Research Article Review Language Acquisition

Outside Reading, Writing Report EDL 205 Requirement Submitted by:

Marco D. Meduranda Submitted to:

Prof. Lorenzo Orillos

College of Education University of the Philippines Diliman

Youngkyu, K. (2006). Effects of input elaboration on vocabulary acquisition through reading by Korean learner of English as a foreign language. TESOL Quarterly 40(2), 341-367

I. INTRODUCTION A large arsenal of L2 vocabulary is essential to attain target language proficiency. In order for learners to make rapid vocabulary gains, they will need to be exposed to plenty of written texts. In this regard, reading plays a pivotal role because it enables learners to attain much larger vocabulary as it gives more processing time needed for focal attention in acquiring new lexis. However, naturally occurring literatures or written input aimed for L2 learners lack reader-friendly features that facilitate comprehension, and thus is not available for SLA. Acknowledging the role of reading in SLA, Krashen pointed out that acquisition will not take place without comprehension of key elements in utterance i.e. the vocabulary. With this in mind, researchers identify that for a reading input to be supportive of vocabulary acquisition, the text must have explicit and salient pedagogical context. This refers to clues that help L2 readers infer the meaning of unknown words from context; thus, the need to modify native speaker text to suit the need of L2 learners is necessary. Studies reveal that the richer the context that surrounds unknown words in a text, the easier it is for students to guess what the word means from the context and to retain the correctly guessed words. Truly, for language acquisition to take place, input comprehensibility is crucial. To make the input comprehensible, text modification must be employed in L2 reading materials. One type of it, text elaboration enriches L2 reading text by providing meanings of unknown words in the form of paraphrases and by making thematic or anaphoric relationships in a text. Another way of making written input conducive to vocabulary development is through typographical written input

enhancement. Here certain linguistic features are made perceptually salient by using attention-getting devices (e.g. bold facing, underlining and using a bigger font) with the purpose of increasing the lexical item’s acquirability and comprehensibility. In sum, reading is believed to be a significant source of input to learners, but it may have an inadequate role if original native speaker text is not made comprehensible. Given this short overview, the following research made by Youngkyu tries to systematically examine how input elaboration and typographical input enhancement affects incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition through reading.

II. ARTICLE SUMMARY The research looks into the impact of lexical elaboration (LE), typographical enhancement (TE) or a combination of both, as well as explicit or implicit LE, to the vocabulary acquisition of 297 EFL learners from Korea. Experimental text that contained 26 target lexical items was given for students to read. The study employed a 2X3 MANOVA model with TE and LE as two independent variables and form-andmeaning-recognition vocabulary post-tests as two dependent variables. The TE was comprised of two levels, enhanced and unenhanced, while the LE had three levels, explicit, implicit and unelaborated. The outcomes were (a) LE alone did not aid form recognition of vocabulary, (b) explicit LE alone aided meaning recognition of vocabulary, (c) TE alone did not aid form and meaning recognition of vocabulary, (d) LE and TE combined did not aid form recognition of vocabulary (e) both explicit and implicit LE aided meaning recognition of vocabulary, (f) explicit and implicit LE did not differ in their effect on form and meaning recognition of vocabulary, and (g)

whether a text was further enhanced in addition to either implicit or explicit LE did not seem to affect the acquisition of the previously unknown words’ form and meanings. Lastly, pedagogical implications of the findings are discussed.

III. REACTION The article further sharpens my understanding of the role of language teachers to vocabulary development and in general to the learning success of my students. Truly, the task of teaching vocabulary-acquisition skills is a significant responsibility of us because formal learning—the kind of learning that students do in school—demands vocabulary knowledge. Helping students learn how to build their “lexical arsenal” will surely helps them succeed across the curriculum. Vocabulary acquisition seems to be dependent on the kind of reading text that we provide to our students. The article makes me cognizant about literatures or reading text that do not facilitate reading comprehension because of the lack of explicit and salient text elaboration or context clues. I must be aware on how to select, modify, and organize text material to accommodate the needs of my English learners.

