EFL STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY LEARNING STRATEGIES AND THE DIFFICULTIES FACED BY THEM IN VOCABULARY LEARNING
Author :
DOI : 10.29228/ijla.48703
Year-Number: 2021-36
Yayımlanma Tarihi: 2021-01-29 21:02:40.0
Language : İngilizce
Konu : Yabancı Dil Eğitimi
Abstract
Keywords
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to investigate whether teaching vocabulary to preparatory class EFL students in accordance with their vocabulary learning strategies would be effective. In line with this purpose, it was aimed to determine the vocabulary learning strategies that preparatory class students used in the discovery and consolidation process of target vocabulary. This study also aimed to find out the difficulties faced by students in discovering and consolidating foreign language vocabulary. The study was carried out using a mixed-method research design. Quantitative data collection instruments were the Vocabulary Learning Strategies Questionnaire and pre/post-tests. The quantitative data were analyzed by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) 23. The qualitative phase of the study included semi-structured interviews carried out with 14 students. The qualitative data were analyzed through descriptive analysis. The analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data demonstrated that students preferred determination strategies to social (discovery) strategies while discovering the meanings of new words. In the consolidation process, they used cognitive, metacognitive, memory, and social (consolidation) strategies respectively. Also, it was found that the participants faced certain difficulties in the vocabulary learning process. After the implementation process, this study revealed that teaching vocabulary to preparatory class EFL students in accordance with their vocabulary learning strategies improves students’ vocabulary knowledge compared to using conventional teaching methods.
Keywords
- Having a significant place in language learning and teaching for the last couple of decades,VLSs have been an investigation area for many researchers. This research topic has beenconsidered by researchers from various aspects such as the efficiency of teaching VLSs(Mizumoto & Takeuchi, 2009; Nalkesen, 2011; Tezgiden, 2006), the frequencies of strategyuse (Çelik & Topbaş, 2010), the relationship between strategy use and success (Gu &Johnson, 1996; Şahin, 2003), and comparison of perceived usefulness and frequency of strategy use (Fan, 2003; Schmitt, 1997).
- Focusing on the effectiveness of teaching VLSs, Mizumoto and Takeuchi (2009) conducteda study with students in two universities. As a result of the quantitative and qualitativeanalyses, it was found that teaching VLSs increased students’ success in vocabularylearning and also strategy usage frequency. It was also found that teaching VLSs increasedthe use of specific strategies and students with different characteristics had different reactions to the teaching.
- In a similar vein, Tezgiden (2006) examined the effects of teaching VLSs on students’ useof strategies and their thoughts about the usefulness of strategies. In addition, attitudes ofstudents and teachers towards strategy training were investigated. The study showed thatthe teaching of VLSs had a positive effect on students’ strategy use, but did not make asignificant difference in their opinions about the usefulness of strategies. Additionally, itwas determined that students’ and teachers’ attitudes toward strategy training werepositive. As a result, it is stated that VLSs training can contribute to student autonomy byencouraging students to think about their own learning processes; therefore, the teaching of strategy can play an important role in teaching English in Turkish universities.
- Another study that provides insight into the effectiveness of teaching VLSs was carried outby Nalkesen (2011) who examined the effects of VLSs training on vocabulary knowledgeand learner autonomy. The findings of the study revealed that VLSs training increased thestudents’ vocabulary learning success, but they did not have a statistically significant effect on vocabulary learning autonomy.
- Considering strategy training as an influential factor in language learning, Çelik andTopbaş (2010) carried out a survey study that aimed to analyze VLSs adopted by TurkishEFL students. The findings of their study indicated a positive relationship between thefrequency of the strategy use and the language levels; also determination strategies werethe most frequently used strategies whereas cognitive strategies were the least frequentlyused category. Another result of this study was that among the participants, theintermediate level learners regarded VLSs as more useful. The necessity of the improvement of VLSs instruction constituted one of the main implications of the study.
- Another topic of interest has been the relationship between strategy use and success. Forexample, Şahin (2003) conducted a study to introduce students to the various strategiesthey can use to find the meaning of a word they encounter for the first time and to determinethe effects of VLSs training on the students’ vocabulary learning and use of strategies.According to the findings, the teaching of VLSs did not make any difference in the students’thoughts about vocabulary learning, but according to the results of the questionnaire andvocabulary test results, it influenced the strategy use of students. From the resultsobtained, it is thought that the teaching of VLSs has a positive effect on students’ vocabulary learning and strategy use.
- An additional study focusing on the relationship between strategy use and success wascarried out by Gu and Johnson (1996). The researchers investigated the relationshipbetween Chinese EFL learners’ strategy use and learning outcomes. The results of the studyindicated that there was a positive relationship between strategy use and success, and alsoa close connection between general proficiency and some strategies (such as guessing fromcontext, using dictionaries, taking notes, contextual encoding and paying attention to word formation) was identified.
