Acquiring Vocabulary

29
" Acquiring Vocabulary through Self Study " Beyhan KESKİNÖZ Methodology Assignment MSc in Teaching English Languages Studies Unit, Aston University May 1994 CONTENTS PAGE Section 1 Introduction Section 2:1 Neglect of Vocabulary Section 2:2 Reason for the present emphasis on vocabulary Section 3:1 What does it mean to know a word? Section 3:2 Do we forget words? Section 3:3 How do we store and retain vocabulary? Section 4:1 Vocabulary acquisition strategies: some suggested techniques

description

Acquiring vocabulary

Transcript of Acquiring Vocabulary

" Acquiring Vocabulary

" Acquiring Vocabulary

through Self Study "Beyhan KESKNZ

Methodology Assignment

MSc in Teaching English

Languages Studies Unit, Aston University

May 1994

CONTENTS PAGE

Section 1 Introduction

Section 2:1 Neglect of Vocabulary

Section 2:2 Reason for the present emphasis on vocabulary

Section 3:1 What does it mean to know a word?

Section 3:2 Do we forget words?

Section 3:3 How do we store and retain vocabulary?

Section 4:1 Vocabulary acquisition strategies:

some suggested techniques

Section 4:2 The place of dictionary

Section 5:1 The institution where this study took place

Section 5:2 Problem

Section 6:1 Method

A. Subjects

B. Materials

C. Instruments

D. Procedure

Section 6:2 Results

Section 7 Conclusion

Appendices

This study investigated the possibility of helping the students outside class hours to expand and retain vocabulary through self study strategies.

Two groups of students ages between 18-20, were selected depending on their mid-term test scores administered in the Spring 1994.

A pre-test and post-test, each consisting of 40 questions of vocabulary taught in the Collins Cobuild English Course book2 were prepared and administered by the testing office to determine the degree of success in each group.

The analyses of the two measures indicated that the students in GP1 did better than the students in GP2. Pre-test and post-test findings are handled and implication of this are discussed.

Section 1 Introduction

Communicative value of vocabulary development is not new to anybody in

language teaching, and yet the complexity of vocabulary acquisition prevents some

people from devoting classroom time on vocabulary.

It is possible to save time in language learning. At present, we don't enable our

students to be successful learners outside school hours because we don't give them

learner training. The classroom time is limited, so what we have to do, as guides, is

to help our learners to discover and develop their strategies. I wish to focus on one

specific area of learner training: acquiring vocabulary through self study.

Section 2:1 Neglect of Vocabulary

French (1986p.1-6) mentions two reasons regarding the neglect of vocabulary:

1. The reason why vocabulary was neglected during the period 1940-1970 was that it had been emphasized too much in language classrooms during the years before that time.

2. In the 1950's people began to notice that vocabulary learning in not simply a matter of learning that a certain word in one language means the same as a word in another language.

The belief that one could master the language by learning a certain number of

words in L2 along with the meanings of those words in L1 was wrong. Knowing a

word involves knowing how to use the word syntactically, semantically, and

paradigmatically (Carter 1987 p.181). Some people preferred to teach grammar

rather than teaching vocabulary which, they thought, would be too time consuming.

Section 2:2 Reason for the present emphasis on vocabulary

The idea that meaning operates across sentence boundaries is getting popular

support among language teachers. Overemphasis on grammar in the language

classrooms proved to be unsuccessful as Allen (1983) states:

" Through research the scholars are finding that lexical problems frequently interfere with communication; communication breaks down when people do not use the right words ".

Allen goes on arguing that in the best classes, neither grammar nor vocabulary is

neglected. There is thus no conflict between developing a firm command of

grammar and learning the most essential words. Allen (1983) also mentions some

questions in his book Techniques in Teaching Vocabulary, OUP (pp 1-6).

These questions are important in that they summarise the key problem points in the

language teaching field in terms of vocabulary:

1. Which English words do students need most to learn?

2. How can we make those words seem important to

students?

3. How can so many needed words be taught during the

short time our students have for English?

4. What can we do when a few members of the class

already know words that the others need to learn?

5. Why are some words easier than others to learn?

6. Which aids to vocabulary teaching are available?

7. How can we encourage students to take more

responsibility for their own vocabulary learning?

8. What are some good ways to find out how much

vocabulary the students have actually learned?

Some of these questions can be answered by some computerised research

because computer corpora allows access to detailed and quantifiable syntactic,

semantic and pragmatic information about the behaviour of lexical items

(Carter 1987 p.188). The refined information about words made available by

computer corpora sheds light on problem areas.

