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The Percentage of Words Known in a Text and Reading Comprehension
Abstract
This study focused on the relationship between percentage of vocabulary known in a text and level of comprehension of the same text. Earlier studies have estimated the percentage of vocabulary necessary for second language learners to understand written texts as being between 95% (Laufer, 1989) and 98% (Hu & Nation, 2000). In this study, 661 participants from 8 countries completed a vocabulary measure based on words drawn from 2 texts, read the texts, and then completed a reading comprehension test for each text. The results revealed a relatively linear relationship between the percentage of vocabulary known and the degree of reading comprehension. There was no indication of a vocabulary “threshold,” where comprehension increased dramatically at a particular percentage of vocabulary knowledge. Results suggest that the 98% estimate is a more reasonable coverage target for readers of academic texts.
... The field of applied linguistics has long acknowledged the importance of vocabulary to most, if not all aspects of language (Barcroft, 2007;Cheng & Matthews, 2018;Ha, 2021b;Lewis, 2002;Nurmukhamedov & Webb, 2019;Webb, 2020). For receptive language skills including listening and reading, vocabulary could be considered to be the decisive factor to learners' text comprehension (Lange & Matthews, 2020;Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;Qian & Lin, 2020;Schmitt et al., 2011;van Zeeland & Schmitt, 2013). Questions regarding the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and comprehension have always been around the notion of lexical coverage, or the proportion of words learners need to know to adequately understand a text (Nation, 2006). ...
... The problem was that teachers did not have any evidence-backed answers to rely on, and as Laufer (2021, p. 238) pointed out, most of the teachers in the 1980s had to work on the assumption that 80% coverage would lead to reasonable comprehension. Further studies on the issue (Hu & Nation, 2000;Laufer, 1989Laufer, , 2013Schmitt et al., 2011) established the two lexical coverage thresholds for acceptable comprehension (95%) and optimal comprehension (98%). ...
... Since the 98% coverage reduces more than half of the unknown words encountered at the 95% threshold, learners at the 95% coverage threshold normally have to double or even triple their existing lexical resource in order to achieve the 98% coverage for the same type of text (Al-Surmi, 2014;Coxhead & Walls, 2012;Dang & Webb, 2014;Nation, 2006;Nurmukhamedov, 2017;Tegge, 2017;Webb & Macalister, 2013). It is worth noting that these coverage thresholds did not only apply to reading comprehension (Schmitt et al., 2011), but were also applicable to listening comprehension (van Zeeland & Schmitt, 2013). ...
The article shines light upon the differences in the vocabulary demands of academic spoken discourse between three broad scientific disciplines: Life Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Social Sciences. By employing the Academic Word List (AWL) and British National Corpus/Corpus of Contemporary American English (BNC/COCA) wordlist, the present study analyzed data of the transcripts from 160 university lectures, 39 seminars, and 600 TED talks. Results from the analysis of the 2.5-million-token corpus demonstrated an order of lexical difficulty in which Life Sciences and Social Sciences were the most and least lexically demanding fields of study, correspondingly. Research findings also indicated a strong supportive relationship between the AWL and the BNC/COCA wordlist. Learners with limited vocabulary knowledge at 1,000 and 2,000 levels could significantly increase their lexical coverage for academic lectures, seminars, and presentations with the support of the AWL. For disciplines with low lexical demands like Social Sciences, the vocabulary knowledge of nearly 2,570 word families (BNC/ COCA 2,000 + AWL) could help students understand 95.07% of the running words in universities lectures and seminars. Research findings offer implications for vocabulary teaching and learning.
... Vocabulary acquisition proved to be an indicator for success in writing (Bialystok et al., 2009), however, not all the words in the English language are of equal value. There is 10% of the words which are repeated more frequently in the running texts (Schmitt et al., 2011). The correct spelling of these words, hereinafter high frequency words, are crucial not only for further comprehension of longer text and utterances, but also for the development of fluency in both oral and written skills (Spencer, 2007)including word frequency, phonemic length and measures of orthographic depth and complexity. ...
... Not all the words in the English language are of equal value when it comes to reading/writing, as there are some words which are much useful than others due to their frequent occurring in the texts (Nation & Hunston, 2013;Schmitt et al., 2011)000-9,000 word families is needed for reading and 6,000-7,000 for listening. But is this the definitive picture? ...
... Four well-established lists were compared and it was found that BNC/COCA2000 (British National Corpus / Corpus of Contemporary American English 2000. Consequently, HFW teaching is recommended as a starting point in vocabulary learning (Nation & Hunston, 2013;Schmitt et al., 2011)000-9,000 word families is needed for reading and 6,000-7,000 for listening. But is this the definitive picture? ...
Within the field of education, there is controversy as to whether the gender of students and the type of school they attend have an impact on the processes of teaching and learning a second language. The aim of this study is to determine whether these elements might be related to the writing of certain high-frequency words in English, which appear in both the Dolch and Fry lists, in 623 Spanish students aged 8 and 9 years. Based on the SPSS analysis of the errors made by these students, a subsequent and more in-depth study was carried out. For this purpose, the following instruments were used: the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test to identify the significant differences; the Kruskal-Wallis test to compare errors according to schooling (single-sex and co-ed schools); and the Mann-Whitney U-test to compare the errors according to students' gender. The results show that the type of school that students attended influenced the spelling of certain high-frequency words more than their gender. To have a stronger basis for conclusions, further collaboration among EFL teachers in all types of school and a systematic follow-up on the writing of high-frequency words over the course of the following school years would be necessary.
... Vocabulary researchers (e.g., Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011) have proved that the larger percentage of known words in a text, the better comprehension is. The percentage of known words in a text is called lexical coverage (Nation & Waring, 1997). ...
... For this reason, a common approach towards identifying the number of words needed for comprehension of text is to estimate the vocabulary size necessary to achieve certain lexical coverage points (Nation & Webb, 2011). There is no lexical coverage threshold for listening comprehension, but higher coverage is likely to result in better comprehension (Schmitt et al., 2011). van Zeeland and Schmitt (2013, p. 474) found that 90%, 95%, and 98% coverage is likely to lead to 'relatively high', 'relatively high and stable' and 'very high' listening comprehension rates, respectively. ...
... However, this does not mean that the ASWL is not useful for them. The greater the coverage, the better comprehension is (Schmitt et al., 2011). Learning only 75 word families from the ASWL that are beyond their current vocabulary knowledge (e.g., triangle, arbitrary, optimize, inverse) may allow these learners to approach closer to the 98% coverage, which indicates 'very high' listening comprehension. ...
Understanding conference presentations is an important but challenging task for EAP learners in their academic careers. Given the importance of vocabulary knowledge for comprehension, this study examines (a) the lexical demands of conference presentations, (b) the coverage of the Academic Spoken Word List (ASWL) (Dang, Coxhead, & Webb, 2017) in these presentations, and (c) the extent to which this list can help EAP learners deal with the lexical demands of these conferences. A 565,758-word corpus was created from conference presentations of 20 academic subject areas. Analysis revealed that together with proper nouns and marginal words, the most frequent 3,000 word families of general English covered 96.84% and the most frequent 5,000 word families covered 98.22% of conference presentations. The ASWL itself covered 87.52% of the academic conference presentation corpus and more than 87% of its sub-corpora. If learners’ prior knowledge of general vocabulary is taken into account, learning the ASWL word families may help users to achieve potential coverage from nearly 95% to 97% of conference presentations. Implications on how to transfer the findings to teaching will also be discussed.
... Vocabulary researchers (e.g., Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011) have proved that the larger percentage of known words in a text, the better comprehension is. The percentage of known words in a text is called lexical coverage (Nation & Waring, 1997). ...
... For this reason, a common approach towards identifying the number of words needed for comprehension of text is to estimate the vocabulary size necessary to achieve certain lexical coverage points (Nation & Webb, 2011). There is no lexical coverage threshold for listening comprehension, but higher coverage is likely to result in better comprehension (Schmitt et al., 2011). van Zeeland and Schmitt (2013, p. 474) found that 90%, 95%, and 98% coverage is likely to lead to 'relatively high', 'relatively high and stable' and 'very high' listening comprehension rates, respectively. ...
... However, this does not mean that the ASWL is not useful for them. The greater the coverage, the better comprehension is (Schmitt et al., 2011). Learning only 75 word families from the ASWL that are beyond their current vocabulary knowledge (e.g., triangle, arbitrary, optimize, inverse) may allow these learners to approach closer to the 98% coverage, which indicates 'very high' listening comprehension. ...
