Using Realistic Movies as an Attractive Strategy for Teaching Maritime English

Abstract

This article explores effective techniques for teaching Maritime English using movies on marine topics. Several choices relate to the multimodality, authenticity of the material, and construction of language units. The challenges that might influence the benefits of using film as a teaching tool are, for instance, how to create tasks that make viewing movies more than just entertainment for language learning and knowledge development. To investigate these issues, we have decided to prepare teaching materials with an emphasis on the safety aspect of the mariner’s life. We consider safety to be one of the most important parts of maritime English. That is why the guidelines LET’S WATCH AND STUDY were developed at the Department of Languages at Kyiv State University of Infrastructure and Technologies. The objective of the guidelines was to develop communicative skills at Maritime English. LET’S WATCH AND STUDY was designed by a group of our teachers for the first, second, and third-year students of the Navigation department. It includes six feature films and three educational ones. The guidelines can be used during the classes of Maritime English in group work. Each lesson is organized so as to develop speaking skills and offers exercises and activities to increase students’ abilities to understand the video material, enlarge the vocabulary, express the points of view, distinguish the movie’s main idea and key points, as well as develop professional and communicative skills. The lessons which include educational movies are organized in such a way as to be interesting and cognitive for students of different years of study. The vocabulary used in the films coincides with the lexical material taught during the classes of English. Every lesson which includes feature films starts with the Plot to help students understand the content easily. It should be underlined that all movies contain extreme situations such as Man overboard, Fire onboard, Abandoning the vessel, Piracy attack, and SAR (search and rescue operation). The findings revealed that training professionals in the maritime industry using films is effective. The lecturers of our department also reported that they warmly welcomed the techniques which led students to enhance their motivation for learning English vocabulary. Finally, the researchers recommend preparing teaching materials that fit the needs and interests of future mariners.