TEACHING BE LIKE CONSTRUCTION IN INFORMAL COMMUNICATION TO UNIVERSITY MAJORS IN LANGUAGES

Abstract

Using be like construction to render utterances, as well as enact thoughts and feelings is a new feature of informal communication in English. Learning this construction helps to make speech more expressive and natural. However, no methods of teaching the quotative be like have been suggested so far. The paper describes an experiment testing the effectiveness of using authentic audiovisual materials to teach be like construction to university majors in languages. The findings revealed that watching and analyzing clips from the popular TV show Friends and videos from YouTube enabled the students from the experimental group to master the construction. While completing the test the students showed a considerable level of grammatical accuracy in using be like construction in its typical functions. They also expressed their emotional reaction to the utterance they were rendering.  The students of the control group showed a lower level of performance, which suggests that quotative be like is difficult to master without visual material. The findings can be useful for compiling teacher’s guides to teaching quotative like to university majors in languages and high school students.