Section 3:1 What does it mean to know a word?

Wallace (1988 p.27) argues that knowing a word in the target language at the

native competence level is the ability to:

a) recognize it in its spoken form;

b) recall it at will;

c) relate it to an appropriate object or concept;

d) use it in the appropriate grammatical form;

e) in speech, pronounce it in a recognizable way;

f) in writing, spell it correctly

g) use it with the words it correctly goes with, i.e. in the correct collocation

h) use it at the appropriate level of formality;

i) be aware of its connotations and associations.

To Richards (1974) in Carter & Mc Carthy (1988 p. 44) knowing a word means :

1. Knowing the degree of probability of encountering it and the sorts of words

most likely to be found associated with it (frequency and collocability ).

2. Knowing its limitation of use according to function and situation (temporal,

social, geographical; field, made, etc.).

3. Knowing its syntactic behaviour (e.g. transivity patterns, cases).

4. Knowing its underlying forms and derivations.

5. Knowing its place in a network of associations with other words in the

language.

6. Knowing its semantic value (its composition).

7. Knowing its different meanings (polysemy).

Jeremy Harmer (1992 p.158) summarises knowing a word in the

following way:

WORDSMEANING

Meaning in context

Sense relations

WORD USE

Metaphor and idiom

Collocation

Style and register

WORD INFORMATION

Parts of speech

Prefixes and suffixes

Spelling and pronunciation

WORD GRAMMAR Nouns: countable and

uncountable, etc.

Verb complementation,

phrasal verbs, etc.

Adjectives and adverbs:

position, etc.

These assumptions made in the light of descriptive linguistics, psycholinguistics

and computational linguistics reveal the fact that knowing a word means more than

just understanding its meaning. They reveal the complex nature of the vocabulary

learning process. Then, the lexical part shouldn't be ignored in language teaching.

Carter & McCarthy (1988 p.42) quote Wilkins stating the centrality of meaning:

"Without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed."

Carter & McCarthy also quote Rivers stating that vocabulary can be presented and

explained but ultimately it is the individual who learns: "Students must learn how

to learn vocabulary and find their own ways of expanding organizing their word

stores." Then individualisation and self-management seem to be a necessary

ingredient in language learning. By involving the learner actively in the vocabulary

acquisition process, it is possible to increase efficiency. Having learned L1 learners

have an experience of language learning, which is a great advantage on the part of

the learner. So learners have a lot to contribute from themselves. They must be

involved in this process and they must organize their own learning and form their

own lexicon. Willis (1990 P.130) also argues that the job of the teacher is to help

learners manage their own learning, discover for themselves the best and most

effective way for them to learn.

To understand an utterance, Widdowson argues, we have to use the linguistic

signs as indicators to where meaning is to be found in the context of the immediate

situation of utterance, or in the context of our knowledge and experience. In

language use, meaning is achieved by indexical and not symbolic means. Giving

the following expression:

"The liquid passed down the pipe"

Widdowson (1986) asks: Why is that we understand the pipe referred to here as a

length of tube, rather that a device for smoking tobacco or a Musical Wind

instrument? Because the association of liquid and pipe calls up a familiar frame of

reference, is indexical of a conventional schema.

Wallace (1988 p.64) distinguishes between form and meaning by giving the

following example.

Jack was sitting on the bank of the river,

I am going to the bank to cash a cheque.

He calls them different lexical items because they have different meanings. So

learners must be aware of such indexical meaning in order to be able to use them.

Section 3:2 Do we forget words?

Most of the time we meet learners who complain about forgetting the words

they have learned. Gairns and Redman (1990) mention two theories of forgetting:

1. We need to practise and revise what we learn otherwise the new input will

gradually fade in the memory and ultimately disappear. This is called the

decay theory.

2. Cue-dependent forgetting, which asserts that information does in fact persist

in the memory but we may be unable to recall it. In other words, the failure

is one of retrieval rather than storage.

Gairns and Redman (1990) argue that the second theory is supported by a

number of experiments. In one of these, subjects were given lists of words to learn

and then tested on their powers of recall. Later they were tested again, only

this time they were given relevant information to facilitate recall. For example, if a

list contained the words "sofa", "armchair" and "wardrobe" the subjects would be

given the superordinate "Furniture" as a cue to help them. These experiments

showed that recall was considerably strengthened by appropriate retrieval cues,

thus suggesting that the information was not permanently lost but only "mislaid".

