Powerful Vocabulary Acquisition through Texts Comparison

Mohammad Reza Hasannejad, Hamid Bahador, Seyyed Ali Kazemi

Abstract


This study aimed to investigate if dual version reading comprehension had a positive effect on Intermediate EFL students’ general vocabulary acquisition, receptive and productive knowledge of vocabulary and students’ synonymous power of words. Two groups were selected - the experimental group and the control group. The study included: (1) four pretests (2) the dual version reading comprehension, and (3) four posttests. It was found that there was no significant difference between the two groups of students on the pretests. However there was a significant difference between the two groups of the students on the posttests. Overall, the dual version reading comprehension vocabulary-learning made the experimental group learners outperformed the control groups in terms of their performance on four types of vocabulary tests. This indicates that students following dual version reading comprehension were more successful in vocabulary acquisition, and developing their receptive knowledge of vocabulary, transferring their receptive knowledge in to the productive knowledge and enhancing the memorization of the synonymous words.

 


Keywords


Dual version reading comprehension, Receptive knowledge, Productive knowledge, Synonymous power

Full Text:

PDF

References


Bengeleil, N. F., & Paribakht, T. S. (2004). L2 reading proficiency and lexical inferencing by university EFL learners. The Canadian Modern Language Review, 61(2), 225-249.

Clarke, D. F., & Nation, I. S. P. (1980). Guessing the meanings of words from context: Strategy and techniques. System, 8(3), 211-220.

Coady, J. (1993). Research on ESL/EFL vocabulary acquisition: Putting it in context. In T. Huckin, M. Haynes & J. Coady (Eds.), Second language reading and vocabulary learning (pp. 3-25). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

DeCarrico, J. S. (2001). Vocabulary learning and teaching. In M. Celce-Murica, (Ed.), Teaching English as a second or foreign language (3rd ed., pp. 285-299). Boston, MA: Heinle & Heinle.

Frazer, C.A. (1999). Lexical processing strategy use and vocabulary learning through reading. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 21, 225-241.

Gass, S. (1999). Discussion: Incidental vocabulary learning. Second language reading and vocabulary learning, 21, 319-333.

Huckin, T., & Coady, J. (1999). Incidental vocabulary acquisition in a second language. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 21, 181-193.

Kelly, P. (1991). Lexical ignorance: The main obstacle to listening comprehension with advanced foreign language learners. IRAL, 29, 135-149.

Krashen, S. (1989). Language acquisition and language education. London: Prentice Hall.

Laufer, B. (1997). The lexical plight in second language reading. In J. Coady & Y. Huckin (Eds.), Second language vocabulary acquisition (pp. 21-34). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Nagy, W. E., Herman, P. A., & Anderson, R. C. (1985). Learning words from context. Reading Research Quarterly, 20, 233-253.

Nation, I. S. P. (1990). Teaching and learning vocabulary. New York: Newberry House.

Nation, I. S. P., & Waring, R. (1997). Vocabulary size, text coverage and word lists. In N. Schmitt & M. MaCarthy (Eds.), Vocabulary: Description, acquisition, and pedagogy (pp. 6-19). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Nation, P. (2001). Learning vocabulary in another language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Oxford, R. L. (1990). Language learning strategies: What every teacher should know. Boston: Newbury House.

Schmitt, N. (2000). Vocabulary in language teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Thornbury, S. (2002). How to teach vocabulary. London: Longman.

Wilkins, D. A. (1972). Linguistics in language teaching. London: Edward Arnold Williams, R. (1985). Teaching vocabulary recognition strategies in ESP reading. ESP Journal, 4, 121-131.

Yu-Kuo, H. (2008). The effect of Lexical Inferencing on Vocabulary Acquisition and Reading Comprehension. Unpublished MA thesis, National Chung Cheng University, Japan.

Zimmerman, C.B. (1997). Historical trends in second language vocabulary instruction. In J. Coady and T. Huckin (Eds), Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.4n.2p.213

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Bookmark and Share


Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

2012-2023 (CC-BY) Australian International Academic Centre PTY.LTD. 

International Journal of Applied Linguistics and English Literature

To make sure that you can receive messages from us, please add the journal emails into your e-mail 'safe list'. If you do not receive e-mail in your 'inbox', check your 'bulk mail' or 'junk mail' folders.