The effectiveness of word cards versus guess from context on the retention of vocabulary of junior high chool students in Tra Vinh city

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Bài nghiên cứu này so sánh tính hiệu quả của việc hướng dẫn học sinh 2 biện pháp học từ vựng “học bằng thẻ” và “học bằng cách đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh” với mục tiêu nhằm xác định hiện pháp hướng dẫn nào tốt hơn trong việc giúp các em học được nhiều từ vựng và biện pháp nào có thể giúp các em ghi nhớ từ vựng lâu hơn. Bên cạnh đó, bài nghiên cứu cũng muốn tìm hiểu thái độ nhận thức của các em đối với tính hiệu quả của 2 biện pháp học từ vựng này.

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Nội dung Text: The effectiveness of word cards versus guess from context on the retention of vocabulary of junior high chool students in Tra Vinh city

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING CAN THO UNIVERSITY VÕ THANH VŨ THE EFFECTIVENESS OF WORD CARDS VERSUS GUESS-FROM-CONTEXT ON THE RETENTION OF VOCABULARY OF JUNIOR HIGH CHOOL STUDENTS IN TRA VINH CITY Major: Principles and Methods in English Language Education Program code: 60 14 10 Degree: Master of Education Supervisor: MS. HỒ PHƯƠNG THÙY CẦN THƠ, 2010
Luận văn đính kèm theo đây với tựa đề tài: “THE EFFECTIVENESS OF WORD CARDS VERSUS GUESS-FROM- CONTEXT ON THE RETENTION OF VOCABULARY OF JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN TRA VINH CITY” do học viên Võ Thanh Vũ thực hiện và báo cáo đã được Hội Đồng Chấm Luận văn thông qua. Chủ tịch HĐ Thư ký HĐ (Ký tên) (Ký tên) Phản biện 1 Phản biện 2 (Ký tên) (Ký tên) 1
STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify that this thesis entitled “The effectiveness of word cards versus guess-from-context on the retention of vocabulary of junior high school students in Tra Vinh City” is my own work, except where due reference is made in the text of the thesis. I declare that this thesis has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma at any other situations. Supervisor Cần Thơ, 2010 Ms. HỒ PHƯƠNG THÙY VÕ THANH VŨ 2
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my supervisor Ms. Ho Phuong Thuy for her insightful guidance and support. Without her professional advice and valuable guidance, the completion of this M.A. thesis would have been extremely difficult. I also take the chance to express my deepest gratitude to the all the instructors of the MA class course 15 who have provided me valuable knowledge during the time I studied at Can Tho University. Thank you very much for your assurance and guidance! You are always the good examples for me to follow! I would like to express my special thanks to all my comrades in MA class course 15 who have helped me a lot in the process of writing this thesis by reading my thesis, giving advices and supports. My special thanks also go to the administrators of Ly Tu Trong Junior High School who have given me the best conditions to access the classes to do the research. I am also owed my thanks to all the students who have enthusiastically participated in the study. Finally, I could not finish my thesis without the support and assurance from my mother, my father and sisters. Thank you my wife for taking good care of my son when I am studying away from home. 3
ABSTRACT This study compared the effectiveness of training the learners on two vocabulary learning strategies (VLS) “word cards” and “guess-from-context” on young learners of English in Tra Vinh City with the aims to identify which vocabulary instruction method was superior to the other and which vocabulary instruction method lead to a longer term of vocabulary retention over longer span of time. In the same way, the study also aimed to investigate learners’ perception on the usefulness of the two vocabulary instruction methods. In the experiment, two groups of 73 junior high school participants in Tra Vinh City learned 20 English words via two vocabulary instruction methods “word cards” and “guess-from-context” respectively. Before the research, they were trained on how to employ these two vocabulary learning strategies to learn the words. Simultaneously, a vocabulary pre-test was also conducted with both of the groups to choose 20 unknown words for the study to ensure that all the participants were at the same starting point. After the treatment period, the desirable data were collected by utilizing three research instruments namely immediate posttests, delayed posttests and small group interviews. Then, the quantitative and qualitative data were statistically analyzed with the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS). The results showed that the bilingual word cards were more effective than guess-from-context in term of vocabulary retained i.e. 83% and 80% of the words were successfully recalled by the group instructed with bilingual word cards, whereas 69.61% and 70.39% of the words were successfully recalled by