Teaching english at the university level through short stories and multimedia

This thesis proposes a technique for teaching English through short stories and multimedia combined towards motivation enhancement, cultural and vocabulary comprehension and a contextual view of language. The purpose of this research is to see if teaching English through short stories and multimedia is a good way to enhance students' motivation and capacity to understand the language. This research was based on three linguistic views, The Natural Approach, the Total Physical Response Storytelling Method, and the Cognitive Approach. Several aspects of each methodology were taken into account to develop a specific technique that could be applied in the different universities in Cuenca. The results and conclusions were based on experiences had in English classes at different universities in Cuenca, combined with the study of the theoretical framework which included both printed and online texts; also, numerous surveys and studies were carried out to prove the hypothesis. This fact made it possible to triangulate all the information and draw conclusions in order to show that teaching English by using short stories and multimedia, if performed correctly, can be very effective for successful language acquisition. Teaching English through short stories and multimedia has been thought of as a way to help teachers enhance student motivation within regular classes, as well as to help students become more aware of vocabulary, idioms, and cultures. Several techniques have appeared recently with technology advances, and with the use of some creativity, they can greatly help to develop skills in English students.Magíster en Lengua Inglesa y Lingüística AplicadaCuenc