71 tech talk music language learning

Columns Tech Talk Using music to facilitate learning for multiple language skills Lucius Von Joo Kanda University of International Studies, Japan

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Lucius Von Joo currently teaches for Kanda University of International Studies, Japan. He holds an Ed.M. in Comparative and International Education and has teaching experience in deaf education, elementary education and EFL/ESL in California, Japan and New York. His research interests include computer assisted learning, film and documentary content-based learning, student educational backgrounds and learning approaches, video-cued multi-vocal ethnography, and family and communities as educators. E-mail: lucius-v@kanda.kuis.ac.jp

or many people, music is one of the early modes of exposure to a new foreign language. Foreign music like foreign food can create a deep connection for people and inspire them to want to learn more. The tune and the melody of a song can easily be understood and enjoyed which often leads to wanting to understand the lyrics. This is one of those moments when autonomous learning can be at its best if properly facilitated. Music can help with multiple language skills such as pronunciation, comprehension, vocabulary and overall motivation.

Many classes use music to teach language and in this Tech Talk I will cover different applications that can be used to practice language. This Tech Talk will be divided into four types of applications related to music and songs: 1) Access to music, where and how to find new songs; 2) Language training through lyrics; 3) Comprehension of the overall meaning of songs and; 4) Shadowing or singing songs. Just as in other Tech Talks the sections can be read independently or as a set.

1) Access to music Access to music has grown exponentially with the evolution of technology. In this section of this Tech Talk I will talk about a few ways to access, identify and find new music.

Spotify (Apple, Android, PC), Apple Music (Apple, Android, PC) and Google Music (Apple, Android, PC) are three of the big names in music providers.

For these as well as other music search libraries you can type in the music you are looking for and find albums songs artists and playlists that match your search. All three services have a monthly subscription cost of around $10, however both Google and Apple offer a free trial period and Spotify has a free version with advertisements.

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These three applications can play in the background, which means that you can hear the music while using other applications or have your device screen off. All three services are fairly intuitive, however if you are using any of these applications in a class you may want to give some time for students to play around and group share what they know about music library apps.

It is also worth mentioning that YouTube, while not exclusively a music library, offers some version of almost every song past and present.

YouTube cannot be played in the background so the device must be left on and open to the YouTube application.

Radiooooo (Apple, Android, PC) is a very fun free application that specializes in exploring world music. I often share this app with students in a variety of settings and even use it to supply background music in my own classes. Radiooooo is supplied by user uploads of music from every country around the world. It is very simple to use, all you do is click a country, decade and genre of music you would like to hear.

Sound Hound (Apple, Android) & Shazam (Apple, Android) are both music identification services.

When you hear a song that you like playing somewhere you can use the application and your device microphone to find what the song is called and who is the artist. Soundhound is a stronger service to find songs even in a noisy setting whereas Shazam tends to be focused on social networking and sharing of music.

2) Lyrics language training

For the screenshots and explanation of this application I selected ‘I speak English’ and ‘I’m learning English.’ This made the operating language, songs and questions in English.

However if I picked Spanish as the language ‘I speak’ but kept the ‘I’m leaning English’ the instructions would be in Spanish but the songs and questions would be in English. The songs offered in Lyriko may not be famous or your favorite songs, but for language practice they felt appropriate.

mode helps with learning new vocabulary with multiple choice pictures that connect with new words highlighted in the song as it plays.

The pictures that are connected to the vocabulary may be hard to see the connection but under each picture you see a written definition as well. The pictures are also repeated when the words reappear in the song so this helps as well.

Lyriko (IOS & Android) is an interesting app that has four modes to practice language through songs. The four modes are; Picture It, Imposter, Interlude, and Reference. I will explain each mode briefly below. With Lyriko you can get instructions in a variety of languages and also hear songs in different languages as well.

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After each game you receive points that can unlock more songs for free within the application.

When I first played this game in English I thought it might be to easy, however when I tried the application in Spanish and Japanese the challenge was at the right level.

mode plays the song alongside written lyrics. When you hear lyrics sung that do not match the lyrics you are reading you click on the mismatched section. Once you click on the words that do not match they will switch to the correct word.

mode helps you connect what you hear with the text in the song. You get four multiple choice text options and click the one you hear in the song. When you click the correct word it will also flash an image that matched the vocabulary.

mode is not a game, however you can learn the new vocabulary without pressure. All you do is click on a word that you would like to know and an image a definition pops up.

Lyric Training (IOS, Android & PC) is a really enjoyable application that focuses on filling in lyrics to music. The application seems to work with almost any video that is on currently on YouTube. This means that learners can find and practice with almost any song they like.

You can either search for the song you would like to practice with or click on one of the current trending songs. I noticed that if you search for a specific song you might not always find the version you are familiar with, but most likely the lyrics will be the same. The PC version seems to work the best with offering the most options. For this Tech Talk I am using the smartphone version, because it seems this version will be the most accessible for all learners.

Below you can see the home screen of popular songs on the application. You can pick from these or search for a song of your choosing.

After selecting your song you can choose the level you would like to try to fill in the missing lyrics.

Easy has about 10% of the lyrics missing, Normal is about 25% and hard is about 50%. In the Pc version of the application there is also an expert

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level in which you fill in all the lyrics. The Karaoke shows all the lyrics for a sing along version.