I

become

mindful

of

considering

first

the

readability

and

comprehensibility of the text before I assign it to my students. As I examine the reading selections in the textbooks, some texts are really inherently difficult (like English-American or World literatures) because the input is quite incomprehensible. Hence, I find it essential to pre-teach key unfamiliar vocabulary before they are assigned to students as well as other background concepts so that learners will meaningfully understand the context of the written input. Other instructional

techniques like semantic associations, word analogies, word logs and word visual representation must also be employed to assist vocabulary learning. I also agree with the author when he pointed out that in order to increase the acquirability of words, learners must have multiple exposures to the same words in different contexts. This calls for a development of a reading program across the curriculum that reinforces acquisition of L2 vocabulary. Although the opportunities for vocabulary instruction are especially pronounced in language arts and reading, vocabulary instruction properly belongs in all subjects of the curriculum in which learners meet both new ideas and the words by which they are represented in the language. Thus, teachers must work together in order to come up with a consistent, valid and reliable reading program that focus on meaningful acquisition, retention and use of English words in various learning contexts. Typographical enhancements that get the attention of the learners to lexical or linguistic features are not observable in public school textbooks. This must be suggested to publishers and to agencies in charge of the production and procurement of instructional materials. Finally, as pointed out in the pedagogical implications of the research, another medium that can be harnessed in the light of second language acquisition is the use of information technology. Reading and vocabulary learning become more interactive and engaging when we provide our students with electronic or online version of elaborated and enhanced reading text. Dynamic and interactive mode of textual presentations in online reading texts further make “input” into “intake” as students learn while having fun.

Detaramani, C. & Chan, I. (1999). Learner’s needs, attitudes and motivation towards the selfaccess mode of language learning. RELC Journal 30 (1), 124-147.

I. INTRODUCTION The self-access mode of language learning encourages students to take responsibility for their own learning as it promotes learner’s autonomy, self-efficiency and self-motivation. In this approach, teachers take the role of facilitators or guides enabling learners to learn how to learn. The teachers accomplish this by providing materials that give learners independence of what learning method they want to employ which is appropriate to their individual levels and interests. In order to be very helpful in improving learner’s language proficiency, person in-charge of Self-Access Center (SAC)’s must first conduct a need analysis that will identify the needs, objectives, interests, practical constraints and motivation of the potential users before procuring equipment and materials. By gathering information about the beliefs and attitudes of learner, teachers will be able to design effective framework for self-instruction through SAC. Through the self-access mode of learning English, individual differences are addressed, learner efficiency and autonomy are facilitated, motivation is enhanced, positive attitude towards learning the second language is cultivated and learning how to learn is emphasized helping learners to attain personal and educational success.

II. SUMMARY The self-access mode of language learning demands learners to be in charge of their own learning encouraging them to be diligent, self-determined and selfmanaged. Driven by the fact that few research has explored on this topic, the researchers seek to determine the needs of the learners and to examine their

attitudes and motivation towards this learning approach. Data were collected from 585 learners using a questionnaire and 5% of the sample underwent in-depth interview. Findings reveal that learners regard self-access centers (SAC) to be useful in learning English autonomously and helpful in equipping them essential skills needed for their studies and future career. They also want more multi-media material as well as facilities on speaking, listening and English for the workplace in the SAC. Learners demonstrate to have extrinsic motivation in learning English based on the analysis of interviews and qualitative data; however, they seem to be reluctant to use the self-access mode of learning.

Furthermore, the study ascertained that

students who are eager to use the SAC possess stronger desire to improve their English, have higher intrinsic motivation and more positive attitudes toward learning the English.

III. REACTION I believe in the rationale of setting up Self-Access Center to promote the selfaccess mode of language learning, but it is quite not feasible in the Philippine public school mainly because of budgetary constraints. However, existing school learning facilities like libraries or computer rooms can be further enhanced and turned into self-access like centers with English teachers acting as facilitators of the learning experience letting students to explore on their own and to choose materials that suit their individual preferences and levels.

Truly, I agree that teachers must encourage and support learner’s autonomy. Though sometimes some mentors find it difficult to cede control over learning, students must be trained on learning how to learn. In order to do this, we should be equipped with strategies and techniques that promote independent language learning. Teachers can encourage students to access learning for themselves by going out on their own, drawing upon resources outside the classroom. Personally, I do this to my students. I usually give my students homework that would demand them to explore a certain concept by researching on the internet or at the school library. They will then share their insights in the class. Meanwhile, teachers also must ensure that low proficiency students who may find it difficult to engage in independent learning are given extra guidance and are not left behind. There should be gradual transfer of responsibility to this kind of students. In addition, mentors must be supportive and patient as they build the selfesteem of low-proficient learners, yet at the same time maintain a firm, positive expectations towards them. I also agree with the authors’ suggestion that students should be motivated to learn English for intrinsic reasons. When learners are intrinsically motivated, they are driven to learn the language for its own sake because it brings them a feeling of competence and self-determination. Teachers should explain to students that the process of studying and utilizing the language can be in itself interesting and fulfilling.