the group instructed with guess-from-context in the immediately posttest and delayed posttest respectively. However, the results also showed that the guess-from-context method could enhance stable long term retention of the target words in comparing with the word cards method. Though word cards method could help learners to learn more words than the guess-from-context method, many of the words were forgotten easily over a short span of time. In addition, the results of the interviews showed that the participants preferred bilingual word cards to guess-from-context, but they thought that guess-from-context was also useful for vocabulary development. As a result, they agreed that these two vocabulary learning strategies should be continuously applied in the following classes but in combination with other vocabulary learning strategies. Based on the findings, the current study also offered some recommendations to teachers and students with the hope to facilitate their vocabulary teaching and learning processes. Key words: vocabulary learning strategy, guess-from-context, bilingual word cards, vocabulary instruction method, vocabulary retention, learners’ perception, young learners. 4
TÓM TẮT Bài nghiên cứu này so sánh tính hiệu quả của việc hướng dẫn học sinh 2 biện pháp học từ vựng “học bằng thẻ” và “học bằng cách đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh” với mục tiêu nhằm xác định hiện pháp hướng dẫn nào tốt hơn trong việc giúp các em học được nhiều từ vựng và biện pháp nào có thể giúp các em ghi nhớ từ vựng lâu hơn. Bên cạnh đó, bài nghiên cứu cũng muốn tìm hiểu thái độ nhận thức của các em đối với tính hiệu quả của 2 biện pháp học từ vựng này. Trong quá trình thực hiện đề tài, 2 nhóm học sinh bao gồm 73 học sinh trung học cơ sở tại TP. Trà Vinh đã tham gia học 20 từ vựng thông qua 2 biện pháp hướng dẫn học từ vựng khác nhau “học bằng thẻ” và “học bằng cách đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh”. Trước quá trình thực nghiệm, 2 nhóm học sinh này đã được hướng dẫn để biết được cách áp dụng 2 biện pháp này để học từ vựng. Và cũng trong giai đoạn này, một bài kiểm tra đầu khóa cũng được tiến hành với 2 nhóm học sinh để chọn ra 20 từ mà tất cả học sinh trong hai nhóm đều chưa được học nhằm đảm bảo rằng cả hai nhóm cùng có chung một điểm xuất phát. Sau thời gian thực nghiệm, dữ liệu nghiên cứu được thu thập thông qua 3 công cụ chính: bài kiểm tra cuối khóa, bài kiểm tra cuối khóa sau một thời gian trì hoãn và các cuộc phỏng vấn học sinh theo nhóm. Sau đó dữ liệu định lương và dữ liệu định tính được phân tích thống kê với phần mềm thống kê xã hội học (SPSS). Kết quả phân tích cho thấy biện pháp học từ bằng thẻ thật sự hiệu quả hơn biện pháp đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh vì có đến 83% và 80% số lượng từ vựng đã được học sinh nhớ lại thành công với biện pháp học này qua 2 bài kiểm tra cuối khóa, trong khi đó chỉ có 69.61% và 70.39% số lượng từ vựng được học sinh nhớ lại thành công với biện pháp đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh. Tuy nhiên, kết quả phân tích cũng cho thấy rằng việc ghi nhớ từ vựng thông qua biện pháp đoán từ theo ngữ cảnh mang tính vững bền hơn. Mặc dù học từ vựng bằng thẻ có thể giúp học sinh học được nhiều từ vựng, nhưng các em rất dễ quên những từ vừa mới học. Bên cạnh đó, kết quả phân tích của các cuộc phỏng vấn cho thấy học sinh thích học từ vựng bằng cách sử dụng thẻ hơn là đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh, nhưng các em cũng cho rằng học từ vựng bằng cách đoán nghĩa của từ dựa vào ngữ cảnh thật sự hữu ích cho việc phát triển vốn từ vựng. Chính vì thế, nên các em cho rằng 2 biện pháp học từ vựng này nên được tiếp tục áp dụng cho các tiết học trong thời gian sắp tới. Tuy nhiên, các em muốn chúng được áp dụng phối hợp với những biện pháp khác để tránh sự nhàm chán có thể xảy ra khi áp dụng 1 biện pháp duy nhất trong 1 thời gian dài. Dựa vào những kết quả đã thu thập được, bài nghiên cứu này cũng đưa ra một số kiến nghị dành cho quí thầy cô giáo và học sinh với mong muốn tạo được phần nào sự dễ dàng cho quá trình dạy và học từ vựng của họ. 5
TABLE OF CONTENTS Certificate of originality ........................................................................................ 2 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................ 3 Abstract.................................................................................................................. 4 Tóm tắt .................................................................................................................. 5 Table of contents .................................................................................................... 6 List of abbreviations ............................................................................................... 