- The comparison of perceived usefulness and frequency of strategy use has been anotherarea of investigation for researchers as well. For instance; Schmitt (1997) carried out alarge-scale study on VLSs with 600 EFL learners from different learning levels: junior highschool, high school students, university-level students and adult learners. The researcherdeveloped a questionnaire to find out strategy use and perceived usefulness. According tothe findings of the study, in discovering the target words, 85% of the participants used abilingual dictionary. As the foreign language vocabulary was presented through word liststhat brought about memorizing of target words, verbal repetition and written repetition ofnew words constituted the second and third most frequently used VLSs respectively.Another result was that a great number of participants did not use some strategies thatthey found effective. Fan (2003) also examined the discrepancy between perceivedusefulness and frequency of strategy use. The research design of his study was similar toSchmitt’s research design and 1067 Chinese EFL learners were the participants. Theresults of the study showed that the participants did not use some strategies that theyregarded as useful. Therefore, as Schmitt (1997) asserted, strategy instruction might behelpful to make students use different strategies that are appropriate to their learning style. Research questions
- In order to harmonize the distinctive components of the study in a coherent and reasonableway and to create a framework for the collection and analysis of data, the research designof this study was established after analyzing the relevant literature. When the literaturewas reviewed, it was found that most of the related studies used the quantitative researchdesign. To accomplish the abovementioned aim, a mixed-method research design waspreferred to combine both quantitative and qualitative data in the investigation process.The need to implement a mixed-method research design arises when the research problemis too complicated to be addressed from a particular viewpoint (Ponce & Pagán-Maldonado,2015, p. 114). When a researcher wants to integrate the elements of both qualitative andquantitative research approaches and to benefit from both types of research, a mixed-method research design is adopted for a broader understanding and validation (Johnson,Onwuegbuzie & Turner, 2007, p. 123). In the same vein, Creswell (2005) emphasizes thatthis third type of research method is a means of better understanding the research problemand also asserts that both quantitative and qualitative data are equally important in mixed-method research design. Therefore, to specify the research questions clearly and to enhancedata, a mixed-method research design was adopted in this study in which both types of data were collected simultaneously.
- As the aim of this study was to determine the effect of VLSs on students’ vocabularyachievement after an implementation process, the most appropriate research design wasexperimental design. The experimental research designs generally consist of two mainresearch groups: weak experimental research designs and strong experimental researchdesigns. Any strong experimental design should include a comparison of at least twogroups; an experimental group and a control group. Two types of strong experimentalresearch designs have been identified in the literature: pretest-posttest control-groupdesign and posttest-only control-group design. The pretest-posttest control-group design isused in this study which is defined as “a research design that administers a posttest to tworandomly assigned groups of participants after both have been pretested and one of thegroups has been administered the experimental treatment condition” (Johnson &Christensen, 2008, p. 465). The table below demonstrates the procedure of this type of research design:
- The questionnaire that was implemented to collect quantitative data was a VocabularyLearning Strategies Questionnaire. This instrument was originally developed by Schmitt(1997) to identify the strategies employed by preparatory class language learners invocabulary learning. When the previous studies about VLSs were analyzed, it was foundthat many researchers used this questionnaire in order to figure out the VLSs used bypreparatory class EFL students for language learning. Catalan (2003: 60) states the benefitsof Schmitt’s questionnaire as “it can be used with learners of different ages, educationalbackgrounds and target languages” and also adds that “it is technologically simple, whichallows for ease in coding, classification and managing of the data in computer programs”. Semi-structured interviews
- The vocabulary instruction for the experimental group was formed by taking their VLSsinto consideration while the control group received a vocabulary teaching based on theirOxford English File Upper-Intermediate course book. Before the treatment process began,all necessary permissions were obtained from the administration of the department. 60students from two preparatory classes of English Language and Literature were involved inthis study. The training of both groups lasted 14 weeks in the spring term of the 2018-2019 academic year. The content, purpose and syllabus of the course were explained to theparticipants in the first week and the implementation of the pre-test took place. 28 hourswere devoted to English vocabulary teaching to the experimental group using mostfrequently used strategies with some extra materials. The control group also received 28- hour vocabulary teaching with conventional vocabulary teaching methods.
- The teaching syllabuses of both control and experimental groups involved teachingvocabulary from the vocabulary parts of the Oxford English File Upper-Intermediate coursebook. The experimental group received vocabulary training through discovery andconsolidation strategies. When the experimental group students were taught an unknownword, the discovery strategies were used, and while teaching them to reinforce theirknowledge about the learned words, the consolidation strategies were implemented. On theother hand, while teaching unknown words and consolidating the meanings of learnedwords to control group, the traditional vocabulary teaching techniques, which Gairns andRedman (1986) divide into three categories as visual techniques, verbal techniques, andtranslation, were implemented. Visual techniques consist of flashcards, realia, boarddrawings, wall charts, etc. and these techniques are usually attributed to visual memory.Verbal techniques include synonym, antonym and definition of words which are regardedas useful in defining abstract words. Lastly, translation technique was used to convey themeaning of words. Some extra materials such as additional exercises were provided forboth groups. Throughout the implementation process, the participants were evaluated byhaving two exams. At the end of the implementation process, a post-test was conducted to both group participants in order to collect the data required for the study.
