The role of classroom and informal vocabulary input in growing a foreign language lexicon
Part of : Εφαρμοσμένη γλωσσολογία ; No.26, 2010, pages 59-80
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59-80
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There is a school of thought, particularly in vocabulary learning, that directed instruction really is not very important. For example, Snow suggests that time spent in vocabulary learning and teaching is “time ... wasted” (Harris and Snow 2004: 58) since “few words are retained from those which are ‘learned ’ or ‘taught’ by direct instruction” (Harris and Snow 2004: 55), and “most L2 vocabulary is learned incidentally, much of it from oral input” (Ellis 1994: 24). These ideas are very misleading and this can be illustrated by studies of course book material. These studies suggest that quality materials using a wide variety of thematic material and exemplifying a range òf both frequent and infrequent vocabulary, can lead directly to the acquisition of foreign language lexicons which are capable of giving good communicative skills. This form of input is particularly important in establishing good knowledge and use of the most frequent words in a language. But it is not clear that this form of input alone can explain how the most able of learners acquire the very large lexicons that enable them to be so good. Case studies of learners engaged in informal vocabulary learning activities (reading comic books, listening to songs and watching DVDs with sub-titles in a foreign language) appear to show that learners can and do acquire surprisingly large volumes of the, particularly infrequent, vocabulary they need to achieve fluency from informal language learning activities, albeit with a clear learning focus.
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Περιέχει πίνακες, σχήματα και βιβλιογραφία
