4.1. Experimental objectives and hypotheses The hypotheses of the research: Using games and stories as a means for acquiring vocabulary can help… [301760]

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4.1. Experimental objectives and hypotheses

The hypotheses of the research:

Using games and stories as a means for acquiring vocabulary can help pupils to enhance their vocabulary and help to memorize it when needed.

Using games and stories by teachers in classroom brings out significant difference in language learning as compared to a situation where no games or stories are used.

This research deals with two important questions:

1. Does the use of language games have a positive effect on vocabulary development of primary and secondary school pupils?

2. Does the use of stories help pupils acquire and enhance their vocabulary knowledge and retrieve when needed?

The objective of the research is improving pupils’ vocabulary learning by using language games and storytelling techniques.

4.2. Research methodology

The methods used in gathering the data were: systematic observation when I [anonimizat]- reflection form.

[anonimizat], which tries to explain the advantages and disadvantages of using games and stories in primary and secondary school.

4.3. The subjects of the research

Taking into consideration that I teach both primary and secondary pupils who have the same level of language and the difference of age is not so big, I have decided to focus my research on a [anonimizat], IIIrd B and Vth A from “Secondary School Tureac”, Bistrița. All my students are from the village called Tureac and they have been studying English for 3 years.

A pre- observation questionnaire was given before the application of the treatment to both groups to make sure they are equivalent and the same questionnaire was administered as a post- observation questionnaire after applying the treatment to see whether the using of games and stories for teaching English vocabulary had any influence on the experimental groups and which strategy have more influence on the subjects than the other.

4.4. The experimental design

This research attempts to identify and understand how children in the third and fifth grade of a primary and secondary school respond to different vocabulary teaching techniques. In order to do this, I have introduced different kinds of games and stories in my lessons so that I could observe how children react to this method of learning vocabulary. I also wanted to find out if there were any problems that occurred during the process of teaching.

To achieve my goal, I [anonimizat] I used games and stories in the classroom and the SWOT analysis method which tries to explain the advantages and disadvantages of using games and stories in primary and secondary school. Owing to the fact that the participants’ level of English is A1 (elementary level), [anonimizat], so that I could be sure that all of them understood the questions and the information I sought were correct. (Appendix 1)

Moreover, during a period of four months I tried to apply as many games and stories as possible in the two classes to learn from learners’ reaction whether they liked games and stories or not and if games and stories could improve their existing vocabulary.

Finally, the language learning games and the stories used will be assessed here, for example, by their various uses of creativity, imagination and social learning, in addition to how the pupils learn to ask questions and access different data. A popular method used in schools all over the world is the SWOT analysis, and that kind of analysis was also used in this paper as well. The SWOT is an abbreviation for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. SWOT analysis is a tool for analyzing the current situation both internally (strengths and weaknesses), and externally (opportunities and threats). In this case, by estimating the four points one should get a simple but a broad enough view about the character of the game and stories and the possible uses and disadvantages of the language learning game in question. Even though, the SWOT method was originally developed for business and industry, it is equally useful in the work of community health and development, education and even personal growth.

The SWOT analysis tables should portray theoretical features which were presented in chapters 2 and 3. The theory chapters did conclude that motivation and fun are one of the driving forces that lead to successful learning: without them pupils do not put much effort into their work. Learning by having fun and sometimes not even noticing that they are truly learning is important when designing a good and interesting language environment. Therefore, the intention of this research is not to give a certain correct answer, a well- designed, functional game or a particular story to be used in the classroom, but mostly to contemplate the strengths and weaknesses of language learning games and storytelling.

At the end of the analysis part a conclusion will be drawn from these findings that should give an indication of how, what, when and especially why a teacher should use games and stories when teaching English to young children.

4.5. Interpretation of children’s observation questionnaire

The first two questions asked to children were “How old are you? And “How long have you been studying English?” Considering their responses, I can say that the children were between the age of nine and twelve. 26% of the children were nine years old, 24% were ten years old, 35% were eleven years old and 15% were twelve years old. This shows that most of the children were ten and eleven years old and that all of them have studied English language for three years now.

