The Impact of Context on Enhancing EFL Students’ Understanding of Phrasal Verbs: The Archers Podcast as an Example

Abstract

Context is deemed important to understand the target language in that it provides the clues necessary for students to decode the meaning of the target vocabulary. One problematic area for students, it seems, is phrasal verbs, which are a characteristic feature of English. This research, thus, aimed to investigate the impact of context—the Archers podcast as an example—on enhancing 1st year EFL students' understanding of phrasal verbs at Mohammed Seddik Ben Yahia University, Jijel. It is hypothesized that the Archers podcast, providing the necessary contextual clues, will have a positive impact on enhancing 1st year EFL students’ understanding of phrasal verbs. To test the aforementioned hypothesis, the researchers used a quasi-experimental design, analyzing by so doing the students’ answers provided in the treatment phase as well as comparing the pre-test and post-test results. The post-test revealed that the students’ scores were statistically superior, showing that context has a positive impact on the students’ understanding of phrasal verbs, confirming thus the posited hypothesis.