Finally, teachers should also incorporate learning strategies to language teaching as it strongly influence learner autonomy and the self-access mode of language learning. Students must be trained on how to remember ideas more effectively, organize and evaluate their own learning, work cooperatively with peers in problem solving and manage their emotions in order to reduce anxiety and increase personal competency. And so, as students learn how to succeed in second language learning, they gain the tools they need to become lifelong learners.

Jie, L. & Xiaoqing, Q. (2006). Language learning styles and learning strategies of tertiary level English learners in China. RELC 37 (1), 67-90.

I. INTRODUCTION ESL and EFL researchers are now having an increasing interest to the role of learning styles and strategies to language learning success. The term learning style is used to encompass four aspects of the person: cognitive style, i.e., preferred or habitual patterns of mental functioning; patterns of attitudes and interests that affect what an individual will pay most attention to in a learning situation; a tendency to seek situations compatible with one's own learning patterns; and a tendency to use certain learning strategies and avoid others. Characteristically pervasive and inherent within learners, learning style is a fusion of cognitive, affective, and behavioral elements. At least twenty dimensions or typologies of learning style have been identified. On the other hand, language learning strategies are the often conscious steps or behaviors used by language learners to enhance the acquisition, storage, retention, recall, and use of new information. Most successful learners tend to use learning strategies that are appropriate to the material, to the task, and to their own goals, needs, and stage of learning. Furthermore, more proficient learners appear to use a wider range of strategies in a greater number of situations than do less proficient learners. Many different strategies can be used by language learners: metacognitive techniques for organizing, focusing, and evaluating one's own learning; affective strategies for handling emotions or attitudes; social strategies for cooperating with others in the learning process; cognitive strategies for linking new information with existing schemata and for analyzing and classifying it; memory strategies for

entering new information into memory storage and for retrieving it when needed; and compensation strategies (such as guessing or using gestures) to overcome deficiencies and gaps in one's current language knowledge. Much more investigation is necessary to determine the precise role of styles and strategies, but even at this stage in our understanding we can state that teachers need to become more aware of both learning styles and learning strategies through appropriate teacher training. Teachers can help their students by designing instruction that meets the needs of individuals with different stylistic preferences and by teaching students how to improve their learning strategies. Teachers must have training relevant to their own instructional situations in three areas: identifying students' current learning strategies through surveys, interviews, or other means; helping individual students discern which strategies are most relevant to their learning styles, tasks, and goals; and aiding students in developing orchestrated strategy use rather than a scattered approach.

II. SUMMARY Aiming to examine the relationship between learning styles and learning strategies in the EFL context in China, the study presents quantitative and qualitative data. Comprising the participants of the quantitative study were 187 second-year college students. The researchers employed two-self rated inventories in the study: the Chinese version of the MBTI-G for examining student’s learning styles and a questionnaire on the use of learning strategies adapted from O’Malley and Chamot’s classification system.

Findings reveal that learning styles have a significant impact on learners learning strategy. Correlating positively with seven sets of learning strategy, the Judging scale occurs to be the primary learning style variable affecting learners’ learning strategy preferences. High achievers are flexible to access learning strategies that are related with their non-preferred styles. Finally, pedagogical implications are discussed and recommendations for future research are proposed.

III.REACTIONS Since the ultimate goal of teaching is to help learners achieve learner autonomy, I agree that teachers should help students determine and get familiar with their own learning styles in order to help them become self-aware learners. This can be done by using learning style instruments like questionnaire or observation survey that measures these preferences. Open-ended interviews and review of student’s output such as projects can also help in ascertaining individual learning styles. When students know their learning strengths and weaknesses, they would be able to develop the flexibilities to cope with different learning contexts and eventually become competent and efficient learners. In my case, every start of the academic year in our school, we subject our learners to language learning and multiple intelligences inventory. Though this is an additional work load for teachers, I appreciate it because it gives me valuable insights on the strengths and weaknesses of my students. This helps me to identify

who among my students need further assistance as regards cultivating better learning strategies. To effectively incorporate learning styles, we, language teachers, can diagnose our own learning style choices so that we can better understand ourselves as teachers. We should also teach with two modalities as possible; for example supplement listening with pictures. In this way, we accommodate our instruction to learner differences. An understanding of the students’ use of learning strategies would also allow teachers to adopt appropriate teaching methods which best cater for the learning styles of the students. As highlighted in the research recommendation, we should include the explicit training of certain language learning strategies in the class in order to maximize student’s learning efficiency. In order to continue to be successful with learning tasks, I deem important that students need to be aware of the strategies that led to their success and that they should recognize the value of using them again. I think by devoting class time to learning strategies, we, language teachers, reiterate and highlight their importance and value. Moreover, I also agree that by equipping our students with strategies for language learning, they can take more responsibility for improving their language abilities and their learning processes.