The Impact of Video-Based Instruction on Railway Engineering Students’ Essay Writing Performance

The study investigated the extent to which watching videos could affect railway engineering students’ essay writing on topics related to their major and explored their perceptions and views of the benefits of watching videos on their essay writing performance. The participants were 30 railway engineering students at Iran University of Science and Technology. The instruments were pre and posttests of writing along with two open-ended questions. The results revealed that the difference between the scores obtained from the pretest and posttest was statistically significant, implying that the students performed better on the essay writing after watching six videos related to their field. The results also indicated that the learners considered watching videos a good way to improve their writing skill. They also held the view that watching videos could provide them with useful ideas for writing, improve their listening and writing skills, and improve their pronunciation and accent. This study recommends that the EAP teachers provide the students with various videos related to their major in order to improve their writing skills.