But in both cases one thing is very clear: learners' active involvement is needed

to keep the vocabulary active and this seems to be possible with adequate

strategies. Carter (1987 P.170) mentions a research reported in Cornu (1979) which

indicates that individuals tend to recall words according to the categories or

semantic fields in which they are conceptually mapped. Then, if learners study the

vocabulary in terms of categories and semantic fields, they will be able to retain

more vocabulary for a longer time.

Section 3:3 How do we store and retain vocabulary?

If one wishes to find an answer to the question " Do we store and retain

vocabulary randomly? ", the answer must be "no". Otherwise it would take a long

time to recall words as Gairns & Redman (1990 p.87) state:

Our "mental lexicon' is highly organized and efficient. Were storage of

information haphazard, we would be forced to scan in a random fashion to

retrieve words; this simply is not feasible when one considers the speed at which

we recognize and recall.

Carter & McCarthy (1988) argue that learners make semantic, phonological and

associational links between L1 and L2. It seems that learners can store and retain

vocabulary more easily if they study items relating by topic, forming pairs etc...

That is, they do it in a systematized way. When we think of the number of words in

our mental lexicon, the speed is incredible.

Gairns and Redman (1990 p.88) cited Freedman and Loftus (1971): the subjects

were asked to preform two different types of tasks.

l- Name a fruit that begins with a P

2- Name a word beginning with P that is a fruit.

The subjects were able to answer the first type of question more quickly than the

second. When they are in the fruit category they can remember other fruits more

quickly. Semantically related items are stored together in a series of associative

networks. Gairns and Redman consider word frequency as another variable which

affect storage. Items which occur most frequently are also easily recognized and

retrieved.

Section 4:1 Vocabulary acquisition strategies: some suggested techniques

Ur & Wright (1992 p.4-5) mention a technique which helps vocabulary

acquisition and retrieval: brainstorming round a word. One powerful side of this

technique is that learners are trying to relate the word semantically. Other

variations of the same technique are quite useful in that they help the learner to

think hard on collocability of words. Once learners try to use this technique, I

believe, they will be actively involved in the learning process, which, in the long

run, will help them acquire more vocabulary.

Brainstorming round a word:

Take a word that you have recently learnt, write all the words associated with it.

With a line joining it to the original word in a circle. If the original word was

"clothes", for example you might get:

DRESS

JEANS SCARF

SOCKS CLOTHES SKIRT

HAT COAT

SHIRT

Variation 1 : Limit association in some way. For example, write only adjectives

that can apply to the central noun so "clothes" might get words like: black, old, smart, warm, beautiful.

Variation 2 : A central adjective can be associated with nouns, for example, "warm" could be linked with: day, food, hand, personality. Or a verb can be associated with adverbs, for example, "speak" can lead to: angrily, softly, clearly, convincingly, sadly.

Gairns & Redman (1990) suggest another technique:

Personal Category Sheets

Learners can store new vocabulary as it arises on appropriate category sheets which they can keep on separate pages. These sheets could have headings such

as topic areas or situations, these headings being selected by the student himself. As he acquires new vocabulary, he can add to the sheets and cross-reference them where necessary the information given on these sheets (i.e. meaning, perhaps translation, part of speech, and an example) should be comprehensive as suggested below:

One big advantage of this technique is that Learners can rearrange these by topic,

word-class, etc.

Wallace (1988 p.61) mentions three techniques for storing and memorizing

vocabulary, which also reflect Individualisation and self-management in language

learning.

1. the use of vocabulary cards : The most basic form of vocabulary card has the

target word/ phrase on one side and the translation or explanation on the

other. (later to be arranged by topic)

2. Meaning bridge - Wallace describes this as on attempt to make some sort of

meaning bridge between the target word and its L1 translation.

For example Turkish word "drt" is pronounced something like "dirt",

five rhymes with hive and four rhymes with door

3. At the elementary level learners can be encouraged to make their own

picture dictionaries, using drawings instead of L1 translations.

A means of making the learners think actively about what he is trying to

remember, instead of the mindless repetition which often passes for vocabulary

learning.

Rubin & Thompson (1982 p.49) warn that a memory technique that helps one

person may not help another. They suggest some options :

1- Put the foreign language words in one column and their translations in

another column. Study the list from beginning to end; then study it

backwards.

2- Put the words and their definitions on individual cards or slips of paper; then

study them in varying order.

3- Study the words and their definitions in isolation; then study them in the

context of sentences.

4- Say the words aloud as you study them.

5- Write words over and over again.

6- Tape record the words and their definitions; then listen to the tapes several

times.

