Assessing Two Strategies for Learning Vocabulary

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Abstract

The focus of this chapter is on assessing the effects of two vocabulary learning strategies, guessing the meaning of words from a reading context and using a monolingual dictionary, on second language learners’ vocabulary knowledge. To this end, a study was carried out with a sample of 60 female students attending a 4-week intensive English as a second language (ESL) course, at a university, in Saudi Arabia. They were divided into two groups, group (1) and group (2). Group (1) was instructed to look up the meanings of words in a dictionary. Group (2) was instructed to guess the meanings of the words from the context in which they occurred. Each group was then divided into three levels, according to proficiency, high, medium and low. One measure was used to determine the effect of the instruction on the two groups, a pretest and a posttest. A significance level of ( p < 0.05) was accepted. Analyses of the measure indicated that the students, in group (2), did significantly better than the students in group (1). Results were analysed through comparing the means of the two groups using a paired T-test then using a repeated measure ANOVA. The results revealed that the students in the guessing from context group outperformed the students in the dictionary group. Proficiency level of the students was also found to have a significant effect on the results.

Keywords

Vocabulary assessment IELTS Vocabulary teaching strategies ESL 
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Copyright information

© Springer International Publishing AG 2018

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.University of ExeterExeterUK

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