9 List of tables..........................................................................................................10 List of figures ........................................................................................................11 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 The rationale of the study……………………………………………….12 1.2 The purpose of the study ……………………………………………….14 1.3 The background of the study …………………………………………...14 1.4 The outline of the thesis ………………………………………………..15 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Guess from the contexts and bilingual word cards……………...……...16 2.2 Research on vocabulary retention………………………………………19 2.3 Research on learner’s preference and perception towards vocabulary learning strategies ……………………………………………………...21 2.4 Review of the related studies …………………………………………..22 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 3.1 Research questions and hypotheses ……………………………………25 3.1.1 Research questions ……………………………………………25 3.1.2 Research hypotheses ………………………………………….25 3.2 Research design ………………………………………………………...26 3.3 Participants ……………………………………………………………..26 3.4 Research instruments…………………………………………………...28 3.4.1 Vocabulary tests ………………………………………………28 3.4.1.1 Vocabulary pre-test ………………………………….28 3.4.1.2 Vocabulary immediate posttest ……………………...29 6
3.4.1.3 Vocabulary delayed posttest ………………………...31 3.4.2 Interview ……………………………………………………...31 3.5 Materials ………………………………………………………………..33 3.5.1 The target words ……………………………………………...33 3.5.2 The course book ………………………………………………34 3.5.3 The implementation of (WC) and (GFC)...……………………37 3.5.3.1 The implementation of word cards ………………….37 3.5.3.2 The implementation of guess-from- context ………..38 3.6 Data collection procedures …………………………………………….40 3.6.1 The preparation stage …………………………………………41 3.6.2 The implementation stage …………………………………….41 3.6.3 The data collection stage ……………………………………...42 3.7 Data analysis methods ………………………………………………….44 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 4.1 Findings on the effectiveness of the two vocabulary instruction methods ………………………….………………………...46 4.1.1 Vocabulary immediate posttests……...………………………46 4.1.2 Vocabulary delayed posttests ………………………………...47 4.2 Findings on vocabulary retention of the two vocabulary instruction methods ………………………..…………………………..49 4.2.1 Comparison the mean scores between the immediate posttest and delayed posttest within the control group ……..…....49 4.2.2 Comparison the mean scores between the immediate posttest and delayed posttest within the experimental group ……...49 4.3 Findings of vocabulary interview ……………………………………...52 4.3.1 Participants’ most frequently used vocabulary learning strategies and the usefulness of the two vocabulary instruction methods ……………………………………………….52 4.3.2 Participants’ preference of word cards and guess-from-context ………………………………………………54 4.3.3 Participants’ perception on the difficulties 7
of using word cards and guess-from-context …………………….56 4.3.4 Participants’ perception on the continue application of WC and GFC to learn the vocabulary ………………………...58 4.4 Discussion ……………………………………………………………...59 4.4.1 Vocabulary retention ………………………………………….59 4.4.2 Preference and perceived usefulness of the two methods …….60 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 5.1 Summary of findings …………………………………………………...62 5.2 Pedagogical implications ………………………………………………63 5.3 Limitation of the current study and some suggestion for future research ……………………………………………………...64 REFERENCES …………………………………………………………………...66 APPENDICES Appendix 1 Analysis to choose the target words ……..…………………………...71 Appendix 2 Vocabulary pretest ……………………………………………………73 Appendix 3 Vocabulary posttest ………………………………………………… .79 Appendix 4 Vocabulary delayed posttest ………………………………………….82 Appendix 5 Raw data of immediate posttests...………………….………………...85 Appendix 6 T-test on immediate posttests....…………………….………………...88 Appendix 7 Raw data on delayed posttests..…………………….…………….…...88 Appendix 8 T-test on delayed posttests…....…………………….………………...92 Appendix 9 Raw data of GFC group in the recall tests..………….……………......93 Appendix 10 Anova test within the GFC group ………………….………………..96 Appendix 11 Raw data of WC group in the recall tests...……….………………....97 Appendix 12 Anova test within the WC group ....……………….……………….100 Appendix 13 Interview (Vietnamese version)………………….………………...101 Appendix 14 Interview (English version)………………………………………...102 Appendix 15 Interview sample transcription……………………. . ……………..103 8
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ANOVA : Analysis of Variance CALL : Computer Assisted Language Learning. GFC : Guess-From Context L1 : First Language L2 : Second Language M : Mean Scores SD : Standard Deviation SPSS : Statistical Package for the Social Science VLS : Vocabulary learning strategy WC : Word cards 9