7- Underline with a colored pencil the words that cause you the most trouble so

you can give them extra attention.

8- Group words by subject matter-for example fruits, vegetables, professions-

and study them together.

9- Associate words with pictures or similar sounding words in your native

language.

10- Associate words with situations- for example, medicines with illnesses.

Rubin & Thompson's list offers a variety of options allowing for individual

differences. The more systems a learner makes use of and the greater exposure to

target items, the easier it will be to retrieve from a variety of sources (Gains &

Redman 1990). As guides, our job is to show learners how to be systematic

whatever system they adopt.

Section 4:2 The place of dictionary

Hartman stresses the importance of finding the meaning of a word as an

essential ingredient of dictionary use in Bailer (1989 P.130). He lists some of the

difficulties which pupils experience at every stage: searching for an appropriate

headword, understanding the discourse structure of the entry, identifying the

relevant part of the definition, relating the appropriate sense to a given context, and

paraphrasing the word by merging it with the source text. This indicates that the

learner should be able to overcome such problems if he is to take advantage of

dictionary use.

Hartman also warns that learners will often fail to find the information they seek

if they lack the required constituent skills. Then, students must be taught the proper

use of the dictionary. For example, students can be given some exercises which

require rearranging words in alphabetical order, finding derived forms under

another headword, finding out pronunciation, checking spelling and so on. The

dictionary can also give them useful grammatical information.

Wallace 1988 diagnoses choosing the meaning appropriate to a given context

when several meanings are defined as the major problem in the use of the

dictionary.

What type of dictionary to use is another point to be considered. At early stages

a bilingual dictionary can be used, but it is a fact that monolingual dictionaries

encourage students to think in the target language. Harima (1991 p.174) states that

there is nothing wrong with bilingual dictionaries except that they do not usually

provide sufficient information for the students to be able to use. The entries for the

following English words in an English - Turkish bilingual dictionary are all the

same:

float (v): yzmek

skin (v): yzmek

swim (v): yzmek

There is no doubt, then, learners need more than that. They must be offered a better

alternative.

Because of the advancements in computer technology, learners are lucky to find

a monolingual dictionary as Collins Cobuild dictionary (1990). This dictionary

presents a real break away from the traditional ones: It gives examples of real

language i.e. how they are used in actual situations with all types of usages.

Section 5:1 The institution where this study took place

In the School of Foreign Languages, Dokuz Eyll University, zmir, Turkey,

there are about 1800 students who are trained for faculties whose medium of

instruction is English, French and/or German. Every year about 1700 students join

the preparatory classes to study English. They are given a placement test which

also functions as an initial step of the proficiency test. Then they are asked to write

a composition of about 250 words. At each step they are graded on a 100 scale.

After that, the percentages are taken as follows:

Placement test score 70%

Composition test score 30%

Total 100%

If the total score is 70/100 or more, students are eligible to skip the preparatory

program.

The other students are grouped according to the test scores ranging from

beginners to advanced. All groups of the same level are given the same tests

prepared by the testing office during the two semesters each of which is 14

weeks.

Section 5:2 Problem

Fourteen adults chosen randomly have been asked to write down what they have

been doing to enrich their vocabulary acquisition . Half the group said that they

read the dictionary and wrote down the words if they found the words interesting.

Four said they only studied the word in the textbook in lists. One said that he wrote

down the sample sentences in the dictionary and studied those sentences. Two said

that they wrote words on small pieces of paper and read them from time to time.

Discussions with colleagues also revealed that they felt unhappy about the fact that

their students were not doing their best to enrich their vocabulary acquisition. In the

light of these points, I thought, we could help students do better in terms of

vocabulary acquisition by exposing them to some vocabulary acquisition

techniques.

Section 6:1 Method

A. Subjects:

In this study two beginners groups were chosen on the basis of the placement

test given in the Fall 1993. Now the first term was over and the students had just

taken the mid-term test. Depending on the midterm test grades given in the

Spring 1994, 7 students, who had the same grades were selected in each group.

They were adults, aged between 18-20. From now on these groups will be called

GP1 and GP2.

The mid-term test scores for GP1 and GP2 are as follows:

G R A D E S Mean

GP1 80 80 75 70 65 65 50 69

GP2 85 80 75 70 65 60 50 69

B. Materials :

The words to be learned were chosen according to two criteria. First, they had

already been chosen on the basis of sound research by Collins and the English

Language Research Department at Birmingham University. Willis (1990) argues

that the first part of this project had involved the assembly on computer analysis of

a 7.3 million word corpus (later extended to over 20 million words) of spoken and

written English, which was proposed by John Sinclair.

