Teaching Vocabulary Using 3D Films for Toddlers:

As many teachers can attest, many students especially toddlers are more interested in language learning when films are involved, especially 3D cartoon films such as Finding Nemo and Cars. These three films have some linguistic features that can be used as materials for teaching vocabulary for young learners especially toddlers.
Many learning skills can be acquired from these films, but for toddler, vocabulary may be the easiest and practical skill. By using these films, they will learn new vocabulary as well as the visual images to help their understanding, such as under water creatures, kinds of fish, underwater activities, things used when swimming in Finding Nemo. While in Cars, they can learn about the word adjectives such as the characteristics of cars in the movie whether they are good or bad, kind and helpful etc. They will also learn how to apply those new words in simple sentences. So that, they will know the meaning of the new words and know how to apply those new words in simple sentences.
They can learn the new vocabulary in these films by using mind mapping and stem statements techniques. Mind mapping is the technique to remember new words by categorizing them into their groups. It will make them easy to remember those new words. While the stem statements technique is the technique use to help them to memorize the new word by using them in sentences. The use of these activities is to minimize the stress burden that the students have when they are introduced to the new vocabulary. By using these techniques, they will not only memorize and learn the new vocabulary but they also feel it like having fun in learning.
Some supported materials are also needed in this mind mapping learning process such as large papers or cartoon where the teacher can write down the new vocabulary and the children are asked to group those new words. But before that, the students must be introduced the new words while they are watching the films. While for stem statements, the teacher will write some sentences on the large papers and the students are asked to write some words to complete the sentences.
The advantages of using these techniques, besides strengthen their understanding of those new vocabulary, the students can also learn the visual image of the things they learn so that they will remember the words, the meaning and how to use those words in their daily life. Although, these kind of learning techniques give a lot of advantages, but still teachers need to be aware of some features of the films which can be the disadvantages of learning.

Key Words : Vocabulary, 3D films, mindmapping, stem statements


Introduction
Have you ever thought why a language learner (even an advanced one) can hear a difficult English word or phrase literally thousands of times and still cannot use that word in the way that a native speaker does? After several exercises on that words, perhaps he or she can start using the word. Children also experience this. They have heard some new English words, and they are quite familiar with those but they cannot apply them in sentences. This is a classical problem in acquiring new vocabulary, not only for children but also for adult. Before a child can produce sentences in English, she or he must have some vocabulary and they have practiced a lot with those. They may get those vocabularies from school, textbook, magazine, television and also films. Films can be used as the effective media of teaching vocabulary for children, especially toddler because films are interesting, colorful and attractive. They hear new English words from films and they repeat it several times and eventually, they will get familiar with these words. If possible, teacher or parents can accompany them and give them explanation or may be give stress on the words they would like to teach by saying the words aloud and ask them to repeat the words, so that they can listen to the word louder and clearly. After that the teacher can classify the words or vocabulary they learned by using mind mapping. Mind mapping is a diagram which is used to represent words, ideas, thoughts, numbers in a simpler form which connects all the ideas together and hence will be easier for the viewers to quickly grasp the ideas. This technique is used to generate, visualize, structure and classify ideas. The last step is teaching them how to use those new vocabularies in sentences. It is very important because it will mean nothing if they know the words (and the meaning) but they cannot apply or use it in sentences. Stem statement can be used as the media for children (also adult) to practice applying new words in sentences. Stem statement is an illustration of how a sentence is constructed. Here, the subject is the stem and it has several branches where the new words are put, such as adjective, noun, verb and adverb (see illustration 1 and 2). The use of mind mapping and stem statement will help children’s understanding of new words and how to apply them in simple sentences.
Why Vocabulary?
Before a language learner can produce a sentence in English, they must have equipped themselves with sufficient vocabularies. Therefore, learning vocabulary is very important for language learners, especially in early ages where it is said that they have the ability to memorize many words easier than adult. However, the way the teacher present the new vocabulary also play important role in the learning process. The old ways of learning vocabulary such as memorizing some new words and its meaning is considered not effective enough because children only know the meaning of those words without being able to apply them in sentences.
According to Frost (2008), there are several things that students may need to know about learning a vocabulary. They are: (1) What it means,it is vital to get across the meaning of the item clearly and to ensure that your students have understood correctly with checking questions, (2) The form, students need to know if it is a verb/a noun/an adjective etc to be able to use it effectively, (3) How it is pronounced, this can be particularly problematic for learners of English because there is often no clear relation between how a word is written and how it is pronounced, (4) How it is spelt, this is always difficult in English for the reason mentioned above. Remember to clarify the pronunciation before showing the written form, (5) If it follows any unpredictable grammatical patterns, for example, man-men / information (uncountable) and if the word is followed by a particular preposition (e.g. depend on ), (6) The connotations that the item may have, bachelor is a neutral/positive word whereas spinster conjures a more negative image, (7) How the word is related to others, for example, synonyms, antonyms, lexical sets, etc. Perhaps, for teaching children item number 1- 5 will be enough.