LIST OF TABLES CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY Table 3.1: Participants’ records for the first semester of the school year 09-10 …..……………………………………………..26 Table 3.2: Categorization of the target vocabulary used in this research paper ……………………………………………………33 Table 3.3: An example of the division of one unit in the English course book 8 …………………………………………………...34 Table 3.4: Time frame of the study ………………………………………………..39 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION Table 4.1: Descriptive statistic of the immediate posttests between the two groups …………………………………………………46 Table 4.2: Descriptive statistic of the mean scores of the 20 target words in the delayed posttests between the two groups ………………...48 Table 4.3: Descriptive statistic of the mean scores of the 20 target words in the immediate and delayed posttests within the control group(GFC) .............49 Table 4.4: Descriptive statistic of the mean scores of the 20 target words in the immediate and delayed posttests within the experimental group …...50 Table 4.5: Most frequently used and most effective vocabulary learning strategies on the interviewees’ perception …………………………….. 53 Table 4.6: Participants’ perceived-usefulness of WC and GFC …………………..54 Table 4.7: Participants’ preference of WC and GFC ……………………………...55 Table 4.8: Participants’ perception on the difficulties of WC and GFC methods …………………………………………………….56 Table 4.9: Participants’ perception on the continue application of WC and GFC to learn the vocabulary …………………………………….58 10
LIST OF FIGURES CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW Figure 2.1 Model of human information processing………..…………………….20 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION Figure 4.1 The result of the immediate and delayed posttests between two groups …………………………………………………..48 Figure 4.2 The comparison of the mean scores within the GFC group and WC group after the immediate and delayed posttests ………........52 11
CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION The Introductory Chapter was constructed in 4 main sections. (1)The rationale of the study would be presented in Section 1. This part would briefly discuss the vital role of vocabulary in the process of second language learning and the need for training the learners on vocabulary learning strategies. In this part, the contradiction between teachers and students’ perception on the efficacy of the two vocabulary learning strategies namely word cards and guess-from-context would also be presented. (2) Then, the purpose of this study would be clearly stated in Section 2. (3) Next, Section 2 would describe the back ground of the study. (4)Lastly, the outline of the thesis would be found in Section 4. 1.1 The rationale of the study Vocabulary knowledge is significant for language acquisition and is a prerequisite for successful communication. Wilkins (1972, as cited in Tassana-ngam 2004, p.47) said that “The fact is that while without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed”. He stressed on to the vital role of vocabulary as we had inadequate knowledge of a new language, some separated words probably made the communication possible. Significantly, McCarthy (2001, p.2) stated that “language is lexis-driven; therefore, vocabulary learning is the real key to second language learning”. He suggested that learners would be more successful if they could develop their own techniques or disciplines, i.e. “strategies”, for vocabulary learning. Gu and Johnson (1996) supported this idea by saying: “The most successful learners were those who actively employed a wide range of vocabulary learning strategies, while the least successful learners used a much more limited range. Successful strategy users needed a strategy for controlling their strategy use. This involved choosing the most appropriate strategy from a range of known options and deciding how to pursue the strategy and when to switch to another strategy”. However, in reality not all the learners who were at their early stage of language learning could develop and control their own “techniques” to learn a large amount of vocabulary of the second language. 12
Therefore, their vocabulary learning was usually slow and ineffective. To solve the problem, Nation (1990, p159) suggested that the learners should be trained on vocabulary learning strategies in order that they could control their learning process: “Because of the large number of low frequency words and because of their infrequent occurrence and narrow range, it is best to teach learners strategies for dealing with these words rather than to teach the words themselves”. From these points of view, it was essential for the teacher to train learners on a wide range of vocabulary learning strategies to cope with the language instead of explicitly teaching them the words Research papers on L1 language acquisition have found that children appear to learn words at a rapid rate. An average 10-year-olds native speaker would encounter one million words each year, of which approximately 20,000 words would be unfamiliar in their written form (Anderson and Freebody, 1983). They might add as many as 3,000 words per year to their reading