Second, because it was the main course book on the program the students had to

acquire the vocabulary given at the end of each unit in Collins Cobuild English

Course 2 by Jane & Dave Willis, a lexical-based course book, which came

out of the Cobuild Project.

C. Instruments:

Two 40-item, four choice multiple choice tests, a pre-test and a post-test, were

constructed to test retention. Each item consisted of a sentence requiring the use of

one of the target words which appeared at the end of each unit in Collins Cobuild

English Course 2. The distracters were chosen from among the target vocabulary

and were the same part of speech as the correct answer.

The pre-test comprised of the target vocabulary from Unit 6 to Unit 10

inclusive, the post-test was constructed from Unit 11 to Unit 15 inclusive.

D. Procedure:

The two groups studied the above mentioned units with task-based approach as

usual. Both groups were taught by the same instructor. When the pre-test was given

a week later they had covered the units 6 to 10. GP1 was presented the strategies

for vocabulary acquisition, but GP2 wasn't. When the groups were given the

post-test a week later they had covered the Units 11 to 15 inclusive.

The students were not told the purpose of the tests. They thought they were

usual quizzes.

The subjects chosen from each group did not know that they were chosen. When

the tests were administered in both classes only those subjects' papers were used for

comparison. Both groups were given the pre-test after having studied 5 units from

Collins Cobuild English Course 2 by Jane & Dave Willis, and we got the following

results:

G R A D E S Mean

GP1 80 70 63 68 58 75 57 67

GP2 85 70 73 78 55 73 63 71

After that, GP1 was given the strategies mentioned in section 4:1 and a month later

the post-test covering the next 5 units from the same book was given to GP1 and

GP2. The scores are as follows:

G R A D E S Mean

GP1 90 75 73 78 68 85 68 76

GP2 80 70 60 73 60 85 68 70

Section 6:2 Results

When we consider the pre-test results in both groups, there is a 4 point difference

in the mean performance. GP2 did better in the pre-test.

As for the post-test results in both groups the difference in the mean performance

is 6 points and this time it was GP1 who did better.

The difference in the mean performance in GP1 may seem insignificant, but it is

significant when the pre-test and post-test mean performances of GP1 are

compared:

The difference is 9 points.

Another point is that the time during which this experiment was carried out was

rather short. It seems that, in the long run, students may be able to get better results.

Mc Carthy (1990 p.130) quotes Atkinson (1972) stating that learners who

controlled how they learnt words performed 50 per cent better in retention tests

than when they had to study random word lists set for them.

Section 7 Conclusion

Learners learn things better if they are involved in the learning process actively.

As Willis (1990) argues:

The teacher is not the "knower" but merely a guide and we must put some of the responsibility on the learners shoulders. They should search and find for Themselves and formulate their own rules.

So, the best thing to do seems to train learners to take more responsibility for how

and what they learn, which, as a result, will pave way for the encouragement of

learner autonomy. Learners should be helped to discover what strategy is best for

them, and they should be introduced to these strategies as early as possible. It

seems to be a good idea to introduce dictionary using skills too. Then, they will

have learnt to stand on their own feet.

As guides and facilitators, we should also help them realize their success to

increase motivation, demonstrating that success breeds success.

REFERENCES

ALLEN V. F.

1983Techniques in Teaching Vocabulary, OUP.

BAILER R. W.

1989Dictionaries of English, CUP.

CARTER R.

1987Vocabulary, Allen & Unwin.

CARTER R. &

MCCARTHY M.1988Vocabulary and Language Teaching, Longman.

GAIRNS R.&

REDMAN S.

1990Working with Words, Cambridge.

HARMER J

1991The Practice of English Language Teaching, Longman.

MC CARTHY M.

1990Vocabulary, OUP.

RICHARDS J.C.

1989The Context of Language Teaching, CUP

RUBIN J.&

THOMPSON I. 1982How to Be a More Successful Language Learner, Heinle & Heinle Publishers Inc.

UR P.& WRIGHT A.1992Five Minute Activities, CUP.

WALLACE M.J.1988Teaching Vocabulary, HEB

WIDDOWSON H.G 1986Explorations is Applied Linguistics 2, OUP

WILLIS D.

1990The Lexical Syllabus, Collins ELT

WILLIS J. & WILLIS D.1988Collins Cobuild English Course Students book 2, COLLINS.

murder (n) + (v) / ......./ =

to kill sb. by plan or intention against the law