Vocabulary is essential for comprehending lectures in university courses. No studies have explicitly compared vocabulary in lectures from different contexts. In this study, three corpora were developed from university lectures in EMI courses, non-EMI courses, and open access EMI courses. Analysis of the vocabulary load showed that lectures in non-EMI courses were more lexically demanding than open access EMI courses, which were more lexically demanding than EMI courses. Analysis of the coverage of Dang et al.’s (2017) Academic Spoken Word List (ASWL) showed that compared to general words, learning ASWL words is a shortcut for learners to improve their lecture comprehension. Moreover, while knowledge of items from all ASWL levels could benefit learners from the three contexts, attention to Levels 1–3 items would probably be more beneficial for those studying in EMI courses and open access EMI courses. Attention to Level 4 items appeared to be more useful for those studying in non-EMI courses.
... Webb (2010, p. 498) defined coverage as "the percentage of known words in a text" and considered it a useful measurement tool as it assists in determining the extent to which learners can comprehend a text and incidentally learn words from it. There have been three seminal studies attempting to explore the effect of lexical coverage on reading comprehension (Hu & Nation, 2000;Laufer, 1989;Schmitt et al., 2011). In one of the earliest studies on lexical coverage, Laufer (1989) found that at 95% text coverage the great majority of the participants scored 55% or higher on a reading comprehension test. ...
... It was at 100% coverage, however, that the majority of the participants gain adequate comprehension. In another study, Schmitt et al. (2011) found that as there was a 1% increase in coverage between 90% and 100% intervals, the participants achieved greater comprehension, suggesting that there is a linear relationship between the two variables. ...
... Taken together, research has shown that 95% and 98% coverage levels might be required for reasonable (Laufer, 1989) and ideal, unassisted reading comprehension (Hu & Nation, 2000;Schmitt et al., 2011), respectively. Regarding listening comprehension, however, research has indicated that coverage levels between 90% and 95% might be necessary to gain adequate comprehension (Bonk, 2000;van Zeeland & Schmitt, 2013b). ...
This study investigated the lexical demands of English-as-an-additional-language (EAL) and general-audience podcasts and their potential for incidental vocabulary learning. Two corpora (i.e., one EAL and one general-audience) comprising 1,188,512 tokens were analyzed to determine the necessary vocabulary knowledge to reach 90% and 95% coverage. The results indicated that 2,000 and 3,000 word families plus proper nouns (PN), marginal words (MW), transparent compounds (TC), and acronyms (AC) covered 90% and 95% of words in podcasts, respectively. The results also showed that EAL and general-audience podcasts required 1,000 and 2,000 words families to reach 90% coverage, respectively. Regarding 95% coverage, knowledge of 2,000 (EAL) and 3,000 (general-audience) word families was required. The results also demonstrated almost 60% of word families from the 2,000-word level were encountered 15+ times in each corpus, suggesting podcasts may hold relatively great potential for learning such words incidentally. Furthermore, our findings indicated that there was some potential for incidentally learning words from the 3,000-word level in both corpora, while general-audience podcasts may hold greater potential in this regard. Implications for using podcasts in language pedagogy are also discussed.
... Humans learn by talking with other people and by reading texts. Many readability features use this assumption, namely the degree of word knowledge and the degree of word predictability [11]. ...
... Hence, the chance that readers saw these words earlier in their lives is high. Therefore, these frequencies can indicate some part of readability [11]. ...
This paper introduces a novel method to predict when a Google translation is better than other machine translations (MT) in Dutch. Instead of considering fidelity, this approach considers fluency and readability indicators for when Google ranked best. This research explores an alternative approach in the field of quality estimation. The paper contributes by publishing a dataset with sentences from English to Dutch, with human-made classifications on a best-worst scale. Logistic regression shows a correlation between T-Scan output, such as readability measurements like lemma frequencies, and when Google translation was better than Azure and IBM. The last part of the results section shows the prediction possibilities. First by logistic regression and second by a generated automated machine learning model. Respectively, they have an accuracy of 0.59 and 0.61.
... Some research studies even argue for vocabulary development as the primary determinant of reading comprehension (Alderson, 2000;Daneman, 1991;Laufer & Sim, 1985). In L2 settings, correlations between receptive vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension range between 0.40 and 0.85 (Henriksen, Albrechtsen, & Haastrup, 2004;Koda, 1989;Laufer, 1997;Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;Qian, 1999Qian, , 2002Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011;Staehr, 2008). In Jeon and Yamashita's meta-analysis (2014), vocabulary (r=.79) was among the three strongest L2 reading comprehension correlates together with L2 grammar knowledge (r=.85) and L2 decoding (r=.56). ...
... This may or may not be linear, however. In contrast, Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe (2011) indicate a linear interaction between vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension. Interestingly, even high levels of vocabulary coverage (98% to 100%) did not lead to 100% comprehension, demonstrating that vocabulary is only one of many facets of comprehension beside grammatical clues, text organization or subject-matter familiarity as some examples. ...
Reading comprehension is a complex, multi-dimensional activity, which depends on a range of cognitive and linguistic processes. This article aims to provide a state-of-art review of linguistic factors which influence learners’ L2 reading comprehension. The focus is on variables which have been posited to be key determiners of L2 reading variance in previous narrative reviews: L2 grammar knowledge, L2 vocabulary knowledge, L2 listening comprehension and L2 decoding. This choice of variables was based on Jeon and Jamashita’s (2014) meta-analysis of 59
studies, in which they identified L2 grammar knowledge (r=.85), L2 vocabulary knowledge (r=.79), L2 listening comprehension (r=.77) and L2 decoding (r=.56) as the strongest correlates of L2 reading comprehension.
... How many word families should be the ideal number for grade 12 Thai students based on the Basic Education Core Curriculum? Hu & Nation (2000) and Schmitt, Jiang & Grabe (2011)'s studies showed that to be able to comprehend written or spoken texts without any assistance, to know at least 98% of running words in texts (98% word coverage) -2 unknown words appearing on every 100 words. This number might sound too many for language learners. ...
... This number might sound too many for language learners. However, the research conducted by Schmitt, Jiang, and Grabe (2011) revealed that with knowing 98% of words in a text, learners would obtain only 68% comprehension of text. Thus, learners who have more than 2% of the unknown words would struggle with a full understanding of texts. ...
The objectives of this present research were to examine the appropriateness of words used in the English O-NETs of grade 12 Thai students and to explore the consistency of the word difficulties used in these tests. The instruments used in this research were the 2008-2010 English O-NETs. Check Words Up Software was used to classify words based on their difficulty levels, 1st-20th word levels. In order to answer the research questions, basic statistics were applied. The results revealed that the words used in each English O-NET were quite suitable to grade 12 Thai students, based on the expected level of their English proficiency set by the Basic Education Core Curriculum (A.D. 2008). However, there were some inappropriate words in some parts of each test. In terms of the consistency, 2008-2010 O-NETs seemed to use equal levels of word difficulties.
... L2 knowledge is usually operationalized in varied ways, such as syntactic knowledge or vocabulary knowledge. Although debatable, L2 vocabulary knowledge is usually considered the best predictor of reading comprehension (Laufer & Aviad-Levitzky, 2017;Proctor et al., 2012;Schmitt et al., 2011). This has led to proposals such as the lexical Final draft threshold which refers to the number of words in the text the reader has to know to use higher order skills (Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010). ...
In recent years, reading comprehension studies have followed a componential approach aimed at determining the way in which variables interact. However, in L2 academic reading comprehension, this progress is still in its initial stages. With this context in mind, this paper aims to explore the relationship between prior knowledge and L2 reading comprehension by proposing a mediation model that considers L2 vocabulary knowledge and metacognitive awareness as mediating variables. A final sample of 75 Chilean university students with an intermediate level of English was used for the study. The variables measured were prior knowledge, vocabulary breadth, metacognitive awareness of reading strategies, and reading comprehension. Among the findings of this study, we propose a simple mediation model in which vocabulary knowledge functions as a mediator between prior knowledge and reading comprehension. Unexpectedly, the impact of metacognitive awareness was not found to be statistically significant.
... Excluding names, 96.8% of the running words belong to the 4000 most frequent word families of English in Nation's (2017) British National Corpus and Corpus of Contemporary American English (BNC/COCA) lists (https://www.wgtn.ac.nz/lals/resources/paulnations-resources/vocabulary-lists), according to the vocabulary profiler on Tom Cobb's (n.d.) Lexical Tutor website (https://www.lextutor.ca/vp/comp/). Since the texts were read in the classroom with a teacher and online dictionaries available for assistance, we did not consider it vital to ensure that 98% of all the running words were known by the students-a "lexical coverage" that has been recommended for unassisted reading (Hu & Nation, 2000;Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;Schmitt et al., 2011). An example of a course text used in the intervention is available as Online Supporting Information. ...
... Another interesting way to look at the impact of vocabulary on comprehension is by trying to answer the tough question: "how many words do we need to understand …". Building on the knowledge that readers or listeners need to be familiar with at least 95% of the words in a text, talk, or recoding to comprehend it adequately [6][7][8][9][10] lexical profiling studies have provided a comprehensive list of lexical demands, or the amount of vocabulary needed to understand 95% of the words in a particular text [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]. ...