vocabulary (Nagy and Herman, 1984), but only 200-300 of these words could be benefited by explicit vocabulary instruction in the classroom (Jenkins and Dixon, 1983). Sternberg (1987) stated that children learn most L1 new words incidentally through extensive reading with the learners guess the meaning of the unknown words from the context. Reading researchers in second language acquisition believed that, as discussed by Morrison (1996), L2 readers should develop ways of handling new words similar to those L1 readers use through the incidental vocabulary learning i.e. the words were learned accidentally as a result of multiples exposures in various contexts. Significantly, Huckin and Coady (1999) seemed to agree that L2 vocabulary learning mainly occurs through extensive reading with the learner guessing the meaning of unknown words. These empirical evidences showed that guess-from-context was very positive for L1 learners’ vocabulary expansion and it might be useful for L2 learners. Therefore, it was necessary to conduct an empirical research to investigate the effectiveness of this vocabulary learning strategy on L2 learners. Though guess-from-context strategy was said to be useful for L2 learners’ vocabulary development and should be applied for their vocabulary learning, the L2 13
learners preferred making use of L1 translation in their process of vocabulary learning. Xiuping (2004) proved that Chinese learners of English hold high positive beliefs on the role of rote learning. Supporting to this evidence, recent studies of (Grace, 1998; Prince, 1996; Qian, 1996; Sze, 1998; cited in Ma, 2008) reported that the retention of vocabulary learned by using L1 translations outperformed that by guess-from-context. As a result, the contradiction between the teachers and students perception on the efficacy of the two vocabulary learning strategies made this topic interesting to investigate. From the basis of these realistic goals, I decided to carry out this research on comparing the effectiveness of training the young learners in Tra Vinh City on two vocabulary learning strategies namely guess-from-context and L1 translation (bilingual word cards) in term of vocabulary retention. In the same way, I also want to investigate their perceptions on the usefulness of these two vocabulary instruction methods. 1.2 The purpose of the study This study compared the effectiveness of training the two vocabulary learning strategies (VLS) namely “guess-from-context” and “bilingual word cards” on 73 junior high school students in Tra Vinh City. It aimed to identify which vocabulary instruction method was superior to the other and which vocabulary instruction method could lead to a longer term of vocabulary retention over longer span of time. In the same way, the study also aimed to investigate learners’ perception on the usefulness of these two vocabulary instruction methods. From the results of this study, teachers and students would gain a deep understanding on the effectiveness of these two instruction methods on the process of vocabulary learning and teaching. In addition, the results of the current study would be taken into account for the need of vocabulary learning strategies training for the young learners in Junior High School in Tra Vinh City in order to facilitate their vocabulary learning process. 1.3 The background of the study In my practical teaching context, I have realized that young L2 learners tend to be over-reliant on L1 translation to memorize a large amount of words which 14
they encounter inside the classroom. This habit seemed to be affected by the traditional method of language teaching and learning - the grammar translation method. In spite of the shift from the grammar translation method to communicative approach after the Course book Reformation in 2002, the grammar translation method still remained some certain effects in English learning and teaching in Junior High School Tra Vinh. In most of the language classrooms, English grammar rules were still paid much attention to and the learners were still required to memorize a long list of irregular verbs. Apart from that, vocabulary teaching in the classroom was simply restricted to giving learners a long list of English words together with L1 translations (Vietnamese) for them to memorize. The only method of memorizing words traditionally recommended to learners was word repetition, saying the L2 word form aloud with the L1 translation. This way of vocabulary learning seemed boring and ineffective for learners’ overall vocabulary development as the learning process was very much dependent on the teacher. In fact, many learners in my teaching context could not participate in the classroom activities because they lacked vocabulary knowledge. Therefore, it was necessary to train the learners on vocabulary learning strategies in order to help them to be more self-directed in their vocabulary learning. 