When asked if they like English and why they like it, all of them answered that they like English because they think that it is fun but it is also necessary to know a foreign language. Some of them said that English is an international language and that many people speak English worldwide so it is important to know English in order to communicate with other people. The younger children said that they like English because most of their computer games are in English. The third question had a personal interest. Although this may be considered irrelevant for this study, I decided to include this question because it was important for me to know if children liked the course I had given them so far. At question five “Would you like to have lists of new words translated to you in Romanian?” all my students answered yes which was not a surprise for me because I know that students feel more secure when the words are translated to them in their first language especially since most of them do not have dictionaries and the discovery methods are still new to them. Question six “Do you feel comfortable to learn new words by heart?” showed me once more that none of my students liked learning words in this way and that I would have to find ways to help them memorize words using different techniques. Finally, questions seven and eight were focused on the purpose of this research. To analyze the results of these questions, which were: would you like to read stories in English or listen to them? Would you like to learn new words through pictures, realia, games, songs or storytelling? Why?; I designed a graph to illustrate what techniques children preferred.

Techniques to teach EFL vocabulary

According to children’s answers, they preferred games because they found the classes fun when I used games in teaching English. They said that they felt more secure when games were used in the lesson because they could cooperate with other classmates and they learnt while having fun.

The second most preferred technique was storytelling. Children’ answers about this technique were that they liked it because they liked listening to stories and because it is good for them to read. In their opinion, stories should be used in teaching English because first, they are challenging and enjoyable and second, because children loved to hear about a hero or a villain, a giant or a dragon as long as it has a happy ending. Some of them said that they loved stories because the pictures and the story helped them to imagine that they were somewhere else and they could travel to awesome places in their imagination.

The third technique children chose was realia because they could use their senses. For example, most of them mentioned they found the class interesting when I used stuffed animals to teach animal vocabulary because they could play and touch them. In addition, these are objects that they see every day in their home and this helped them to remember the vocabulary more easily.

Pictures were preferred by 10% of the students. They answered that it was fun to learn new things by using pictures because it was easy for them to remember the new vocabulary. Moreover, students also said that they loved pictures because they helped them to “see” what they were learning.

Songs was one of the techniques with an apparently low preference percentage only 8% of the 100%. They said that they liked songs because it was easy for them to learn new things by singing. The song that some children remembered was “head, shoulders, knees and toes”. It is because they loved to move and touch the parts of their body as they were singing. I think that one of the reasons why children did not like to sing is that sometimes children feel too shy to put their hands up, or speak out in general class time.

To conclude with, I think that the questionnaire was a very useful instrument for collecting data, because the questions allowed me to register the information I needed without making children nervous. Through these questions, I realized that the techniques children preferred were games, stories and realia. In contrast, the techniques that least caught the children’s attention were songs and pictures. Their choices showed me that children preferred to learn English while playing with the language. Children enjoy games and thus participate without anxiety. Even though children love games, it is still important to vary the material used in the classroom. After all, students will get bored with doing the same type of activity day in day out. Therefore, it is important to use a variety of different materials: TV/video programmes for visual stimulation, games for active participation, and an overhead projector to display something or tape recorder to listen to a story in English. Alternatively, the teacher can use colourful images from the internet or use paints and colouring pens/pencils to get students doing interesting activities in English.

4.6. Analysis of the language learning activities used in the classroom

In this section, I focused my attention on the language learning activities that were used in the classroom and I also tried to make a SWOT analysis which will attempt to explain the advantages and disadvantages of using games and stories in teaching English in primary and secondary school.

In teaching different topics, I used realia, flashcards, games and stories and I have tried to learn from my children’ reactions whether they liked them or not, whether they encountered any problems in doing a particular activity and whether a certain activity could be more beneficial to primary school children and less to the secondary school children. I also took into consideration the fact that all of my pupils believed that learning English through games and stories is more fun and pleasant and that they usually got bored when vocabulary words were presented to them by the teacher in lists that they had to learn by heart at home.

4.6.1. Realia

Realia is a term for real things, concrete objects that are used in the classroom to build background knowledge and vocabulary. Realia is used to provide experiences on which to build and to provide pupils with opportunities to use all the senses in learning.

I employed realia with the topics of animals, classroom objects and toys in the third grade students. Meanwhile, in the fifth grade the topics were animals, clothes and toys. What I noticed when using toy animals for teaching vocabulary related to domestic and wild animals was that, at the beginning of the lesson, all the pupils looked really interested and excited about what was going to happen. But soon they lost interest and became distracted because they wanted to play with the animals and the noise in the classroom suggested me that I had to change the activity so that I wouldn’t lose control of the class. Nevertheless, the activity was a success because the pupils mostly used English language rather that their first language in describing their animals. With the fifth graders, on the other hand, the activity was much more relaxed and the pupils enjoyed bringing animals’ toys in the class.

