‘Good for binge-watchers!’: Exploring the effect of watching and making interactive videos on EFL students’ purposeful vocabulary learning

With the ever-growing interest in the purposeful adoption of emerging digital tools in language classrooms, interactive learning environments are playing a more prominent role in educating the new generation of students. Using an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design, this study aimed to investigate how EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students’ vocabulary knowledge and immediate learning experience can be developed through individually watching interactive videos as the weekly assignment and collaboratively creating interactive videos as the course project. To collect the quantitative data, we used a vocabulary test and to collect the qualitative data, we used semi-structured interviews and narrative reflections. The results demonstrated that the students in the experimental group outperformed the ones in the control group. The findings further showed that seven features of interactive videos, i.e. multimodal input contextualisation, optimal question format, adaptive learner-oriented instruction, interaction-rich learning space, integration of current educational technologies, self-made digital stories, and real-time games potentially facilitate students’ vocabulary learning. The students’ narrative reflections on the joint production of interactive videos further highlighted the role of learners’ flow zone, movie-based learning situations, and peer learning. This study promises implications for technology-assisted interactive language instruction.