Background
The field of language teaching and learning has long recognized the role of vocabulary knowledge in all aspects of language proficiency and indicated that vocabulary beliefs and learning strategies play a pivotal role in learners' vocabulary development. As a result, understanding learners’ beliefs and strategies in vocabulary learning is of paramount importance to language teachers. The Vocabulary Learning Questionnaire (VLQ) developed by Peter Gu in 2018 could be considered the most recent, validated instrument for the measurement of vocabulary learning beliefs and strategies. However, the VLQ contains too many items and is only available in English. The objectives of the study, therefore, are (1) to develop and validate a Vietnamese version of the VLQ which can exclude construct-irrelevant noises related to L2 comprehension, and (2) to reduce the number of items while retaining the key factors in the instruments.
Methods
722 Vietnamese university students took part in the study. Exploratory factor analyses (EFA) and confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) were examined with the free software Jamovi 2.3.13. Both Cronbach's alpha and McDonald's omega were employed to evaluate the factors' internal consistency.
Results
Separate EFAs confirmed the two dimensions of vocabulary beliefs, explaining 62.6% of the total variance, and seven factors of vocabulary strategies, predicting 72.1% of the total variance. CFAs confirmed the hypothesized 9-dimensional structures of different vocabulary learning beliefs and strategies and offer cross-validation evidence for the Vietnamese VLQ. Reliability metrics demonstrated acceptable internal reliability for vocabulary belief and strategy sub-scales.
Conclusion
The Vietnamese VLQ provides a validated measure of vocabulary beliefs and strategies. The 30-item version of the Vietnamese VLQ serves as a starting point for future research in the field of vocabulary learning and teaching in Vietnam.
... As for the coursebooks' texts vocabulary level, the analysis revealed that the coursebooks progress gradually and in a logical manner with around 88% of the vocabulary limited to the first 2000-word families with words from the third 1000 level counting for around 4% throughout the three different levels. Yet research (Hu & Nation, 2000;Schmitt, et al., 2011) has proved that learners need to be in control of 98% of the running words to be able to use the contextual cues to guess the remaining 2% effectively, and with 34.6% of the learners' scores ranging at around 3000 words-families or less, syllabi designers must remedy this by ensuring that another 10% of the is adapted to fall within the first 3000-wordsfamilies, and shift the focus away from form-based instruction and ensure more comprehensive input and enough spaced-encounters with the new vocabulary for the learners to develop their vocabulary repertoire. As for the-end-of-secondarycycle examinations' reading texts, 15.6% of the vocabulary type is beyond the 3000-word families scope and that is largely due to the academic nature of texts; thus, teachers as well as syllabi designers have an important task of ensuring that the learners encounter academic vocabulary often enough and on suitable intervals to ensure its acquisition. ...
One of the major areas in which Algerian EFL learners struggle the most is acquiring enough vocabulary to be able to comprehend English language materials and express themselves properly. Yet as data regarding Algerian EFL learners' vocabulary size and factors influencing its development is notably lacking, no informed measures can be taken to remedy the situation. Hence, the current study aims at measuring the vocabulary repertoire of secondary school pupils and investigating their reading habits, in addition to analyzing the texts of the coursebooks to gauge their suitability to the current level of the learners and make recommendations in the light of the ensuing findings. The results of the Vocabulary Size Test (VST) for both first-year and third-year pupils revealed the opposite of what would be expected as the former group outperformed their senior counterparts, meanwhile the survey revealed that reading is still largely marginalized amongst Algerian learners. A situation that can only be reversed through a national reading program that aspires to systematically instill reading habit in young learners.
... Researchers have repeatedly observed strong correlations between an individual's vocabulary knowledge and their reading abilities, both in L1 and L2 (for L1 : Carver, 2000: Carver, , 2003Stanovich, 1986;Thorndike, 1973;and for L2: Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;M. Li & Kirby, 2015;Nguyen & Nation, 2011;Verhoeven, 2000; though see Schmitt et al., 2011, for slightly weaker relationships). Interestingly, Stanovich (2000) argued for a reciprocal causal relation between reading and word knowledge, in that better word knowledge leads to better reading proficiency, and conversely that reading helps boost word knowledge. ...
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https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10.1177/02655322231162853
The purpose of this paper is to (a) establish whether meaning recall and meaning recognition item formats test psychometrically distinct constructs of vocabulary knowledge which measure separate skills, and, if so, (b) determine whether each construct possesses unique properties predictive of L2 reading proficiency. Factor analyses and hierarchical regression were conducted on results derived from the two vocabulary item formats in order to test this hypothesis. The results indicated that although the two-factor model had better fit and meaning recall and meaning recognition can be considered distinct psychometrically, discriminant validity between the two factors is questionable. In hierarchical regression models, meaning recognition knowledge did not make a statistically significant contribution to explaining reading proficiency over meaning recall knowledge. However, when the roles were reversed, meaning recall did make a significant contribution to the model beyond the variance explained by meaning recognition alone. The results suggest that meaning recognition does not tap into unique aspects of vocabulary knowledge and provide empirical support for meaning recall as a superior predictor of reading proficiency for research purposes.
... The finding that knowledge of about 98% of the words in a text is necessary to understand it well (e.g. Schmitt, Jiang, and Grabe 2011) shows the important role that vocabulary has for reading comprehension. Moreover, Nation (2006) estimates that a learner of English needs to know 8-9000 word families to comprehend written English. ...
Learning vocabulary is a central and time-consuming endeavour for a language learner and it has thus been suggested that the foreign language classroom has to supply explicit support for students' vocabulary development. A major source of explicit word focus is vocabulary exercises in teaching materials and students' learning can be facilitated if they are designed in a way that is conducive to learning. Few studies have so far sought to establish what learning opportunities tasks in materials provide. The present study reports an analysis of the vocabulary exercises in three series of Swedish intermediate EFL materials, focusing on target vocabulary and learning conditions. The target vocabulary was analysed in terms of frequency distribution in general English and the learning conditions provided were studied using a modified version of the Involvement Load Hypothesis. The results indicate that learning is facilitated through extensive retrieval opportunities in the material. However, it was also found that the exercises seldom require students to use the target vocabulary and that it comprises primarily high-frequency words, that is, words that the learners are likely to already know. It is therefore concluded that a more systematic approach to vocabulary has to be adopted by materials developers to ensure that word-focused tasks contribute significantly to students' learning. ARTICLE HISTORY
... Moreover, independent ER is interpreted as reading activities for personal enjoyment, without any external pressure to read or specialized knowledge of the material (Day & Bamford, 2016). Likewise, Renandya and Farrell (2019) state that blended reading programs include numerous reading resources and tasks to encourage learners to develop their reading abilities, strategies, and fluency. ER is an essential and valuable strategy to increase language fluency and promote lifelong learning regardless of the term. ...
Despite multiple studies that have broadly highlighted the positives of employing metacognitive reading strategies, there remains an absence of the rationale for adopting the reading strategy based on the students' perspectives. The present study aims to look into first-year EFL students' preferences for using metacognitive reading strategies as part of an extensive reading (ER) program at one of the public universities in Malang, Indonesia. The data were acquired from both quantitative and qualitative data sources. The fundamental data were garnered from a quantitative online survey, and the results were counted using descriptive statistics. Semi-structured interview sessions with six participants were carried out to collect qualitative data, and the results served as a means to strengthen the primary data. The results revealed that the problem-solving reading strategy proved to be the most commonly used in the ER program, followed by global and support reading strategies. The reading strategies advanced students' reading comprehension. Students could also strengthen their language skills, particularly reading comprehension, vocabulary acquisition, and writing abilities. The study findings implied considering an alternative teaching strategy and understanding how students find it most helpful to assist them in a supervised ER program.
... Hashimoto's rationale was that such correction is not essential when the item, as opposed to the person, is of interest. Nevertheless, Hashimoto (2021) and the earlier original study still included pseudowords, and our instrument followed this approach to informally gauge for problematic participants with an inordinate frequency of FAs, which was capped at 10% (Schmitt et al., 2011). Seventy-two COCA-derived pseudowords were randomly selected from the pseudoword list in Hashimoto (2016) for inclusion in the AWL-based yes-no instrument, which achieved the conventional 60:40 ratio between real and pseudowords (Hashimoto & Egbert, 2019). ...