1.4 The outline of the thesis The thesis consisted of five chapters: Firstly, Chapter 1 would give the introduction to the thesis as a whole. Secondly, relevant literature related to this study would be reviewed in Chapter 2. Thirdly, Chapter 3 would describe the research method employed in the study. It would provide details descriptions for the research methodology including the research questions and hypotheses, the research design, the participants, the research instruments, the materials used in the study, the data collection procedures and the data analysis method. Then, the findings collected from the vocabulary immediate, delayed posttests, the interviews and the discussion on these findings would be presented in Chapter 4. Lastly, the conclusions of the study would be found in Chapter 5. 15
CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW This literature review Chapter consisted of 4 main Sections. (1)First, the effectiveness of guess-from-context and word cards would be discussed. (2) Second, the research related to vocabulary retention would be reviewed. (3) Third, the studies relevant to learners’ perceptions on the usefulness of the two vocabulary instruction methods used in this study would be analyzed. (4)Last, the studies related to guess-from-context and L1 translation would be summarized and some limitations from these studies would be discussed. 2.1 Guess from the contexts and bilingual word cards Language learning strategies are defined as ‘any sets of operations, steps, plans, routines used by the learners to facilitate the obtaining, storage, retrieval, and use of information’ (Wenden and Rubin, 1987: p29). Gu and Johnson (1996) conducted a study on good learners and they have found that most successful learners were those who actively choose the most appropriate strategy from a range of available “options” and decided how to pursue the strategy and when to switch to another strategy. As a result, it gave rise to the importance of strategy training at the early stages of second language learning to equip learners with a wide range of vocabulary learning strategies as well as the skills in using them, in order to help learners to be more self-directed in their vocabulary learning. As mentioned in Chapter 1, the learners should be trained on vocabulary learning strategies to cope with a large amount of vocabulary in the English language. Therefore, the term “vocabulary instruction method” used in this study involves in “training” the learners on vocabulary learning strategies to facilitate their vocabulary learning process. The term “Vocabulary instruction method” used in this study was different from “vocabulary learning strategy” in the sense that the latter was related to learners’ voluntary employment of strategies for vocabulary learning, without teaching or training involved. Among the ranges of available vocabulary learning strategies, guessing the meaning of the words from the context (GFC) was often discussed. The term 16
“guess-from-context” used in this study meant “to figure out or to infer” the meanings of the unknown words thank to the context clues. According to McCarthy (1990, p.125), guess-from-context was the most common strategy that learners employ to infer the meaning of the new words basing on the world knowledge and the previous experience of the text. Research on language learning showed that guess-from-context was crucial for learners’ vocabulary retention. Craik and Tulving (1975) believed that strategies which involve deeper manipulation of information like guessing from context might yield better retention because the learners involved in a deeper processing of the words i.e. processing new lexical information more elaborately by paying careful attention to different aspects of the word as pronunciation, orthography, grammatical category, meaning and semantic relations to other words. In term of L1 language learning, Sternberg (1987) stated that “L1 language learners learn most of their vocabulary by inferring the meaning of the unknown words from the context clues. Extensive reading was a good way for them to enhance word knowledge and to get a lot of exposures to the most frequent and useful words. At the earlier and intermediate levels of language learning, simplified reading books can be of great benefit for them”. Nation (1990, p.160) supported this idea by saying “. . . in English a large proportion of the unknown words (at least 80 percent) can be successfully dealt with this way of vocabulary learning”. As a result, teaching learners strategies for identifying and using context clues was significant for L1 learners’ vocabulary development. In the discussion of Morrison (1996), reading researchers believed that L2 readers should develop similar ways of handling new words that L1 readers used through the incidental vocabulary learning. Nation (2001, p232) added that guessing from context strategy was regarded as the most important of all sources of vocabulary learning, it was particularly true for the L1 learners and might be positive for the L2 learners as well. While researchers suggested that L2 learners should apply guess-from- context to learn the vocabulary as it seemed vital for their vocabulary development, the learners on the other hand made frequent use of L1 translations in understanding meanings of unknown words (Larrotta Monsalve, 1999). Results from a number of 17