I was surprised to see that many of them knew many words and when we played the recycling race game all of my pupils could use the words related to animals and they were also able to ask questions in English correctly. The use of realia in this case served to foster a more creative and active teaching- learning environment and facilitated the language acquisition and productivity.

When I taught the topic of classroom objects, I used the objects that were in the classroom such as chair, blackboard, chalk, sponge, desk, etc. What I noticed was that the pupils were interested in learning how to say the objects that they could see and use during the English lessons. Because there were too many words, I also tried to vary the activities and play a games “hot seat”, where we practiced the vocabulary learnt by describing the objects.

With vocabulary related to clothes to the fifth grade I decided to have a fashion show because children love to dress up and it was a great opportunity for them to show off their unique style and creativity. We revised vocabulary related to clothes and colours and because they had to describe each other using sentences like, She is wearing a… they also learnt to use present continuous in a meaningful context.

When examining and questioning the realia method used in this lessons according to the SWOT analysis, one can easily sum up the positive and negative aspects of this technique.

Table 1: SWOT analysis of realia

From table 1 one can conclude that using realia in teaching English in primary and secondary classrooms is a great option even though, young children can get distracted sometimes. The use of realia brings a welcome change in the class, a break from typical class activities like reading and writing. Kinaesthetic learning is the type of learning that students will most effectively acquire, mostly because they will have hands-on experience.

Students will clearly understand the reason they’re learning a particular ESL component. Instead of wondering when and where they might have use for a particular language element, they’ll know the reason. Moreover, realia saves time, as recognition of an object is immediate and so cuts out the need for lengthy explanations and drawing funny pictures on the board. Elicitation becomes much easier and holding up the object with a raised eyebrow will usually result in the desired word being spoken. Realia can be used indirectly as a tool for teaching grammar; for example, items of food and drink are perfect for teaching uncountable and countable nouns. Therefore I think that realia is a perfect tool for teachers because using realia and other visual aids will generate interest and help create an atmosphere conducive to learning.

4.6.2. Flashcards and pictures

During the period of the research flashcards and pictures were used in teaching different topics, such as weather, colours, clothes, family, etc. I realized that pictures and flashcards were a great tool when teaching English especially with young children because I could easily catch their attention, consequently making the learning process easier.

With both classes I used big colourful flashcards to teach weather and clothes. I also used the video projector to show them pictures of weather and different items related to clothing. Since the internet is nowadays a great tool for teachers, I used the following site in my lesson: http://esl-kids.com/flashcards/weather.html.

In both classes students seemed to like the activity and they memorized vocabulary really easy. We also played different games using flashcards such as bingo games, matching flashcards, flashcards in a chain and the magic eye. All these games were used to help them recognize, memorize and practise vocabulary through associating words, meanings and pictures. For the games in this lesson I used the following sites: http://www.mes-english.com/flashcards/weather.php.

http://www.mes-games.com/weather.php.

The final project that students did when talking about the four seasons made me realize that they had acquired many words related to the topic and were able to remember how the weather was in each season and what clothes people wear in each season.

So, pictures and flashcards were in this case successful with both classes. Students enjoyed the activities and participated with great enthusiasm. Moreover, the final project of their work showed me that this type of activity is suitable for big classes, for all ages and it is a great way to make students use English language more. All the positive effects of using flashcards and pictures can be seen in the SWOT analysis from table 2:

Table 2: SWOT analysis of flashcards and pictures.

As seen in table 2 flashcards and pictures are indeed great tools not only for teachers but also for students because they are a really handy resource to have and can be useful at every stage of the class. They are a great way to present, practise and recycle vocabulary and when students become familiar with the activities used in class, they can be given out to early-finishers to use in small groups. Flash cards can be bright and colourful and make a real impact on visual learners. This is why flashcards are ideal to use as educational games.

4.6.3. Games

During the four months of my research, I tried to use as many games as I could in the classrooms, at different stages of the lesson. The games used for this purpose were ice- breaker games for example “Find someone who…’’, ball games, “Abracadabra” for introducing animals, numbers present continuous, actions, “Pass the secret” to listen to and whisper instructions or words; “Simon says…”; Can I cross your river, Mr. Crocodile?” to introduce can for permission, clothes and parts of body, present continuous; matching games, “Hot! Hot! Hot!” to ask and answer questions; memory games, guessing games; “hot seat” to practice different vocabulary such as fruit or vegetables; board games; “Hangman”; “ I spy”; video games. All these games are described in chapter 3, so, in this section, the researcher focused her attention on the SWOT analysis that I hope will show the positive and negative aspects of using games in teaching English as a second language.

