reason that this method should be continued was mainly because it attracts students' attention with the use of attractive and colourful pictures in a lesson. It also helps the students to relate the lesson or the target words to their daily life. When the pupils are

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attentive, they would be engaged to the lesson well a meaningful lesson was created. Despites the results shown that this way of teaching is effective, it is still need to be improved. To improve this method, I would suggest that the teacher should improvise by using drawing or incorporate actions in it. For example, teacher can ask the students to touch the picture. The teacher fixes about ten to twenty pictures all over the board. He or she divides the class into two teams and invites them to stand one behind another in two rows, about 2 meters from the board. The teacher says a word expressing the meaning of one of the pictures.

The first student from each team runs to the board and touches the appropriate picture. The first one to touch the correct picture gains a point for his or her team. They both fall in the back of their queues. The team that first reaches the beforehand defined amount of points wins. Apart from that, the teacher should consider that atmosphere of the lesson. In my research, it was done during the fasting month. Therefore, some students were hungry and sleepy during the lesson. So, they were hardly paying attention and could not get all the new vocabulary taught.

In conclusion, as a future teacher I should be prepared from the beginning to meet the challenges that happening in the profession. A challenge such as lack of interest in education among the pupils can be overcome by having this action research. Such studies will definitely enable me to comprehend with the problem and try to find an appropriate way to handle it. Hence, it will help me to improve the quality of teaching and learning, to choose the appropriate method and also to develop new knowledge. Nonetheless, this research is open for interpretation and improvement for the betterment of future teaching practice.

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