Abstract
Longitudinal experimental research has been conducted for several years in order to examine the effects of the use of CALL system on English language activities in elementary schools. The purpose of this study is to reveal the relation between the amount of learning and perceptual ability of English by Japanese elementary school students. One hundred and seventeen students in the 3rd grade participated during the period. As indexes for the amounts of learning, (a) the total number of task blocks completed, (b) the number of different kinds of tasks, (c) total learning time, and (d) the number of task blocks completed per hour, were calculated. As indexes for the English perceptual ability, (1) a character recognition test (capital alphabet letters), (2) a perception test of syllables, and (3) a phonological perception test, were conducted at the end of the academic year. A correlation analysis was conducted, and it was found that there was a weak correlation tendency between the character recognition test (that is, (1)) and the number of different kinds of tasks (i.e., (b)), whereas there were some correlations (r = .29 - .57) between speech perception ability (i.e., (2) and (3)) and the amount of learning (especially (a), (b), and (d)). These results show that the children who intensively tackled as many and as varied tasks as possible using CALL materials would make much further progress in their speech perception.