The ice- breaker games and warmer games were used in both classes. The third graders seemed to enjoy these games because they had a chance to move around the classroom and interact with their classmates. However, I also noticed that some of them used Romanian language rather than English when asking questions to find the information they needed. One of the difficulties that I had faced in doing these games was to quiet students down after the activity in order to be able to continue the lesson. Some of them got too excited and noisy therefore, it was difficult to relax them and catch their attention during the lesson. On the other hand, the fifth grade students were able to use English most of the time and even though there was noise during these activities, they could focus their attention to the other activities of the lesson too. The same situation appeared when I used “pass the ball” game in my lesson, because the group was big and students got anxious and bored while waiting for the ball. However, one of the things that I observed doing this game was that most of the students were willing to join in the activity and were anxious to share personal information in English with the other students. In “pass the ball” game, it was easier for me, as a teacher, to control the activity and to help students use English rather than their first language. The following SWOT- analysis table evaluates the characteristics of ice –breaker games.

Table 3: SWOT-analysis of ice- breaker games

From table 3 one can conclude that even though there some negative characteristics of ice- breaker games, they offer more positive aspects and opportunities. Therefore, I truly believe that ice- breaker games and warmers should be used in teaching English not only with young students but also with teenagers. They strengthen oral and social skills and create a warmer atmosphere and, in the same time, they can be excellent devices to help students feel more comfortable with themselves and with others and feel more "at home" in a group. As a facilitator, the secret of a successful icebreaking session is to keep it simple: design the session with specific objectives in mind and make sure the session is appropriate and comfortable for everyone involved.

Even though students understand the importance of vocabulary when learning a foreign language, most Romanian students learn vocabulary passively due to several factors. First, they find the teacher’s explanation for meaning or definition, pronunciation, spelling and grammatical functions boring. Second, students only think of vocabulary learning as knowing the primary meaning of new words. Therefore, they ignore all other functions of words. Third, students only learn new vocabulary through new words in their textbooks or when given by teachers during classroom lessons. In this case, most of them do not want to take any risks in applying what they have learnt. This means that often they may think they recognize a word in a written or spoken form but they are not able to use that word properly in different contexts or pronounce it correctly. In order to learn and retain new words, learners should participate in different task- based activities in their classroom whether it is a guessing task, a describing activity or conversation making. Such activities also include vocabulary games which focus on helping learners develop and use words in meaningful contexts and thus, making the lessons enjoyable.

There are many vocabulary games nowadays that can be used in teaching English, but here, I focused my attention on those games which I most frequently used in my classrooms. When I used memory games, guessing games and bingo games, I realized that most of my students not only enjoyed them but they actively participated in the games. To my surprise, even the shyer students wanted to come in front of the classroom when we played mime games, “I spy game” or “Hot! Hot! Hot!” Another thing that I observed when playing games was that most of them could remember new words more quickly and they were able to use new words correctly afterwards. The following SWOT- analysis table evaluates the characteristics of vocabulary games.

Table 4: SWOT-analysis of vocabulary games

As one can see, vocabulary games offer many strengths and opportunities. There are a number of factors that must be taken under consideration when games are used in teaching English. Children will always enjoy games because they like to play. Every time I used games in my classes, children looked enthusiastic about these and wanted to participate. Games help students to learn and to be motivated during the activity. When learning and practicing new words repetition seems to be the key, therefore, games provide the context for repetition not in a boring way but in a funny and enjoyable one. Games can also involve a wide variety of learning styles from visual to dramatic, from kinaesthetic to auditory or creative. However, before playing a game, teachers should pay attention to the number of students, proficiency level, cultural context, timing, learning topic and the classroom settings. Therefore, the results of this research suggest that games are used not only for fun but, more importantly, for the useful practice and review of language lessons, thus, leading towards the goal of improving learners’ communicative competence.

4.6.4. Stories

Stories were also used in teaching and practicing vocabulary during the fourth months of the research. From the questionnaire sheets, I noticed that most of my students, from both classes liked stories very much. 80% of them like to listen to stories and only 20% of them like to read stories themselves. The third grade students were more enthusiastic when they could listen to stories online, because they could also see pictures and it was easier for them to follow the story in this way. On the other hand, the fifth grade students heard the stories from their teacher. The stories that were used in the lessons were “Cinderella”, “The sleeping beauty”, “Hansel and Gretel”, “Rapunzel”, “Ariel the little mermaid” and “the Gingerbread Man”.