- According to Tabachnick and Fidell (2013), in order to regard the data results as normallydistributed, the skewness and kurtosis values should be between +1.5 and -1.5. As can beseen from the table, the quantitative data gathered from questionnaires can be consideredto be normally distributed. Therefore, parametric tests were conducted in the analysis ofdata. Additionally, the homogeneity of the data was examined by Levene’s Homogeneity Test for questionnaire.
- For the analysis of qualitative data, content analysis was utilized to examine students’answers in interviews. After transcribing the data, the researcher read all the interviewscarefully many times and tried to combine participants’ answers into relevant categoriesthat were later banded together into comprehensive themes. The process of qualitative dataanalysis of this study was conducted by hand. As Creswell (2005) mentions if the researcherhas a small database or wants to be close to the data and has enough time, manual analysis can be implemented.
- As Table 16 shows, the second difficulty faced by students is ‘pronouncing the words’.According to a language essay published in UK Essays (2018), “words that are difficult topronounce are more difficult to learn”. In the same vein, the participants generallycomplained about the difficulty of pronouncing the target words. Most of them claimed thatalthough they paid special attention to the pronunciation of words, they still had problemswith the correct pronunciation. When asked about the difficulties that they experienced while learning vocabulary, one of the participant’s comments are as follows:
- The challenges faced by students in discovering and consolidating foreign languagevocabulary was another point of concern of the study. The qualitative data showed thatstudents experienced some kind of difficulties such as memorizing words, pronouncing thewords, using new vocabulary in speaking or writing, similarity of words and multiple-meaning words. The most encountered difficulty in learning vocabulary was memorizing.The majority of students were of the opinion that it was hard to memorize the target words.The reason why they have difficulty in memorizing target words may be that the number ofwords that language learners have to learn is extremely large. This difficulty was alsoreported by Rohmetillah (2014). To determine the difficulties faced by students invocabulary learning, he used both a questionnaire and an interview. The results of hisstudy showed that participants generally had difficulty in memorizing target words. At thispoint it is possible to suggest that to help students in memorizing new words, teachersshould consolidate the new words by using listening and reading activities and also putemphasis on guessing strategies. A recent study conducted by Afzal (2019) whichinvestigated problems encountered by EFL students also showed some similar difficultiesfound in the present study such as pronouncing new words. A possible explanation for thisresult may be students’ lack of interest in learning pronunciation. Therefore, it can besuggested that pronunciation should also be taught as an integral part of vocabularyteaching. Students also reported some other difficulties such as using new vocabulary inspeaking or writing, similarity of words and multiple-meaning words. As a result, thementioned difficulties could be overcome if lecturers design their teaching materials by taking the difficulties faced by students into account and also use a variety of VTSs.
- The quantitative data of the study also revealed that there are significant differences instrategy use based on gender variable. The results showed that female participants usedall types of VLSs more than male participants. The findings suggest that gender is one ofthe factors influencing VLS use. Especially, there were significant differences betweenparticipants in terms of using cognitive and social (discovery) strategies. This finding wasalso reported by Catalan (2003). She examined sex differences in L2 vocabulary learningand according to the results male and females differ significantly with regard to number ofvocabulary strategies used. In addition, the findings of present study show parallelism withthe study conducted by Yılmaz (2017). In her article, the results revealed a significantdifference between female and male participants in favour of females in all categories ofVLSs. On the other hand, the findings of the present study contradict with those of Zokaee,Zaferanieh and Naseri (2012) who found that there was no significant difference betweenmale and female learners in terms of their VLS use. As Yılmaz (2017) stated, studies whichfound that male participants used VLSs more than female participants or those that foundno significant difference between the two group participants are very few in the literature.The main objective of the current study was to explore whether teaching vocabulary topreparatory class students in accordance with their VLSs was effective compared to usingconventional vocabulary teaching techniques. At the end of the implementation process, aposttest was applied to both group participants. The results have revealed that the studentsin experimental group got higher scores in vocabulary test than those in control group. Apossible explanation for this result may be related to the efficiency of strategy use invocabulary learning and teaching. One of the studies supporting the findings of the presentstudy is that of Serçe (2013). The researcher tried to determine the effects of teaching VLSson vocabulary achievement and also on using VLSs. The results demonstrated thatteaching VLSs increased the success and permanence of experiment group participants atboth elementary and pre-intermediate levels. Furthermore, according to the results,teaching VLSs increased students’ strategy usage and students used different strategies invocabulary learning process depending on more than one factor. Overall, it can beconcluded that teaching vocabulary to students in accordance with their VLSs improves students’ vocabulary knowledge compared to using conventional teaching methods.
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