studies showed that learners were favour on learning the words with L1 translation as it could enhance better vocabulary development in comparing with guess-from- context (Grace, 1998; Prince, 1996; Qian, 1996; Sze, 1998; cited in Ma, 2008). Among the vocabulary learning strategies that related to L1 translation, “word cards” were supposed to be the most prominent one (Thornbury, 2002). He added that learners should be trained on using “word cards” to learn the words because it seemed to be one of the most effective strategies for vocabulary memorization. “Apart from the keyword technique, there is probably no vocabulary learning technique more rewarding than the use of word cards. In fact, it is arguably more effective than the keyword technique, since there are some learners who find “imaging” difficult, but all learners can be trained to prepare and use sets of word cards” (Thornbury, 2002, p145). Word cards are a set of cards where the L2 word is written on one side and its L1 translation or definition on the other. They were used for mere presentation of the words as well as for rehearsal and retrieval practices. Some researchers noted that learning vocabulary with cards could facilitate vocabulary acquisition (Mondria and Mondria-de Vries, 1994; Nation, 2001; Schmitt and Schmitt, 1995; Waring, 2004, cited in Nakata, 2004, p.4). However, Coady (1997) stated that “vocabulary memorization strategies seem to offer the greatest assistance to the beginning learners but may not be beneficial in the long run because learners may forget the words rapidly”. In short, both of the two vocabulary learning strategies “guess-from-context” and “word cards” were useful for learners to develop their vocabulary. However, some contradictions between the two strategies could be found in the following aspects: First, the guess-from-context was believed to be better for vocabulary retention, whereas word cards were supposed to be not beneficial for vocabulary development in a long run. Second, guess-from-context was useful for L1 language learners to develop their vocabulary size, while word cards could benefit L2 language learners to learn vocabulary of the second language. Third, teachers seemed to prefer guess-from-context and suggested the L1 learners to apply it to learn the vocabulary of a second language, but the learners were making use of L1 18
translation to learn the words. As a result, these contradictions gave rise to the need of conducting this research on comparing the effectiveness of these two vocabulary learning strategies. 2.2 Research on vocabulary retention One aspect that researchers usually paid attention to when they conducted a research on vocabulary was vocabulary retention which was usually measured with recall tests (immediate posttests or delayed posttests). The format of the recall tests were varies in different studies. In the current study, one immediate post-test and one delayed post-test were administered to measure the short-term and the longer- term memory respectively. In term of human information processing, Kihlstrom (1984, as cited in Schmidt, 1990, p.35) and Baddeley (1999, p.10) believed that information from the environment (the input) entered human memory through our sensory registers (Visual-look, Auditory-listen and Haptic-touch) and was stored in our short term memory as a result of paying a careful attention to the information. At this stage, the information would be lost if we did not pay attention to it. The short term memory in human brain was also called working memory where the information was executed, analyzed and responded to the environment as the output. However, our short term memory had a very limited capacity, therefore, we had to continuously rehearse the information, so that it could stay there or we had to move it out of this area by shifting it to long-term memory or we had to move it out of this area by forgetting it. In contrast, our long-term memory could stores information for a long time. The advantage of long-term memory was that we did not have to constantly rehearse information to keep it in storage there. In addition, there was no restrictive limit on the amount of information that we could store in long-term memory. If we moved information to long-term memory, it would stay there for a long time - perhaps permanently! To make use of this information in long term memory, we had to move it back to our working memory, using a process called retrieval. This process could be demonstrated in figure 2.1. 19