Today's students are visually oriented and video provides a powerful means to reach them. While elementary language textbooks are now including video components, video materials in Portuguese tend to be limited, especially for more advanced students. Video tapes of Brazilian movies or Brazilian television can add a challenging aural testing component to both language and conversation classes. Video materials not only provide visual images of Brazil but may also stimulate discussion when used in conjunction with written worksheets prepared by the teacher. Rather than use the video in a passive manner, simple testing of aural comprehension encourages the students to listen and thus makes them active participants in the construction of meaning in the video transmission.

Among the possible materials for video use are Brazilian films, many of which are available at school libraries, even video stores. «Black Orpheus», «Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands», «Bye Bye Brazil», and «The Hour of the Star», are among the widely acclaimed films that students enjoy. If the teacher travels to Brazil and tapes television footage or is able to tape television commercials, newscasts, and scenes from telenovelas from a satellite, these taped materials can be used for aural comprehension exercises and discussion. The teacher must first preview the material, select a scene or segment that has vocabulary or grammatical structures that emphasize materials studied in class, and then transcribe the segment. Initially, this requires a substantial time investment, but the teacher can control the material, and the results are very rewarding. These segments can be used once a week towards the end of the semester, or once every other week during the entire semester. Since conversation classes tend to move faster, the teacher can show entire films in conjunction with these comprehension exercises.

After transcribing the segments, the teacher then provides a handout to include background material such as a written summary of the plot or useful vocabulary. These handouts may be distributed the day before the video so that students are able to ask questions prior to viewing the segment. The teacher can also begin with some class discussion before the viewing.

To develop aural skills, transcripts can be given to students with key words left blank. They will have to listen for the words to complete the sentence. When the segment is first presented, the students should be encouraged to follow the transcript without writing. With successive viewings, the teacher should suggest that students write phonetically if necessary, and then make sense of the word by its context later. Generally, the students will need to listen to a segment three to five times before they can fill in the blanks. Since using a film with subtitles is more distracting, the teacher may want to darken the screen if the English interferes with the students' aural comprehension in Portuguese, and then view it normally. By watching the scene that follows the transcribed one, the teacher can ask the students for an oral or written summary. If students are required to hand in the material at the end of class, there is added incentive to pay attention. If students seem very frustrated, the teacher may read the entire transcript aloud as a final exercise.

Another exercise is answering oral or written questions about the video. This exercise can involve a review of important structures such as the subjunctive, which is often used when students are giving their opinion. An exercise in intonation and pronunciation is another possibility. After listening to the native speaker on the tape, the students attempt to use the correct intonation by reading the transcript aloud.

The Portuguese class that worked with this project complained that everyone spoke too fast on the video; however, the students impressed me with how much they actually understood. One student compared the aural testing with video to the language lab, but liked the video better because the teacher was there to supervise and answer questions. This exercise satisfied the class plea to «see a movie». While seeing an entire movie is valid and stimulating in its own way, this exercise forces the student to listen closely and carefully.

The use of video with transcription is a possibility for teachers wishing to use video materials in a more active way. This avoids the passivity of the video image and stimulates the students' aural comprehension and encourages their active use of the language as they make sense of the video transcript and express their opinions in discussion.

Hispania [Publicaciones periódicas]. Volume 74, Number 3, September 1991