Exploring systematic orthographic crosslinguistic similarities to enhance foreign language vocabulary learning

This study explores whether middle-school students can exploit explicitly addressed crosslinguistic lexical similarities between German and English to learn vocabulary more efficiently. Across six weeks, 260 Swiss German learners of English as a foreign language (17 classes) completed three vocabulary learning tests (T1, T2 and T3). Additionally, 7 of these 17 classes attended a 90-minute intervention between the first and second test: During a 45-minute introductory lesson students discovered four systematic orthographic correspondence rules (e.g. <p> to <f> as in ship and Schiff), followed by three 15-minute sessions to consolidate their knowledge. The intervention group’s improvement in cognate learning was significantly larger in comparison to the control group. The difference was observed across both test modes and all rules introduced. While learners’ initial English vocabulary size correlated with their overall performance, it did not affect intervention uptake. This suggests that these younger learners benefitted from form-focused instruction, independent of proficiency and type of correspondence.

Seeing or acting? The effect of performing gestures on foreign language vocabulary learning

We evaluate the impact of gestures during the teaching of vocabulary in a foreign language (FL). Spanish speakers learned words in a FL in four gesture conditions according to the relationship between the meaning of the words and the gestures (congruent gestures, incongruent gestures, gestures without meaning, and no gestures). The participants learned the words by performing gestures (‘do’ teaching group) or by observing the gestures performed by others (‘see’ teaching group). Compared to the meaningless gesture condition, the processing of congruent gestures facilitated the recall of second language (L2) words in the ‘see’ and ‘do’ teaching groups. However, the interference effect associated with the processing of incongruent gestures was greater in the ‘see’ teaching group than in the ‘do’ teaching group. Thus, the performance of gestures seems to mitigate the negative impact that the use of gestures may have on the teaching of vocabulary in a foreign language.

Deliberate Vocabulary Learning from Word Cards

While word cards are a widely supported method of deliberately studying foreign language vocabulary, there is a surprising lack of research-based evidence supporting them. This paper first reviews some of the key literature on word cards and then briefly describes two experiments concerning word card methodology. The first experiment described in this paper examined the learning outcomes of making word cards while the second experiment compared the use of self-made word cards with premade cards. The results of the first study indicated that the simple process of making word cards results in significant short-term vocabulary learning, but this new knowledge is sensitive to attrition if no further study is carried out soon after making the cards. The results of the second experiment indicated that while both methods are effective in the short and long-term, learners may be better studying from premade cards. Taken together, the results offer support for the use of word cards for foreign language vocabulary learning.

Is a picture really worth a thousand words? Evaluating contributions of fluency and analytic processing in metacognitive judgements for pictures in foreign language vocabulary learning

Previous research shows that participants are overconfident in their ability to learn foreign language vocabulary from pictures compared with English translations. The current study explored whether this tendency is due to processing fluency or beliefs about learning. Using self-paced study of Swahili words paired with either picture cues or English translation cues, picture cues garnered higher confidence judgements but not faster study times, and this was true whether judgements of learning were made after a delay (Experiment 1) or immediately (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3, when participants learned Swahili words with only one type of cue (pictures or English translations) and then estimated which one would be more effective for learning, the majority of participants believed pictures would be more effective regardless of whether they had experienced those cues during learning. Experiment 4 showed the same results when participants had experienced neither type of cue during a learning phase. These results suggest that metacognitive judgements in foreign language vocabulary learning are driven more by students’ beliefs about learning than by processing fluency as reflected in self-paced study times.

Vocabulary Learning via Reading: Is Input Modification Useful?

Since authentic texts address native speakers, they might lack the reader-friendly attributes which can help EFL learners to read and understand them. Also, learning the new vocabulary through reading can be difficult for EFL learners. As such, in order to utilize these texts as teaching materials in EFL classes, they should be modified. The present study investigated Iranian intermediate-level EFL learners and how they acquire English language vocabulary incidentally from modified English texts while their primary task is reading for meaning. In order to measure the impact of lexical input modification on the improvement of foreign language vocabulary learning, 60 adult Iranian EFL learners between the ages of 18 and 22 in two intact classes were selected and randomly assigned to two homogenous groups of control and experimental. The analysis of the data revealed that incidental second language vocabulary learning could be improved effectively by lexical input modifications such as lexical and typographical elaboration.