Since technology is now a huge part of the human life, I have decided to use the internet when teaching vocabulary through stories. Therefore, I used the stories from: http://princess.disney.com/ariels-story,

http://www.kidsworldfun.com/short-stories/the-gingerbread-man.php.

I have chosen these stories because students are familiar with the characters and the plot and it was easier for them to link new information with their prior knowledge thus, making the input more comprehensible to them. The prior knowledge helped students to complete the pre-, while- and post-listening and reading tasks. I also considered the students’ levels of proficiency. Both the grammatical structures and the vocabulary used in the stories correspond to young learners’ knowledge of the language at their levels of proficiency. Grammar presented in the stories had already been learnt or was being learnt at the moment of instruction. The vocabulary of the stories comprises both words and phrases learnt before and new language. The unknown words, which may cause difficulties when listening or reading the story, are explained with the help of small pictures. These measures facilitate the learning of new vocabulary and give the opportunity to recycle vocabulary learnt and raise learners’ motivation to listen or read the story. The high proportion of unknown words and structures may make young learners feel frustrated and lead them to lose interest in reading. The rich illustrations accompanying the stories also stimulate better understanding of the input. Furthermore, the pictures satisfy young learners’ need for visualizing. Memorizing of new vocabulary goes more smoothly since learners make steady associations between words and pictures and new vocabulary is stored in the long-term memory. The vocabulary of the stories is grouped around certain topics, thus, thematic instruction is provided as well. The stories can be used as an extra aid when teaching particular vocabulary, such as family, animals, the body, etc. The vocabulary used in context is easily memorized and retained because students deal with language in use, not separate words.

The post-listening activities are aimed at checking comprehension, recycling old vocabulary and learning new vocabulary presented in the stories and giving context for speaking. Students are supposed to use different techniques when fulfilling the tasks. Students match the pictures and the words, colour the pictures according to the code, draw small pictures, etc.

The third grade students enjoyed the stories and even though they had some difficulties in fulfilling the tasks, I observed that most of them remembered the sequencing of the stories and were able to complete the vocabulary tasks using the words from the stories. I also noticed that younger students do not like to read stories in English, because they are afraid of making pronunciation mistakes, therefore, they prefer to hear the story told by someone else. Furthermore, I realized that storytelling works better when it is accompanied by pictures or realia. Combining pictures with storytelling is more successful because children can visualize the vocabulary and this helps them to use it correctly.

The fifth grade students, on the other hand, were more confident and they wanted to read stories themselves in the classroom. They also preferred working in groups rather than individually when fulfilling the tasks. From what I could observe, storytelling was a good option to present and revise vocabulary. In addition, it helped children to develop their listening skills as well as comprehension. The lessons were more pleasant and enjoyable due to the fact that students like stories and want to listen to them over and over again. I was also surprised when my students suggested me to have a storytelling competition. They all prepared a story to read in the classroom and the rest of the students had to recognize the title of the story. This was a great opportunity for me to see how my students can use English and how they can use vocabulary in context. I realized that many of them had acquired quite many words and were able to use them correctly when reading their stories. There were some grammar mistakes, but at this level of language, they seem inevitable and, I was more concerned with their vocabulary acquisition.

The following SWOT- analysis shows the positive characteristics of storytelling.

Table 5: SWOT- analysis of storytelling

From table 5 one can see that using stories in teaching English is a great tool for teachers because of their positive characteristics and opportunities. Stories have always been an important part of human beings and they should be used in teaching as well, since they are a means of developing children’s potential as autonomous learners. By using story as a teaching strategy, students’ long term memory is improved, because the language is reinforced through repetition. The use of flashcards and pictures in a story facilitates words acquisition. Stories and games can be used together in the classroom, thus helping children to play with the story and learn in the same time in a warmer atmosphere.

To conclude with stories and games are not only great tool to introduce and practice vocabulary but they also establish good relationships among students and their teacher.

CONCLUSIONS

The goal of this research was to highlight how useful games and stories are in learning and how they should be incorporated into foreign language teaching. By evaluating the usefulness of the SWOT analysis method and then incorporating those practical lessons into theory, one should realise the vast effectiveness of educational games and stories.

In Romania, learning vocabulary has been considered a boring and difficult subject for a long time and the traditional way of learning vocabulary by merely translating words and learning them by heart has proved to be less than effective. Meanwhile, games are still seen as time- filling activity in most English classrooms. Even though words are better understood and memorize in a meaningful context, many teachers are still reluctant to use stories with young children because they are afraid that at this level stories can be too difficult for them. However, from this research, I found that students are demanding a new way of teaching vocabulary, and they themselves are in search of a new way of learning this subject as well. Taking into consideration the study made on various researchers in the field of education in chapter II and III, I can say that the use of games and stories made the language learning process meaningful and fun for the children.

