【Lyrics Training】: Enhancing Listening Skills and Vocabs through Songs

Sample song from Lyrics Training - Call Me Maybe

WHAT IS LYRICS TRAINING?

Lyrics Training is a website which allows teachers and students to read and listen to the lyrics from music videos, and then fill in the missing lyrics as they go along. Bear in mind that this site is NOT SIMPLY KARAOKE but is also pretty useful for students of foreign language to improve their listening skills because they are required to identify words from a song. It can also be used as a fun and interactive means by language teachers to assist their students by introducing new vocabulary as well as grammar to them.

HOW TO USE IT?

There are seven different songs' languages to choose from (see Screenshot 2.1) in Lyrics Training. That means this site is not merely functional for ESL/EFL students but also for other users who would like to develop their listening skills and vocabulary of some other languages. However in our ELT case, we choose English as our songs' language.

Screenshot 2.1: Languages available for lyrics training.

After that, you can start by searching for lyrics by typing song title or artists' names into the search box. Once you have decided on a song, you will be told which kind of accents the particular song is sung in and the difficulty levels of the lyrics chosen (see Screenshot 2.2). 

Screenshot 2.2: Songs' accents and difficulties levels are both shown.

The next step is choosing a level- Beginner, Intermediate or Expert (see Screenshot 2.3). The level chosen determines how many words in the lyrics are missing and students have to fill in. After this, all you go!

Screenshot 2.3: Three different Levels are available to choose from. 

p/s: What is absolutely the highlight of this tool is that while you are hesitating about filling which words into the gaps, the song stops automatically and waits for you to do the job. And, in case you feel the need to listen to a particular line again, no problem!

Screenshot 2.4: Some buttons to help you during training

WHY DO TEACHERS & STUDENTS LIKE LYRICS TRAINING?

Teachers and students like Lyrics Training might be due to the following few reasons:

a) It is absolutely FREE where teachers and students can have
    access to it anytime and anywhere.

b) It is incredibly simple to use and also could be rather
    interesting because the students could choose the songs
    which they like or would like to learn.

c) This tool could be highly appropriate for students who
    are strong musically and spatially (visually) [according
    to Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences]
    since they will be more likely to develop listening skills
    and learn vocabulary items faster and easier through listening as
    well as watching the music videos frequently. 

d) Turning the classroom atmosphere to be more relaxing
     by using songs could help much in language learning
     because students' affective filter will become lower by
     having lower level of anxiety and higher level of motivation 
     and confidence. 

HOW COULD IT BE USED IN LANGUAGE LEARNING CONTEXT?

1) (a) Some pre-listening activities can be carried out before
          listening to a song. For examples,
          (i) show the students some song-related pictures or
          (ii) ask some topic related/ guiding questions 
    This is to activate students' schemata and have students to
    contextualise the whole picture in order to have a rough
    idea on what the song is all about.
   
     (b) Then, teachers can project the music video on the
           projector screen and the whole class can enjoy and
           fill the gaps together.

2) For higher-levelled students, teachers can divide them into
    pairs/ group of three and have them listen then write out
    the entire song lyrics together on paper before comparing
    their outcomes with the original lyrics.

3) Teachers can also set listening to a particular song as homework.

SOME LIMITATIONS OF LYRICS TRAINING

• Sometimes it could be too difficult to listen properly to what the singers are actually singing due to the fast rhythmic patterns of the songs. Some singers' voice tones are not appropriate for certain mode (eg: Beginner) as well (see Screenshot 2.5).

Screenshot 2.5: Problem of inappropriate singer's voice tone pointed out by one of the users.

• The lyrics will stuck halfway sometimes although the music is still on which causes the users have to restart all over again. It could be quite frustrating, really! 

That's all about it. ** HOPE YOU ENJOY IT! **