Mobile Game-Based Learning Approach and The Speaking Skill

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the influence of mobile game-based learning approach in the speaking skill in students of the first semester of the Carrera de Pedagogía de los Idiomas Nacionales y Extranjeros de la Universidad Técnica de Ambato. It is a bibliographic study with a quantitative approach, and a quasiexperimental design. The students were divided into a control group with 14 students and an experimental group with 11. A pre-test was applied, which was taken as a posttest at the end of the process. For this, the Cambridge A2 KEY exam speaking paper was used, from which the second phase of the first part and the first phase of the second part were taken. The lowest scoring students were chosen to be part of the experimental group. This group was exposed to twelve virtual treatments divided equally by criteria: grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and interactive communication. Each session lasted 1 hour. During this process, mobile game applications and web-based learning games focused on developing students' speaking skills were used. To corroborate the hypothesis, a t-test was performed using the SPSS program. Finally, it was concluded that the implementation of the MGBL approach did influence the development of the speaking skill of the students of the experimental group. In addition, it was evidenced that the criterion that obtained the best results was vocabulary, followed by interactive communication, grammar and pronunciation, respectively.