For this example I picked the easy level. After picking the level you will then be brought to the song. You may be asked to start an account, if you do not care about saving points and songs you can skip the account and play one song at a time without accumulating points. If you want learners to be able to interact and save their scores you can have them make accounts. In the picture above you can see that people’s high scores for the song I chose show up. Once you start the song the lyrics will show up below with live highlighting of the words that are being sung. You then have to type in the words that are missing. If you do not do it in time, you can click repeat for the line you missed. I was concerned about students having a difficult time with perfect spelling, however the app will only accept the correct letter so if you can’t figure out the word, you can hit every letter on the keyboard until the correct letter is entered. This helps when a word is very hard to understand.

Below you can see an example of filling of the application in action.

Musixmatch (IOS & Android) is a simple application that will put any lyrics in live time on a screen to any song you have on your device.

You can also find the lyrics translated into multiple languages and they will play below the songs original lyrics. The translations are crowd sourced so popular songs will have more translations and the translations may not always be perfect.

3) Lyrics comprehension

Genius (IOS, Android & PC) is another crowd sourced music application that has the facts and explanations behind the lyrics in a song.

Just as with Musixmatch popular songs will be more sourced and most likely have more details.

Below is an example of lyrics being explained.

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Songfacts (PC) is an online application that is similar to Wikipedia about the songs. All you do is go to songfacts.com type in the song you would like to know more about and you will see facts about the lyrics and song. The site is a bit advertisement heavy, this is something I have noticed about many free online sites related to music. There is no risk to the advertisements but can be distracting and make me want to share add free applications with students instead.

scoring system is not perfect, however the instant feedback helps with the flow of wanting to sing again.

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4) Shadowing and singing I really enjoyed researching this type of application and testing these applications and I am someone who does not participate in karaoke usually. There are many apps that offer singing along with lyrics, however what songs are available and if there is a free version of the application has access to ranges greatly. Below are 3 different applications that offer a form of singing with songs. All of the applications offer filters for your voice and have recording setting to save your singing to listen too. All the below applications are best used with headphone that have a built-in microphone.

Yokee (IOS & Android) is a very simple app that has the lyrics played in time with the music.

It has both a paid and free version of the application; the free version has pop up advertisements. It does not have the game interface of testing your timing, however you can still add filters to your voice and save recording which can help with learners metacognition. The learner can replay the recording and listen for pronunciation and even turn down the background music and turn up their vocals. This is another chance where you could help facilitate by having learners keep a record of their recording, what they would like to change about it and how they plan to improve a specific aspect.

For example if a learner had a hard time pronouncing a certain word or had difficult with timing they could make a plan on how to focus on that specific element and record the song again.

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Starmaker (IOS & Android) is free application that has access to many songs, however the version of the song that is available may not be what you are familiar too. This application is very fun, because it scores your on your timing of the lyrics which could very much help with learners general listening and rhythm of speech skills. Below you can see an example of how this application plays the song below and on the top of the image you can see a sequence of lines that measures your timing as you sing. The

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Smule seems to have the largest number of original recordings and has the most streamline interface, however Smule has a monthly subscription of around $10. This app may be nice for a learner who really enjoys singing or perhaps a school language lab.

facilitation can help learners feel out how to use an app quickly.

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Depending on the setting the singing apps are used in, learners could be insecure to sing in front of others or have a learning difficulty with music in general. However because these apps are on mobile devices, learners have access to practice alone or in groups.

This is due to the fact that most smart phones and tablets come with speaker and microphone access. In the past learners would need an extensive language lab set up to accomplish such a task.

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Like any extensive resource or dynamic interactive platform, these apps can be distracting. If you want to use these apps in a classroom setting be prepared for users to be distracted looking for everything that comes to mind. This is where facilitation or a simple hand out of what to accomplish with using the application may help.

Summing up Here are a few of the benefits and limitations of music related applications.

Overall benefits of music applications 1.

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Music can inspire any level of language learner. As I mentioned in the introduction to this Tech Talk learners can already understand the melody to a song without needing to understand any of the verbal language. The listener learns to understand different cues of communication in analyzing the music and can be further inspired to research the meaning of the lyrics.

Music applications are a current and up to date language-learning tool. New music is always being produced and there is also an immense body of preexisting material.

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Using music apps can be habit forming and rewarding. Music will not go away any time soon, so learners will always have a need for these applications. Many of the applications in this Tech Talk can be enjoyed alone or in a group, which makes the use much more probable.

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The versatility of music allows the resource to be used in teaching any topic or skill. A quick Internet search can often yield great results in songs that focus on different grammar, vocabulary or theme.

Possible limitations of music applications 1.

Because there are so many songs in production music applications can be overwhelming. Most of the applications mentioned in this Tech Talk were very user friendly, but complicating the listening experience of music can become daunting.

This is where

Final Remarks Music is everywhere and is arguably one of the oldest forms of communication. The possibilities for how to use music as a language-learning tool are limitless. Apps can give learners more personal choice of what music they would specifically like to learn more about. This personalization creates room for tailor made lessons. In the past when I would use songs in my classroom I would use them as a daily warm up so that I could have multiple genres and styles in hopes that the variety would help each student connect to at least one of the lessons. Now that technology has opened up overall accessibility to music the variety of possible connections has also grown. However, just like any resource the time spent with each song has changed greatly.

This is where facilitation can be really helpful for learners on ways to interact with and sift through this vast resource. I was inspired to focus on music for this Tech Talk because of a few music apps that students have shared with me recently.

It was exciting to see what learners seek out to enjoy the language they are studying. This Tech Talk kept reminding me of a famous quote

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credited to Hans Christian Anderson that goes; Where words fail, music speaks.

Dear Readers, If you have any requests for future Tech Talks please feel free to contact me. Any request is greatly appreciated and can range from a specific program you want explained to a general lesson that you want to incorporate technology into.

Thank you, lucius-v@kanda.kuis.ac.jp

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