facilitating long term retention of vocabulary

8/10/2019 Facilitating Long Term Retention of Vocabulary

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to the pctrricular Ie~el of the graded reader. Hence, for increasd number of repe:titionc.

the authors sug_gesteither c hoosing longer te~ts, or assigning several texts at the particular

kel.

In the case of a

conscious attempt on the pa rt of the learner to memorize lists of word

pairs, the number of the necessary repetitions may be lower. HowtLcr unima_einative rote

learning

is, evidence from research suggests that words practised

this way are retained quite

well (we Nation,

IYSZ for

a rwirw of research).

As for the spacing of repetitions. Pimsleur (IY67) proposer a memory schedule according

to which the learner should be reminded of the ne\ vord about 5 seconds after its

presentation. The interval before the nest repetition is 5 = 25 seconds; the next intcrxil

i\ 5 = 125 seconds. and so on. Russels (1979) revision schedule (quoted in Cairns and

Rcc lman, 1986). on the other hand, starts with a review 5 to IO minutes after the end of

rhc study period. continues

2-l hours later, then one \ tcc k later, one month later and sis

months later.

A

cliffcrwl approach to rciiifo rcirip rctwtioii cintkisires not tic quantity of rcpctilioflc.

but ttic rtuatily of word proccs5ilig . Gainis and Rcdman (lYH6) suggest invuhing the Ica rncr

in mc:i i i i ngCi l l activities connsctcd wit ti the newly learnt \ vortls. lhcy report 311cipcrimcnt

in which one group of subjccls w;I\ ashcrl lo r;i(c items on Itic hasi of pcrsonat prcfcrcncc .

anolhcr group of subjects had IO rtcc idc whcrhcr the items would bc irnportarlt if they wcrc

\trar~rlcd on ;I dcscrt ihi d. A coill rol grout> w;ih ;ISLLYI 10 mctiiori/c ttic tar,cc t words for

3 test. Itic groups thal pc rtormcd the pcrsonali~ccl l~sks displayed a higher dcgrcc of recall

than ttlc role-learning group. Ialmbc rg (lY8X) claims that compurcr yamc~, and cspccially

rnoli~atiiq Ic~-;~dvc~tL~~-c ;lriics

iii 3 forcigil laiigi~agc,

C;III proriicllc vocabulary Ica rning.

I lc dc xribcs an crpc rirncnl with computer game\ inkdving new vo~abul3ry. A month

aflcr the cspcrilncnt tlic subjccl\ ~rdnsl;~tctl correctly 35 out of Ihc 50 word\ \ \ hich ucrc

1CSl Cd

.A cliflcrcnt yualitativc mdhoc l of vocabulary learning involves the use of vcrtxrl and imagery

mnemonics. The technique operates as follows: a foreign word is linked IO the keyword----a

ridlive language word or phrase similar in sound 10 part or AI of rhc Iorcign langu;ig:c word.

Then, an interac ting image is tx;Ltcd bc twccn the keyword and the natikc langu;tgc

cquivnlent of the nc\ v foreign word. For example. if the new word is palo (Sp~misli for

dusk), the English keyword

c:tn

be pot

arid ttic

image is a duc k wearing ;1 pot on irs

head. (Atkinson tY75). Numerous studies showed thar, on tcs,ts of vocabulary rctcntion,

the mnemonic ~cchniques compared favorably with other methods (Atkinson and Raugh

lY75. Kelly lY86, Cohen I987 for a review of rcscarsh).

I~hile the keyword technique relics on interlingual assoc iations bc t\ vcc n the L2 word and

similarly sounding I.1 word, committing new vocabulary to memory can also be fxilitatcd

by establishing intralingua l links. i.c. links between the new item and other items in 1.2.

Thc~ links can be paradigmatic--tiith the ncu words synonyms, antonyms, co-hyponym\ .


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F ~ClLIT4 I-I? LONG-TERM RETESTION OF VOCABCLARl : THE SECOhD-H.XiD CLWE 2lY

morphologically related words, or syntagmatic-with the words collocating with it. the

sentence in which the word appears, or its wider context.