This article presents a conceptual replication of Hashimoto and Egbert (https://doi.org/10.1111/lang.12353), a study that featured multivariate models where lexical sophistication variables accounted for word difficulty (yes-no recognition) better than frequency alone among learners of English as a second or foreign language from North America. This current study (n words = 88; n people = 128) conceptually replicated Hashimoto and Egbert with data from three Asian university English-for-academic-purposes sites. Methodological differences included a more conservative lexical sophistication operationalization process and avoidance of stepwise regression. Like the original study, the replication's findings favored multi-variate models over frequency, which predicted 36% of word difficulty's variance alone. In a multiple regression model accounting for word difficulty, R 2 = .52, frequency accounted for 17% of the predicted variance with age of acquisition (AoA: 18%) and word naming reaction time (WN_RT: 16%) also being significant predictors. This replication also extended the testing approach by using a mixed-effect model, involving person and site intercepts as random effects. The model's ability to predict word difficulty fell, marginal R 2 = .22, conditional R 2 = .40, but frequency, AoA, and WN_RT remained the strongest predictors. Taken together, this replication successfully supports the original study's more-than-frequency conclusion while highlighting the need for further research into the area.
... A reading vocabulary threshold refers to how much vocabulary, i.e., how many words, a learner needs to know so as to be able to read a certain text without outside assistance. Many have tried to answer this challenging question, bearing in mind that the knowledge of vocabulary and comprehension are, naturally, strongly related Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;Schmitt et al., 2011). ...
With a view to advancing their students’ listening comprehension and vocabulary, English for Science teachers are frequently in search of new and interesting audio and video materials. TED Talks on science topics are a good option for this purpose. But just how suitable, vocabulary-wise, are they for English for Science learners? This study explores the lexical profile of TED Talks on science and compares it against non-science TED Talks and science academic lectures. We use a 5-million-word TED Talk corpus, with a 1.3-million-word science subsection. Of the two categories of TED Talks, it is the science ones that are lexically more similar to science academic lectures. Science TED Talks also feature significantly more technical vocabulary than non-science TED Talks. Reasonable listening comprehension is achieved at 4,000 words for science TED Talks, while ideal comprehension is achieved at 8,000 words for both categories. These results recommend science TED Talks for English for Science listening.
... students are able to read, but they do not understand the text's message. This statement is supported by Schmitt (2011), teachers tend to complain that their students can read but P-ISSN 2623-0356 E-ISSN 2654-5586 ...
The goals of this study were to understand more about students' learning strategies for understanding English reading content and to discover why did students employed those strategies. Students in the second semester of the English Education Study Program at the University of PGRI Palembang participated in this research. A qualitative descriptive method was used in this study. A semi-structured interview was also used as a primary source of data. Data collection, data reduction, data display, and data verification were all utilized to examine the information. The data revealed that students used a variety of strategies to perceive the English reading text. Besides, habitual translation was the most commonly used reading strategy through students, while guessing the meaning of the text was the least commonly used reading strategy. Additionally, this study found through several reasons.
... During this time, students were encouraged to sample a number of readers at different levels and identify their "comfort zone" levels at which they occasionally met a word they didn't know, but this didn't interfere significantly with their understanding or enjoyment of the content. Studies indicate that 95 -98% of words appearing in a text should be known for reasonable comprehension (Hu & Nation, 2000 ;Laufer, 1989 ;Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011) facilitating enjoyment/engagement and implicit learning from context, a major benefit of graded/extensive reading (Hunt & Beglar, 2005 ;Liu & Nation, 1985). ...
This exploratory, 10-week study employed online questionnaires to gauge Japanese university students' sense of engagement as they participated in selection, reading and discussion stages of a graded reading activity. Specifically, we examined the effects of self-vs. group-selection of graded readers done in alternate weeks throughout the study. Results revealed similarly moderate levels of reported engagement, with no statistically significant differences and small to negligible effect sizes at each stage of the activity. However, an exploratory examination of the results beyond strict statistical constraints hints at slight advantages for reading of group-selected readers in the effort domain, and for discussion of group-selected readers in terms of engagement, competency and success. Further work may be merited in these areas. In sum, students responded positively to both approaches, and lacking strong evidence of differential engagement, instructors working with similar activities in similar contexts can feel free to vary their use of self-or group-selection depending on practical constraints and/or the type of activities they want to try. This study was conducted as part of the 2018 Quantitative Research Training Project, a professional development program for language teachers in Japan looking to gain knowledge and experience in quantitative research methods.
... There are many studies that examined students' vocabulary learning at different educational levels (e.g.; Nation, 1983;Horst et al., 1998;Qian, 1999;Hu and Nation, 2000;Zahar et al., 2001, Horst et al., 2005Tekmen and Daloglu, 2006;Yu, 2007;Webb, 2009;Laufer and Ravenhorst -Kalvoski, 2010;Schmitt et al., 2011;White, 2014). These studies suggested that vocabulary knowledge may affect the ability to learn words incidentally through reading and writing. ...
... There are many studies that examined students' vocabulary learning at different educational levels (e.g.; Nation, 1983;Horst et al., 1998;Qian, 1999;Hu and Nation, 2000;Zahar et al., 2001, Horst et al., 2005Tekmen and Daloglu, 2006;Yu, 2007;Webb, 2009;Laufer and Ravenhorst -Kalvoski, 2010;Schmitt et al., 2011;White, 2014). These studies suggested that vocabulary knowledge may affect the ability to learn words incidentally through reading and writing. ...
... According to earlier research, L2 learners need a word coverage of between 95% (Laufer, 1989) and 98% (Hu & Nation, 2000) to understand written texts. In a study by Schmitt et al. (2011), they concluded that readers of academic text should aim for 98%-word coverage to improve reading comprehension. The findings also showed a relatively linear relationship between vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension. ...
Japanese graduate school students in the field of science and engineering need to read academic research in their second language (L2), and such tasks can be challenging. Studies showed a strong (0.78) correlation between vocabulary size and reading comprehension (McLean et al., 2020), and providing high-frequency word lists could enhance comprehension. In this work-in-progress, 1.35 million tokens of professor-recommended reading materials were used to investigate a method to create a vocabulary list that would benefit science majors in graduate school; the procedures to create a corpus and a high-frequency word list efficiently; and the steps required to create a cleaner corpus. This paper outlines a systematic literature-informed method that includes input from professors in the field; the combined use of tailored script in MATLAB and AntCont (Anthony, 2022) generated corpus and high-frequency words efficiently; and repeated comparison of original PDFs and the matching text files, then adding MATLAB script to deal with specific issues created by a cleaner text. This proposed method can be applied in other contexts to enhance the generation of high-frequency word lists
... (Brandenburg-Weeks & Abalkheel, 2021). Some scholars further identified that 95 per cent coverage is acceptable, but at least 98 per cent is the ultimate goal for learners (Laufer & Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010;MacDonald, 2019;Schmitt et al., 2011;Tegge, 2017). Thus, when considering the relationship between the vocabulary levels and lexical coverage, the higher the level of understanding required (to 95-98 per cent coverage) of a corpus, the greater the difficulty for recipients. ...
The current study explored the vocabulary use and examined the rhetorical move structure of World Health Organization Emergencies Press Conferences on the Coronavirus Disease. Vocabulary use was described using a corpus of 140 press conferences containing 1,139,248 running words that was analysed based on three indicator variables: vocabulary level, lexical coverage, and lexical profiling. The move structure was analysed based on 70 press conferences randomly selected from the corpus to identify shared moves and steps throughout the selected press conferences. The vocabulary level and lexical coverage analysis identified that 95 per cent of the vocabulary used in the corpus came from the first 3,000 high-frequency words based on the frequency rates of the British National Corpus (BNC) and the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). Harmoniously, non-medical terms were extensively used across the press conferences covering 93.56 per cent of the corpus. Therefore, L2 users of English would understand most of the language used in the press conferences. According to the corpus-based move analysis, the frequency findings revealed 11 moves and their respective 32 steps. The study also established the move sequence prototypes for each stage comprising an opening stage, opening remarks, stage engagement, and closure. These results could be implemented for assisting learners in public speaking or English for business courses.
... 4. Variables that may affect incidental vocabulary learning 4.1 L2 proficiency Research indicates that learners who know more L2 words are likely to learn more words incidentally through reading (e.g., Webb & Chang, 2015a;Zahar et al., 2001) and watching television (Feng & Webb, 2020;Peters & Webb, 2018). This may occur because students who know more words have better reading (Laufer, 1989;Schmitt et al., 2011) andlistening comprehension (Van Zeeland &Schmitt, 2013b), which may allow them to attend more to unknown language features that are encountered. Research indicates that the degree to which learners attend to unknown L2 words during reading is positively related to learning those words (Godfroid et al., 2018;Pellicer-Sánchez, 2016). ...