During the implementation of the research, students showed a lot of motivation for learning; first because they loved playing the games and second, because the stories were appealing and interesting to them. The variety of activities made the lessons interesting, fun and motivated the students to participate in an active way. Games also helped me to create a confident and stress- free learning environment where children felt secured and relaxed during the learning time. At first, I thought that using stories would be the most difficult pedagogical technique for me, but I was surprised by the students’ response every time we listen to a story. The students were not only interested in the story, but they demonstrated their understanding of the story and their language learning. This was probably due to the fact that the stories used were familiar to the children and therefore, they could find meaning in the story thus, motivating them to try to improve their ability to understand even more. Furthermore, students have an amazing ability to absorb language when activities are familiar and enjoyable to them. It is important to know what kind of activities children like, such as drawing, singing, acting, moving, etc. when planning the lessons in order to involve children in all the activities. I also observed that with third grade students games involving movement were more successful that other games. Maybe this is because at this age, most of the children are restless and the teacher needs to be patient and needs to vary the activities in order to capture their attention. Through the techniques used and their SWOT- analysis tables, I observed that children of this age enjoy moving, singing, touching, seeing and interacting with other children of the same gender. The students are competing against each other in a productive way while learning grammar, vocabulary or oral skills – or all of them at the same time. Hence, I can say that these techniques facilitated the vocabulary learning of my students.

In order to insure good learning and classroom management, the teacher also needs to plan the game and the playing situation properly. Otherwise, the game will not teach the students anything. When done correctly, games can offer a wide range of teaching materials to spice up the language classrooms. From what I could observe, the successful of games in teaching vocabulary depends on different factors such as:

the simplicity of the game especially in large classes,

the cooperation among the students,

the involvement of all students in the game,

clear instructions facilitate the participation of the children in the game,

pre teaching interactive vocabulary for playing the game and encourage students to use it,

making sure that students understand why a certain game is played can help students make an effort to use English rather than their first language.

As stated in chapter I motivation should be taken into consideration because when students have opportunities to practically use language and vocabulary in a way that is personally meaningful to them, the content learning can be said to be more illuminating and personally motivating. In an encouraging assignment a student will most probably be more focused on the task and thus learning will become truly known, not only memorised.

The same ideas can be applied to stories. Even though children like hearing stories over and over again, it is important when choosing a story to carefully consider whether it is interesting, motivating, and suitable for young children and whether all activities give students an opportunity to develop their language skills. Looking back at my lessons, I dare say they were dynamic and effective. Working with stories helped students develop learning strategies such as listening for general meaning, predicting, guessing meaning and hypothesizing. Using stories allows teachers to introduce new vocabulary by exposing children to the language in different contexts, thereby enriching their thinking skills and introducing them to the productive skills. Another important thing that I observed during the period of my research is that young children like pictures and colourful images, therefore, at this age it is probably a good idea to use pictures with stories because children can associate pictures and words and arrive at a better understanding of the story. A story is more memorable if it can be related to a sequence of pictures. Moreover, games are also a very good tool for students to practice and reinforce the new vocabulary needed to achieve a better understanding of the stories. The games I used in class also helped me to create a relaxing environment. After presenting and practicing the new vocabulary, the children had the opportunity to use the language in a non-stressful way thanks to the games in which they could participate.

To conclude with I can say that learning vocabulary through games and stories is one effective and interesting way that can be applied in any classrooms. The results of this research suggest that games and stories are used not only for mere fun, but also more importantly, for the useful practice and review of language lessons, thus leading toward the goal of improving learners' communicative competence. I have learnt a lot about how to use language games and storytelling methods in English teaching process eg., lesson planning and management, motivation, my pupils and I will utilize the gained knowledge in my further work. Moreover, I can say that working with young children is something interesting and fun but it is also very difficult because children pay far more attention to the whole situation than to language itself. Therefore, the context in which children carry out activities in the primary and secondary classrooms needs to be natural and real, it has to be relevant and to make sense to the children, it has to support children’s understanding and encourage the use of language as a vehicle to do things that have a real purpose. This paper is relevant because it points out that every teacher, every class and every child is different. This is what makes primary and secondary language teaching a unique and dynamic ongoing learning experience, not only for the children but for the teacher too.

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