One argument for using intralingual associations could be supported by the schemata model

in reading comprehension, according to which

new knowledge is more easily acquired when it can be related or attached to something that

is already known. Translated into vocabulary instruction, this model would capitalire on existing

semantic relationships as means of showing students how new words are related to alread

known words or concepts. (Hague. 1987: p. 21).

hlore

important,

however, is the claim that linking the new word with other words associated

with it, in terms of form, meaning, or context, provides an opportunity for deeper or more

elaborate processing of the target word, which in turn leads to the formation of a more

persistent trace and consequently better memory performance. Craik (1973: p. 57) reports

an experiment (among several others) in which three types of questions were asked about

the target words:

I. Is the word in capital letters/lower case?

2. Dots the word rhyme with ?

3. l)oc~ the word fit into the following scntcncc_ -__-__?

Type 3 questions rcquircd dccpcr analysis of the word than types 2 and I. The word had

to bc chcckcd for its part of speech, its grammatical cnvironmcllt, its collocations. arid

meaning in the immediate

arid the witlcr contc.u(s.

Whcri the

stthjccts wcrc asked lo recall

as runny target words as they could from

t hc

task. words suhjcctcd to question type 3 wcrc

bcttcr rcrncmbsrcd than

those

in type

I

m 2.

A similar approach to vocabulary Icarning is advocalcd by Schoutcn-van Iarrcrcn (19X9),

who claims that variety and co~~tcnt ofthc actions

011

words arc crucial for their relention.

In her cxprrimcnts. the grcalcr the variety of ways words were treated. the bcttcr they wcrc

learnt. Trcuting words in diffcrcnr ways, according

to

the author,

C;III best bc done in

meaningful texts.

Som e p ruc ricul l i tni lul ion s a / l l ir relen l ion ttwIirod s in the c ottlexf 0J EA I Eng lish Jiw

A

cu tnic

Purpo .ws) c ou rses

The above mcrhods of reinforcing retention, successful as they might have proven with

the subjects in the respective experiments, may not necessarily be applicable in the

cast

of EAP (English for Academic Purposes) courses.

hlultiplc exposures to new words, whether 10 or 16, can most easily be implemented with

elementary and intermediate learners, who are exposed lo a limited number of new words.

The esplosion of vocabulary occurs at a more advanced stage when learners arc exposed

10 a large number of words in a short period of time. This makes it difficuh to keep track

of the number of times each word was cncountcrcd. Although the use of graded readers

can increase the number of repetitions. such readers arc no longer of help 10 advanced

learners, who have 10 confront unsimplified material. Authentic (cxts arc not written with


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language learners in mind, nor do the]; use limited vocabulary. Therefore, it is unrealistic

IO rely. for memorization of a uord, on there being a sufficient number of its occurrences

in such a text.

Ga mes and other ptrqonalircd acti\ ities Hill often meet with resistance from adult

university learners, uho\ c main objective is reading academic lirerature and m ho hill regard

such ac tivities as childish and unnecessarily time consuming.

bith regard

to the keyword method, its success depends on the ability 10 find keywords

and conjure up visual images.

It i\ doubtful \ +hether such association a kind ofproblcm solving activity

and ;I\ such ha a ccrlairi appeal to 311 adull ac ademic Icarncr. tlowcvcr, in view of our

rcscrvations about lcsica l pucAng, it W;L felt [hat this processing should not bc done on

nc\ v uordh ;II the stage ofthsir initial prcscnlation, but via a different task which WC cfcr

IO a\ the second-hand clo/c.

The cccond-hand CIOK is an cscrcisc consisting of a summarized version of a studied


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text with the target words deleted. The learner has to supply the missing words in text blanks.

Though such a task looks like a cloze test, our exercise could not be considered a cloze

test, or even a cloze exercise because the text summaries were not new unseen texts, but

rewritten versions of already studied texts. In other words. by requiring the student to supply

words in blanks, we made use of the cloze procedure. It is different from the conventional

cloze in the following respects:

-The aim of the ordinary cloze passage is either to test comprehension, or to practise

specific areas of language like words, grammatical structures, discourse connectors.

The aim of the second-hand cloze, on the other hand, is to force the student into

a situation of deep mental processing of a newly learnt set of words as a means of

retaining those words.

-The contest in which the words were supplied was not new, but familiar to students

from their syllabus.

-The test was not in its original version, but in a modified summary and the deleted

items appeared in syntactic structures and collocations which were different from

their original context.