There is a great deal of variation in gains found between studies of second language (L2) incidental vocabulary learning, as well as many factors that affect learning. This meta-analysis investigated the effects of exposure to L2 meaning-focused input on incidental vocabulary learning with an aim to clarify the proportional gains that occur through meaning-focused learning. Twenty-four primary studies were retrieved providing 29 different effect sizes and a total sample size of 2,771 participants (1,517 in experimental groups vs. 1,254 in control groups). Results showed large overall effects for incidental vocabulary learning on first and follow-up posttests. Mean proportions of target words learned ranged from 9-18% on immediate posttests, and 6-17% on delayed posttests. Incidental L2 vocabulary learning gains were similar across reading (17%, 15%), listening (15%, 13%), and reading while listening (13%, 17%) conditions on immediate and delayed posttest. In contrast, the proportion of words learned in viewing conditions on immediate posttests was smaller (7%, 5%). Findings also revealed that the amount of incidental learning varies according to a range of moderator variables including learner characteristics (L2 proficiency, institutional levels), materials (text type and audience), learning activities (spacing, mode of input), and methodological features (approaches to controlling prior word knowledge).
... Laufer (1989) believes that 95% coverage is needed for reasonable comprehension of a text, while Nation (2006) states that 98% is ideal for understanding written texts. Other estimates include 98% for reading for pleasure (Hirsh & Nation, 1992), 98% for adequate unassisted reading comprehension (Hu & Nation, 2000), 98% for reasonable comprehension of academic texts (Schmitt et al., 2011), and 98% for unsimplified written texts (Laufer, 2013). ...
The present study investigated the lexical demands of scripted and unscripted television programs. To that end, two corpora consisting of 286 episodes from 14 different programs, both scripted and unscripted, were analyzed. The results indicated that the 1,000 most frequent word families, plus proper nouns, marginal words, transparent compounds, and acronyms, were required to reach 90% coverage in both scripted and unscripted programs. Furthermore, knowledge of the 2,000 most frequent word families accounted for 95% coverage in the unscripted programs, while, to reach the same threshold in the scripted programs, a vocabulary size of the 3,000 most frequent word families was needed. Regarding 98% coverage, vocabulary knowledge of 4,000 and 6,000 word families was required for the unscripted and scripted programs, respectively. A corpus-driven investigation was also conducted to explore the potential of both types of television programs for incidental vocabulary learning. Accordingly, the results showed that both types of programs may hold relatively great potential for learning words from the 2,000- to 3,000-word levels and might have some potential for the incidental learning of mid-frequency words (i.e., 4,000- to 9,000-word levels). Implications for using both types of television programs in language learning and teaching processes are discussed.
... As word reading becomes easier and faster, reading practice and the volume of words read increases; and beginning readers progress from reading individual words to reading connected text (Ehri, 2015). Exposed to increasingly complex text, developing readers continue to encounter new words which must be decoded and whose meanings must either be recognized or inferred (Schmitt et al., 2011;Perfetti, 2010). Word level reading skills become increasingly less effortful, and more cognitive resources are available for making meaning from text (Perfetti & Stafura, 2014). ...
Reading proficiency is requisite in our read-to-learn educational system, yet two-thirds of American students are not proficient readers. Assuring educational equity means supporting all learners with multiple component reading interventions that individually scaffold students while remediating weak literacy skills and providing intensive and sustainable intervention early. This study (N = 855) measured the efficacy of two different multiple component reading programs for students in grades three, four, and five. Grade levels of students were assigned to either the treatment intervention or the typical practice condition; and all students were pre-and post-tested using EasyCBM Reading Benchmarks. Students scoring at/below the 30th percentile on either benchmark were also assessed with the WRMT-3 Passage Reading Comprehension and Oral Reading Fluency measures. Students in the treatment condition received Readable English and students in typical practice condition continued to receive Amplify CKLA during their regular ELA times for 45—60 hours. Students receiving Readable English significantly outperformed students in the typical practice condition on measures of oral reading fluency, reading rate, accuracy, and passage comprehension. Raw scores, growth scale values, and grade equivalents are reported, and implications for practice are discussed. In a school year fraught with pandemic instructional interruptions and learning loss, elementary students in the intervention condition averaged a year’s worth of growth in reading fluency and nine months of growth in reading comprehension compared to three- and five-months fluency and comprehension growth in the typical practice condition. Students in the Readable English condition experienced meaningful gains in reading rate and accuracy that will give exponential word reading volume dividends to students able to read text faster and more accurately going forward. This study adds to accumulating evidence that multiple component reading programs designed to reinforce fluency skills also support reading comprehension gains for all students.
... It has, for example, been found that a learner needs to know about 98% of the words in a text to fully comprehend it (e.g. Hu & Nation, 2000;Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011). Nation (2006) has suggested that knowledge of about 8-9,000 word families 1 is needed to understand texts in English, such as newspapers or novels. ...
Learning vocabulary is a central but yet complex aspect of learning a language. Hence, researchers stress the importance of facilitating vocabulary development via a structured approach to target words and recycling. While teaching materials have the potential to provide this structure to all students in a classroom, few studies have investigated the vocabulary component of textbooks and the learning opportunities they provide. In the present study, the texts in five series of EFL materials aimed at intermediate learners in Swedish secondary school (years 7-9) were investigated , using corpus-based methods. The results indicate that the texts encompass a suitable amount of unknown vocabulary for vocabulary learning from reading and provide exposure to mid-frequency vocabulary. However, it was also found that these items are not recycled sufficiently. Rather, the materials mainly recycle lexical items that students are likely to know already. It is therefore concluded that although the materials offer input suitable for the target students, they are not structured in a way that supports vocabulary development.
... In this study, knowledge of critical content words was assessed with a multiple-choice test. By contrast, Schmitt et al. (2011) were not able to determine a clear lexical threshold in a carefully designed study with a wordnonword recognition test and a standardized reading comprehension test. ...
Vocabulary knowledge is one of the most important elements of reading comprehension. Text coverage is the proportion of known words in a given text. We hypothesize that text comprehension increases exponentially with text coverage due to network effects and activation of prior knowledge. In addition, the lexical threshold hypothesis states that text comprehension increases faster above a certain amount of text coverage. The exponential relationship between text coverage and text comprehension, as well as the lexical threshold, are at the heart of text comprehension theory and are of great interest for optimizing language instruction. In this study, we first used vocabulary knowledge to estimate text coverage based on test scores from N = 924 German fourth graders. Second, we compared linear with non-linear models of text coverage and vocabulary knowledge to explain text comprehension. Third, we used a broken-line regression to estimate a lexical threshold. The results showed an exponential relationship between text coverage and text comprehension. Moreover, text coverage explained text comprehension better than vocabulary knowledge, and text comprehension increased more quickly above 56% text coverage. From an instructional perspective, the results suggest that reading activities with text coverage below 56% are too difficult for readers and likely inappropriate for instructional purposes. Further applications of the results, such as for standard setting and readability analyses, are discussed.
... Thresholds for mastery of the underlying construct have been suggested for VLT scores, for instance, the threshold of 86.7% percentage score correct (Schmitt et al., 2001) and the 96.7%-threshold (Webb et al., 2017). Although subsequent research suggests that the 86.7% level may be too low (Schmitt et al., 2011), it has been widely used (e.g., Edgarsson, 2018;Henriksen & Danelund, 2015;Skjelde & Coxhead, 2020). McLean (2021) criticizes the 86.7% threshold because of the few empirically based arguments that this threshold is sufficient for a learner to comprehend 98% of the words in a text. ...
English academic vocabulary knowledge is needed for reading in many internationalized university contexts around the world. However, our knowledge is limited regarding the degree to which pre-tertiary education prepares students for the academic English reading demands at university. To explore this question, this cross-sectional study analyzed academic vocabulary scores from two Swedish student samples (N=952), at the beginning and at the end of upper secondary English education. Statistical analyses were conducted to describe and compare the academic vocabulary knowledge in the two samples, also in relation to gender, study disciplines and English grades. Large variations in vocabulary scores were observed within and between samples. The exit-sample outperformed the entry-sample. The exit-sample’s academic vocabulary knowledge correlated positively with English grades, however, these (CEFR-B2) students do not, on average, reach suggested mastery thresholds of academic vocabulary knowledge. A logistic regression analysis showed higher probabilities for male students and Arts/Humanities/Science/Technology students than female and Economics/Social science students to reach suggested mastery thresholds. This unequal distribution of academic word knowledge is discussed in the context of curricular goals about equality and university-preparation.
... Nonetheless, the use of various mobile technologies in most studies has been associated with short-term interventions (Chwo et al., 2018;Hwang & Fu, 2019), and their potentialand affordances for second language acquisition remained largely unexplored. Given that reading in a foreign language is among the main sources for vocabulary development (Nation, 2013;Webb & Nation, 2017), and the fact that knowledge of vocabulary correlates positively with all other language skills including speaking, writing, and listening (Morris & Cobb, 2004;Qian, 2002;Schmitt et al., 2011Schmitt et al., , 2017, there is a need for more studies investigating the effects of mobile-assisted reading on second language vocabulary development. This study followed this line of inquiryand compared the vocabulary learning gains from mobile or paper-based reading. ...