Why 3D Films?
There are many things we can do to make the learning process more memorable for our learners, especially for children. Such as using pictures, films, interesting contexts and stories can help memory and giving the children the opportunity to practise the new vocabulary in personalised and meaningful tasks are also essential tools. The idea of using films because they are colourful, attractive, enjoyable, and the characters in the films produces sounds which can be imitated by the children. 3D films, in this case we use Cars and Finding Nemo, are even better because the colour they have are brighter, more lively, more attractive with the actual people voices filled by famous actors and actresses. Classic cartoon films such as Mickey Mouse, Tom and Jerry or maybe Cinderella have less bright colour, less attractive and exposes more on movement or motion instead of the conversations or dialogue between the characters in the films. The other reason is these cartoon films also give simple moral messages to children, for example in Finding Nemo, it teaches the children to obey what parent said and in Cars, it teaches children not be arrogant, selfish and teaches them to be helpful and kind.

Why Using Mind-Mapping?
There are many techniques used in teaching vocabulary. Why using mind mapping? What is mind mapping? How to use it? What are the advantages of using it compared to other techniques? Mind mapping is a diagram which is used to represent words, ideas, thoughts, numbers in a simpler form which connects all the ideas together and hence will be easier for the viewers to quickly grasp the ideas. This technique is used to generate, visualize, structure and classify ideas. Children (also adult) are easier to memorize new words when they are classified based on specific characteristics such as colours, pictures, genre, field, variety, etc. Mind mapping has an organised display of information which will help the children understand the new words they learned. Not only that, it also help them to understand the whole story of the films they watched, because the idea of films converted into a map or draft.
According to Steele (2008) there are several steps need to be considered in making mind mapping, such as: (1) Choosing a topic, in young-adult class, students are given a topic to write on by the teacher and the continue it, but in children class, teacher will make the map or draft by choosing the topics (about Nemo and Cars) and involving the children in making it although the teacher herself who write the sentences, (2) Note making once the topic has been introduced, the teacher encourages the children to close their eyes and think about it for a minute or two, in silence. They then have to say aloud what they think. If they do not know a word in English, they can write it in L1, the the teacher will help translate the word in English, (3) Feedback, the next stage, in which the teacher makes a collective mind map on the board, is optional, but is useful for children who are new to the idea of mind maps, or for weak classes. It is also in this feedback stage that any remaining language problems can be ironed out.
Making a mind map should be a spontaneous pre-writing activity. Students start with a topic at the centre and then generate a web of ideas from that, developing and relating these ideas as their mind makes associations. Mind maps work well as their visual design enables students to see the relationship between ideas, and encourages them to group certain ideas together as they proceed. Mind maps work especially well when created in groups, since the discussion this engenders aids the production of ideas, and makes the task livelier and more enjoyable.
These are the examples of mind mapping of Finding Nemo and Cars.










Why Using Stem Statement?
After being able classifying, understand the words and their meaning, the children are expected to be able to apply those new words in sentences. They will be introduced to stem statement which will help them to make simple sentences. Why using stem statement? What is the advantage? Stem statement is an illustration of how a sentence is constructed. Here, the subject is the stem and it has several branches where the new words are put, such as adjective, noun, verb and adverb. The use of mind mapping and stem statement will help children’s understanding of new words and how to apply them in simple sentences. The advantages of using stem statement is that the children can illustrate how the sentence is constructed, for example a sentence begins with a subject and it can be followed by adjective or verb. For example they have learn some part of speeches in Finding Nemo, such as happy, nervous, afraid (adjectives), play, swim, touch (verb), bubbles, pebbles, coral (noun), and freely, happily, slowly (adverb), and in Cars, rear view mirror, bumper, wheel engine (noun), arrogant, selfish, helpful, kind (adjective), run, fix, start, stop (verb), and also safely, friendly, helpfully, kindly (adverb) but they do not know how to use them in sentences. Firstly, they should be taught which the subject is and how to form the sentence if it is followed by adjectives, noun, verb and adverb.
These are the example of stem statements of Finding Nemo and Cars


Conclusion
Mind mapping and stem statement are two of effective ways in teaching vocabulary for children (toddlers). Mind mapping is used to classify the words and its part of speech while stem statement is used to help children construct the new vocabulary in sentences. Teacher’s role is very important in this kind of learning process considering the students are children. They are not as active and fast as young-adult learners, but with the use of 3D films, they are expected to be active and able to follow the story and remember the words in the films.