-The lenrncr wzs specifically instructed to fill the memorized target items as they

fitted the context. This was achieved by dictating a list of the target itcrn5 in the mother

tonpuc which had to be translated and supplied in the proper placc5. Thus, the task

was named the second-hand clo~.c.

Tcnchcr cxpcricncc supgcstcd that whcncvcr words wcrc suhmi[tcd to the task of sccord-

h;Incl clo/c, lhcy wcrc bcttcr Icarnf than those words which wcrc practiscd in other ways.

It was thcrcforc dccidcd to submit this observation to ;III empirical test. which would confirm

or rcfutc the assumption that the consistent USC of second-hand clot as ;I vocabulary

practicing

rnclhod

will

rcsull in ;I sig1iiIicmt i11lprovcmcrll ol long-lcrni rclcnlion of new

words.

T11E STlJI)Y

As the study investigated the effectiveness of the second-hand clo/c in long-term retention,

it addressed the following question: Are words submitted to the task of second-hand cloze

rcmcmbcrcd significantly bcttcr than words which are

not

submitted lo this task

Thirty university students of an English for Academic Purposes course took part in the

study. They were native speakers of Hebrew and Arabic. As they were graduates of lsracli

high schools, their level of English was equivalent to that required by the First Certificate

of English. In their English course, the learners were exposed to authentic texts of an

acndcmic nature and were trained in reading comprchcnsion skills, so that subsequently

they might be able to read bibliography in English. AH wcrc taught by the same teacher.

The investigation lasted 10 weeks. during which subjects studied six authentic texts of varying


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Icnp ths in order to acquire and prxtise various reading skills and also to improve their

Icxical and syntactic knowlcdgc of English. The study period of each test was si.\ to eight

hours. From each tc\ t. 10 vocabulary items were chosen which were unknolvn to the

students. The tcachc r presented these items in conteyt a nd provided a Hcbrew translation

for them. Only one meanins was provided-the one espressed in the text. At the prac tice

stags. all items wrre subjec ted to similar activities (synonyms. antonyms, derivatives, rote

Ica rninp. etc.) During the study period of each text, the lcarncrc lucre told to learn the

tarpet IO Herds for a quiz. The quiz task trould take one of two forms. In three case5

it 5 ~ the second-hand cloze, in the other three tramlation of a dictated l&t of Ll Herds

into L7. The two tasks wcrc altcrnatcd: the dic tated list task was the last enc. This way.

in addition to the identical recycling exercises which all target items wcrc subjec ted to, 30

target words (three sets of IO each) undctxcnt an additional practice of second-hand clorc.

while the other 30 did not. Instead they were practiscd by Ll to L2 list translation.

The

III~;I~~~~III~II~

instrument was an uncspc ctcd test in the form of a list of

ll the

target

\ ~c~rcl~n English to bc translated inlo ~cbrcw. No tirnc restriction was set. For each student,

two scores wcrc ~;~kulatcd: (I) the numhcr nfcorrcct translations of the second-hand clox

words; (2) the number of correc t translations of the non second-hand clozc words. The

means of the twu cc ts of \ corcs wcrc compared by a matched I-test. The diffcrcncc in SCOI-cs

W;I\ significant (, 15.1s. ~~. while in our5

it wxs long-term recall that was inrcstigatcd as it included word> that had been taught up

to IO week\ prior to the test. Since our rcsuIt\ show that the cori\i\tcnt u\c of \ccorid-hand

clo/c will contribute to long-term rctcntion of

irord\ . UC may conc lude th:tt a good Ica rning

tcchniquc may indeed improve long-tsrm rctcntion of vocabulary. The sccorld-hand clot.c

is one such c ffcctivc tcchniquc. IIS cffcctivcnc\ \ ca n bc ascribed to the fac t thar it cmbodics

some charaztcri\ tics of scvcral well-tried nmnurimt ion tcchniqucs , but ;tt the s;tmc tirnc

it ovcrcomcs their shortconiinps.

Ihc second-hand 40x provides an opportuni ty to rcaclivatc the new words, but it avoids

the rmm~tor~y and artificiality of rote learning by pro\,iding ;I test cmtcst. It is a meaningful

activity as it in\olvcs rcconrtructing a summary from an authentic test which deals with

the students pa rticular field of intcrcst. The gap filling task is not a game which adults


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facilitating long term retention of vocabulary

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