In recent years, the proliferation of mobile technologies is transforming educational practices around the world. In this regard, students are attending classes with their mobile or tablet devices, on which they do most of their reading and writing activities. This has resulted in new understanding of literacy as being multimodal, fluid, sociocultural, and dynamic social practices. Meanwhile, mobile-assisted language learning developed exponentially, and its implementation has been reported to be generally effective in language education compared to traditional materials. Within this line of research, the current study examined the impacts of mobile assisted reading on English language learners' vocabulary development. The participants of the research were 52 adult language learners divided into one experimental and one control groups. The participants in the experimental group employed mobile devices for reading a number of selected and simplified news reports, however, the control group used traditional print-based materials for reading the same content over the course of 10 weeks. The participants' vocabulary gains were compared in pre-and post-tests and the findings indicated that the two groups improved their vocabulary knowledge, but the experimental group learned more vocabulary items and outperformed the control group on post-test. The findings highlighted the significant contribution of mobile phones in improving foreign language reading with associated impacts on vocabulary development. The study has implications for language teachers and materials development in teaching English to speakers of other languages.
... In general, learners use English materials whose difficulty levels fit their English proficiency levels. According to previous work, there is a linear relationship between the degree of reading comprehension and the percentage of vocabulary in an English material known by the reader (Schmitt, Jiang & Grabe, 2011). This implies that the difficulty of materials the learner is using is a good indicator of the learner's English proficiency. ...
Learning material recommendation has been a common field in the recommendation in e-learning due to the difficulty the learners experience in choosing appropriate learning materials among many resources. However, few traditional recommendation methods can be applied to e-learning as they are because they do not consider the learners' characteristics. Such methods may not be persuasive enough for the learners and make them less motivated. In this study, we propose an explainable English material recommendation that can adapt to the changes of learners' learning state and can explain the basis of the recommendation by using an information retrieval technique. This aims to address learners' trust and motivation issues. The algorithm estimates the difficulty of materials and learners' English skills and makes material recommendations that fit their skill levels. A case study in the setting of extensive reading is also described. Lastly, this paper introduces plans for implementation using an e-learning system with this recommendation. In the future, we will conduct an experiment and improve the recommendation algorithms.
... Vocabulary size, receptive vocabulary size in particular, is often reported to be highly correlated with reading comprehension among both L1 and L2 readers. For example, it is well known that adult English L2 learners need to be familiar with at least 95% to 98% of the words in a text in order to comprehend the text independently (without getting help from teachers, dictionaries, and other means; e.g., Laufer, 1997;Schmitt, Jiang, & Grabe, 2011). Recent studies on adult L2 readers, however, have uncovered complex relationships between vocabulary size and reading comprehension. ...
This study examines young English readers’ ability to infer word meanings in context and to use metacognitive knowledge for constructing word meanings in relation to their reading performance. The participants were 61 fourth-grade students in the United States, comprising 24 monolingual English-speaking (ME) students and 37 English-as-a-second-language (L2) students; each group was also divided into strong and emergent readers in English. Participants were asked to read aloud paragraphs containing words unfamiliar to them in two different contextual conditions (i.e., explicit and implicit conditions), to guess the unfamiliar word meanings, and to tell a teacher how they arrived at the inferred meanings. Quantitative analyses found significant differences between strong and emergent readers in their oral fluency as well as in their ability to infer word meanings and articulate their use of metacognitive knowledge. Although significant differences were found in the ability to infer word meanings and the use of metacognitive reasoning between ME and L2 students, such differences disappeared after controlling for the size of students’ receptive vocabulary. Qualitative analyses also revealed differences in the kinds of knowledge and strategies that strong and emergent readers relied on when constructing the meaning of unknown words in both explicit and implicit contexts.
... Some researchers are interested in how extensive reading can broaden the learners' vocabulary breadth (Kulikova, 2015;Webb, 2008;Schmitt, 2008). Although second language learners might not be masterly at deriving unfamiliar lexical meanings from extensive reading, reading might intensify and fortify the understanding of moderately recognised expression (Kulikova, 2015;Schmitt, Jiang & Grabe, 2011). Nation (2001) reports that learning from the given background is a snowballing development, thus, even minute growth in information is worthy of noting. ...
The level of English First Additional Language (EFAL) Reading Comprehension competence among school learners in some schools in South Africa is a concern. English is used as a medium of teaching and learning in most South African public schools although the majority of these learners are EFAL speakers. To counter this anxiety, reading comprehension interventions become handy. This study aimed to explore the reading comprehension strategies of South African high school EFAL learners in the FET phase. The study employed a non-experimental quantitative design to collect data. The general version 7.0 questionnaire on strategy inventory of language learning (SILL) Oxford (1990) on identifying strategies learners use in reading comprehension was used. The sampling frame was 80 grade 11 high school EFAL learners in South Africa. The results of the study show that EFAL learners use multiple language learning strategies to enhance their understanding of English in an EFAL setting. It is difficult to strike consistency in language learning strategies because the choice of a language learning strategy differs from one EFAL learner to another. It remains important that language practitioners become aware of the need to equip EFAL teachers and learners as they strive to sharpen EFAL learners' language learning skills.
... Form-and-meaning relationship was chosen because it is the most important aspect of knowing a word and provides the foundation for further development of other aspects of vocabulary knowledge (Nation, 2013). The Yes/No format was chosen because it is an appropriate format to measure a large number of targetwords with a large number of participants (Schmitt et al., 2011). It is not difficult to construct, administer, or score, and allows a higher sampling rate for reliable estimation because a large number of items can be tested in a limited period of time (Read, 2000). ...
Recently researchers have proposed using information from teachers and learners to supplement the information from corpora in the selection of the most useful words for foreign language learners. Yet the extent to which these data sets correlate to one another is unclear. This study explicitly investigated the relationships between (a) the lexical coverage in 18 corpora, (b) the knowledge of 275 Vietnamese English as a foreign language (EFL) learners, and (c) the perceptions of 78 EFL teachers of the usefulness of 973 high‐frequency words. The correlations between lexical coverage and the other two factors were significant but small, and the correlations between learner vocabulary knowledge and teacher perceptions were large. Teacher perceptions better‐predicted learner knowledge than lexical coverage. This study confirms the value of lexical coverage as a key criterion to select words for foreign language learners, and also highlights the importance of teachers' perceptions of usefulness on ultimate vocabulary learning in EFL contexts. Foreign language learners should learn the words that are most useful for them. Information from various sources (corpora, teachers, and learners) has been used to identify these words. One question that arises is to what extent these data sets correlate to one another. This study aims to address this question.
The Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) is a high-stakes test for students in higher education in Taiwan to fulfill the English-language graduation requirement. However, little is known regarding the vocabulary threshold for the test or the effects of the lexical coverage and profiles of test items on the adequate comprehension of the test. This study used a validated Listening Vocabulary Levels Test (LVLT) and the TOEIC listening subtest to estimate learners’ aural vocabulary knowledge required for an exit TOEIC listening score. The findings showed: (1) aural lexical knowledge accounted for more than half of the variance in comprehension performance; (2) a minimum level of 3,000 word families for a lexical coverage of 98 % considerably affected the comprehension of spoken texts; and (3) lexical profiles varied in the individual parts of the listening subtest, with a range of 3,000–5,000 word families required for achieving a lexical coverage of 98 %. The crucial role of lexical knowledge/coverage in comprehension performance on the exit test was discussed.
In Iceland and elsewhere, there is an increased awareness of the key role that vocabulary plays in learners’ literacy development (Auður Pálsdóttir, 2017; Beck et al., 2013; Roessingh, 2016; Sigríður Ólafsdóttir & Baldur Sigurðsson, 2017). The academic words used across different subject areas (Tier 2) are pivotal for students’ academic procedures (DiCerbo et al., 2014; Lawrence et al., 2016).
The purpose of this research was to develop a Tier 2 Icelandic academic word list (í. listi yfir íslenskan námsorðaforða, LÍNO-2). Such a list is important since it provides information about Icelandic words that learners need to know for active participation in school, their reading comprehension, discussion and writing skills.
In the Icelandic language, the number of words is countless, and therefore, it is important to know what words lie at the heart of academic success. Thus, it is important to research which words and how many words are useful to work with at each education level. Words that go beyond the most common words of the language (Tier 1) are called academic vocabulary (Beck et al., 2013; Roessingh, 2016). A part of these words is taught systematically within the various school subjects. Those are Tier 3 words. However, the words in Tier 2 are often overlooked by teachers and neglected in school activities. Words in this category are general, high-utility academic words used across various fields of study. They play a key role when discussing complex issues. The learners’ poor knowledge of these words is one of the main reasons why they have difficulty understanding a written text, which in turn, reduces their ability for academic progress.
A new Icelandic corpus (Málheild fyrir íslenskan námsorðaforða, MÍNO) was compiled containing selected student and academic texts from Tagged Icelandic Corpus (MÍM, Stofnun Árna Magnússonar í íslenskum fræðum, n.d.-a) and Icelandic Gigaword Corpus (IGC, Stofnun Árna Magnússonar í íslenskum fræðum, n.d.-b). MÍNO has a total of 31,680,235 running words. All the texts are current texts published this century. Words that appear 100 times or more in the corpus are sorted by frequency. The total word frequency list contains 10,314 words (lemmas, Tiers 1, 2 and 3). Objective and subjective approaches were used to categorise the words of the corpus, i.e., to distinguish between words belonging to Tier 1 and Tier 2, as well as words belonging to Tier 2 and Tier 3 (Dang, 2020). The Icelandic academic word list (LÍNO-2) contains 2,294 Tier 2 words (lemmas) from the new Icelandic language corpus MÍNO (Beck et al., 2013).
The words on LÍNO-2 were divided into five bands depending on their frequency in MÍNO. The first band included words from the most frequent 1000 words. The second band included words from the next 1000 etc. (Dang, 2020; Nation, 2001). The frequency bands are a useful reference when choosing words to teach the youngest learners. With the increased student age, the words from lower frequency bands are included step by step. LÍNO-2 is a valuable contribution to teaching Icelandic as a first and a second language.
The value of LINO-2 is fourfold. First, the value is for teachers and students in Iceland as an effective tool to enhance student Icelandic vocabulary, reading comprehension and productive language skills, i.e., proficiency in discussing and writing. Second, LÍNO-2 is valuable for developing teaching materials for different age groups and groups with diverse Icelandic language proficiency. Third, LÍNO-2 is important for assessing student status or learning progress of receptive and productive vocabulary, reading comprehension and writing skills. Fourth, the value of LINO-2 is significant for research aiming at keeping Icelandic words alive with future generations.
This research is the first of several projects funded by the University of Iceland Research Fund (í. Rannsóknasjóður Háskóla Íslands), the Icelandic Language Technology Fund (í. Markáætlun um tungu og tækni) and the Icelandic language fund (í. Íslenskusjóðurinn), where Icelandic academic vocabulary is the core subject.
Research in the Malaysian context has shown that English as a second language (ESL) students have an insufficient vocabulary for higher education and thus, must be provided with opportunities to acquire new words. Recently, evidence has emerged that viewing audio-visual input is effective for incidental vocabulary learning (IVL). Yet, there is limited understanding of the effectiveness of academic videos for IVL, an accessible, cost and time-efficient resource that is encouraged to be used for promoting personalised and interactive teaching and learning. Therefore, this research investigated the potential vocabulary gains through a 10-min academic video among 56 ESL foundation students in an English-medium university in Malaysia. Before watching the video, IVL was measured using a modified Vocabulary Size Test, followed by a comprehension test and a post-target words test afterward. Results indicated a significant gain of 0.78 words on average after watching the video, where thirty participants made gains of 44 words in total. However, further research is necessary to investigate the role of various learner-related factors on IVL. These findings provide insight for educators on how teaching practices using academic videos may address the low vocabulary knowledge of ESL learners and develop long-lasting L2 proficiency for successful education.KeywordsIncidental vocabulary learningAcademic videosSecond language acquisitionLearner-related factorsInnovative teaching strategies
TOEFL is a standardized test that has been used as requirement to graduate from university. However, students frequently struggle to pass the TOEFL reading test. Therefore, this study was aimed to identify (1) which sub-skills were the most challenging for students in reading comprehension of TOEFL test and (2) factors affecting the students’ difficulty in answering the reading comprehension section of the TOEFL test. This study applied both quantitative and qualitative approaches. A total of 32 students from various majors of Universitas Pamulang were samples for the test. The data were obtained by test results and interview results. The test result showed that the most challenging problems in reading comprehension were vocabulary (25 %), unstated detail question (20%), stated detail question (18%), pronoun referent question (15%), inference question (12%), and main idea question (10%). Moreover, the interview results revealed that lack of vocabulary, slow reading, and lack of strategy were factors affecting students’ difficulty. Therefore, TOEFL teachers and trainers are strongly advised to devote more time to prepare for the topics with the highest percentage of errors.
This corpus-based vocabulary study aimed to develop a new computer science academic word list across ten sub-disciplines of computer science defined by Association for Computing Machinery (hereafter ACM). A corpus of Computer Science containing 2,500,990 running words was developed from 300 Computer Science Research Articles (hereafter CSRAC) as a database of this study. Drawing on and combining procedures and methods from Coxhead (2000), Gardner and Davies (2014) and other previous studies, this study developed a New Computer Science Academic Word List (hereafter NCSAWL), containing the most frequently-used computer words in computer research articles from the corpus. The NCSAWL contains 444 words, which accounts for approximately 20.33% of the coverage in the CSRAC, the NCSAWL has a much better coverage of computer English. The result of this study has numerous implications for computer science learners, English teachers, researchers, as well as material writers and course syllabus designers. For examples, English computer teachers should focus on teaching learners the most high-frequent words which have a dispersed coverage and have special meaning and use in the discipline of computer science. Teachers could also raise the awareness of learners that some words have different meanings and uses in general English. The material designers for English for academic and special purposes could incorporate the NCSAWL vocabulary into their academic reading and writing materials for computer science students. Researchers and English language teachers who are interested in expanding their computer science academic vocabulary could also use this NCSAWL.
Nous nous intéressons à l’utilisation de l’inférence lexicale en langue seconde/étrangère (L2) qui consiste en la déduction du sens d’un mot inconnu rencontré dans la lecture. Nous cherchions à savoir 1) si l’existence d’un équivalent lexical dans la langue maternelle de l’apprenant pour un mot L2, ou la lexicalisation, influence l’inférence et l’acquisition subséquente de ce mot et 2) si une charge cognitive plus importante dans l’input aboutit à de meilleurs gains lexicaux pour ce mot.Selon les résultats de notre étude menée auprès d’apprenants francophones ayant un niveau intermédiaire en chinois, la lexicalisation n’a pas d’effet sur l’attention que les apprenants portent aux mots inconnus pendant la lecture, mais elle influence le choix de sources de connaissance des apprenants pendant l’inférence lexicale ; la lexicalisation n’est pas l’élément concluant dans le résultat de l’inférence lexicale, cependant, les apprenants ont davantage de difficultés à retenir les mots non lexicalisés à court et à long terme ; enfin, la combinaison de deux tâches post-inférence aboutit à de meilleurs gains pour les mots inconnus sur le plan formel.
This Element aims to address the complexity of metalinguistic awareness to achieve a thorough account of its impacts on second language (L2) reading development and promote an in-depth understanding of the factors regulating the influence of first language (L1) metalinguistic awareness on L2 reading. It is guided by four questions: 1) To what extent do L1 phonological, orthographic, and morphological awareness correlate with L2 phonological, orthographic, and morphological awareness in L2 readers? 2) To what extent do phonological, orthographic, and morphological awareness correlate with word decoding intralingually in L2 readers? 3) To what extent do L1 phonological, orthographic, and morphological awareness correlate with L2 word decoding in L2 readers? 4) To what extent do the relations in questions 1–3 vary as a function of linguistic-, learner-, measurement-, and instruction-related factors? This Element is the first to systematically investigate the roles of distinct facets of metalinguistic awareness in L2 reading.
Vocabulary growth is of great importance, and textbooks are the main sources of vocabulary learning for many EFL learners. Previous research has shown that learning vocabulary involves a mastery of several knowledge dimensions. Little research, however, has focused on vocabulary knowledge dimensions in EFL textbooks. It remains unclear how the different word knowledge dimensions are addressed in Saudi EFL textbooks and whether there is a variation among the textbooks in addressing the different dimensions. The present study aims to fill this gap by investigating how the different vocabulary knowledge dimensions are addressed in the local Saudi EFL textbooks. It investigates the activities in English textbooks that give attention to vocabulary to explore the amount of attention given to each dimension in a particular activity. To achieve this, all the 12 EFL textbooks used in primary and middle Saudi schools were analysed. Applying Nation’s (2013) framework of word knowledge, a total of 1181 activities were examined. The findings showed that textbooks for primary school levels place greater emphasis on form, followed by meaning and finally use, while in intermediate-level textbooks, the greatest attention is given to meaning, followed by use and then form. The results also reveal variations among the textbooks in the amount of attention given to the different vocabulary knowledge aspects. Pedagogical implications for textbook writers are suggested.
This experimental and descriptive study was conducted to enhance the reading comprehension of 177 Grade 11 HUMSS students of Tipas Integrated National High School through the utilization of Lexical Proficiency Worksheets (LPWs) designed and integrated with the Course Reading and Writing Skills given for eight weeks during the 3rd Quarter of the School Year 2021-2022. It is a quantitative type of research that used correlational design and purposive sampling techniques. It used pre and post-test, LPWs and perceptionnaire as research instruments. The study revealed that the pre-assessed level of comprehension skills among respondents before the LPWs’ utilization ranged from non-reader to independent level while the post-assessed level of comprehension skills among respondents ranged from frustration to independent level after the utilization of LPWs. The respondents perceived the quality of designed LPWs as very satisfactory in terms of objectives, content, format and language, usefulness, and satisfactory in terms of instructional delivery. The hypothesis stating that there is no significant difference between the pre and post-assessed level of reading comprehension before and after the utilization of LPWs is not supported. Additionally, the hypothesis stating that there is no significant relationship between the perceived quality of the designed LPWS and the respondents’ reading comprehension is not supported. The designed worksheets contributed a lot towards enhancing the lexical proficiency and comprehension skills of the learners. Keywords: Lexical Proficiency Worksheets, Lexical, Literal, Interpretive, Applied, Affective Comprehension Skill
Dans cet article, l'A. s'interesse a la question du developpement du vocabulaire des etudiants lors de programmes d'echanges linguistiques a l'etranger. Il examine plus particulierement le developpement du vocabulaire en Grande Bretagne, a travers l'analyse statistique de tests et de questionnaires proposes a 53 etudiants issus des programmes ERASMUS et LINGUA
The use of yes-no tests seems to be a promising method for measuring the size of receptive vocabulary knowledge of learners of a foreign language. Items in a yes-no test each consist of either a word or a pseudoword. Participants are asked to indicate whether or not they know the meaning of these words. This article attempts to tackle the problem of determining a meaningful score for this type of test. Such a score should contain correction for guessing as well as for participants’ response style. Three possible methods are discussed, but none of these measures appear to apply this type of correction. Signal Detection Theory is applied and a new, more accurate index is suggested. Based on theoretical as well as empirical considerations, recommendations are made about the choice for the index to be used in a yes-no vocabulary test.
In Reading in a foreign language: a reading problem or a language problem? Alderson (1984) ascribes poor reading in L2 to four possible causes: (a) poor reading ability in the first language; (b) inadequate knowledge of the foreign language; (c) incorrect strategies for reading in the foreign language; (d) reading strategies in the first language not being employed in the foreign language, due to inadequate knowledge of the foreign language.
This study examined the rate at which English vocabulary was acquired from the 3 input modes of reading, reading-while-listening, and listening to stories. It selected 3 sets of 28 words within 4 frequency bands and administered 2 test types immediately after the reading and listening treatments, 1 week later and 3 months later. The results showed that new words could be learned incidentally in all 3 modes, but that most words were not learned. Items occurring more frequently in the text were more likely to be learned and were more resistant to decay. The data demonstrated that, on average, when subjects were tested by unprompted recall, the meaning of only 1 of the 28 items met in either of the reading modes and the meaning of none of the items met in the listening-only mode, would be retained after 3 months.
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The ability to learn and execute the component processes of reading varies widely. Reading comprehension involves language specific processes as well as domain general cognitive abilities-sensation, perception, attention, memory, and reasoning. Variation in any of these abilities potentially underlies individual differences in comprehension performance. Thus, one important question concerns the extent to which variation in some ability is central to individual differences in comprehension performance and the extent to which variation in the ability is derivative. For example, researchers have found that poor comprehenders have more difficulty parsing complex syntactic structures than do good comprehenders. This chapter reviews five reader characteristics that are associated with comprehension ability in mature readers. Two criteria are used in selecting these particular characteristics from all of those that are potentially involved in comprehension. First, characteristics are selected that have the strongest correlations with comprehension performance. Second, characteristics are selected that play a central role in different theories of comprehension skill. The characteristics that selected are: word-level ability, working memory capacity, suppression ability, print exposure, and background knowledge.
Examines what percentage of coverage of text is needed for unassisted reading for pleasure, where learners are able to read without the interruption of looking up words. Looks at the effect of three densities of unknown vocabulary on two measures of reading comprehension, a multiple-choice test and a cued written recall test. (Author/VWL)
This study investigated the relationship between reading comprehension development of 389 adolescents in their dominant language (Language 1 [L1], Dutch) and a foreign language (Language 2 [L2], English). In each consecutive year from Grades 8 through 10, a number of measurements were taken. Students' reading comprehension, their linguistic knowledge (vocabulary and grammar knowledge) and processing efficiency (speed of word recognition and sentence comprehension) in both languages, and their metacognitive knowledge about reading were assessed. The relative strengths of the effects of these components of reading were analyzed to distinguish among 3 hypotheses about the relationship between L1 and L2 reading comprehension: the transfer hypothesis, the threshold hypothesis, and the processing efficiency hypothesis. The transfer hypothesis predicts a strong relationship between L1 and L2 reading comprehension and a strong effect of metacognitive knowledge on L2 reading comprehension, whereas the threshold and processing efficiency hypotheses predict a more important role of language-specific knowledge and processing skills. Results support the transfer hypothesis, although language-specific knowledge and fluency also contribute to L2 reading performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The authors report results of a study into the role of components of first-language (L1; Dutch) and second-language (L2; English) reading comprehension. Differences in the contributions of components of L1 and L2 reading comprehension are analyzed, in particular processing speed in L1 and L2. Findings indicate that regression weights of the L1 and L2 components are different. Although correlations between most processing speed components and reading comprehension are substantial, there are no unique contributions to the explanation of either L1 or L2 reading comprehension when linguistic and metacognitive knowledge are accounted for. In addition, L1 reading comprehension is shown to have a large contribution to L2 reading comprehension, supporting theories of L1-L2 transfer of reading skills. Results are discussed from a developmental perspective. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This chapter builds on prior reviews of reading theory, research, and assessment published in the Annual
Review
of
Applied
Linguistics and uses them and additional current research to develop a set of 10 instructional implications for second language reading. The review draws upon both L1 and L2 research to demonstrate support for instructional approaches that (1) ensure fluency in word recognition; (2) emphasize the learning of vocabulary; (3) activate background knowledge; (4) ensure acquisition of linguistic knowledge and general comprehension; (5) teach recognition of text structures and discourse organization; (6) promote development of strategic readers rather than mechanical application of strategy checklists; (7) build reading fluency and rate; (8) promote extensive reading; (9) develop intrinsic motivation for reading; and (10) contribute to a coherent curriculum for student learning. There is empirical support for each of these implications, although at the same time, additional research related to many is needed to further identify aspects of effective L2 reading instruction in particular settings. While further research alone does not guarantee improved reading pedagogy, it provides one means of identifying specific aspects of reading abilities and testing alternative instructional practices and is thus a crucial component in the search for more effective outcomes.
Review of the book: Learning vocabulary in another language. This article has been published in the journal: New Zealand Studies in Applied Linguistic. Used with permission.
A considerable proportion of our everyday language is 'formulaic'. It is predictable in form, idiomatic, and seems to be stored in fixed, or semi-fixed, chunks. This book explores the nature and purposes of formulaic language, and looks for patterns across the research findings from the fields of discourse analysis, first language acquisition, language pathology and applied linguistics. It gradually builds up a unified description and explanation of formulaic language as a linguistic solution to a larger, non-linguistic, problem, the promotion of self. The book culminates in a new model of lexical storage, which accommodates the curiosities of non-native and aphasic speech. Parallel analytic and holistic processing strategies are the proposed mechanism which reconciles, on the one hand, our capacity for understanding and producing novel constructions using grammatical knowledge and small lexical units, and on the other, our use of prefabricated material which, though less flexible, also requires less processing.
This book is the most comprehensive and up-to-date treatment of the assessment of reading in a foreign or second language.
This volume presents a framework that expands the traditional concept of a vocabulary test to cover a range of procedures for assessing the vocabulary knowledge of second language learners.
Introduction: Simple Ideas about Reading Comprehension. A Framework for Comprehension. Higher-Level Factors in Comprehension. The Linguistic-Conceptual Machinery for Comprehension. Word Identification, Decoding, and Phonological Awareness .Comprehension Instruction. Conclusion: A More General View of Comprehension Development
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Most notably, comprehension necessitates the application of prior knowledge in combination with the encoding of information currently in discourse focus. Comprehension requires building connections between those events and existing representations in memory. For example, the situations described in the first two riddles take place in chronological order and are temporally contiguous. The elephant was put in the refrigerator first; unless the elephant is removed, the giraffe cannot be stored in the fridge. To answer the riddle, the reader must connect these two situations. Comprehenders routinely assume that consecutively described events take place in the order in which they are described, and that no unmentioned event will have occurred between them. Thus, the two events should be connected with each other and, given expectations about chronological order; those events should be assigned a predictable temporal association. In fact, a growing body of evidence suggests that comprehenders routinely and/or strategically keep track of protagonists, objects, locations, and events to build useful associations.
School children appear to increase their vocabularies by thousands of words per year. Many have hypothesized that a large proportion of this growth occurs through incidental learning from written context. However, experimental research has until now failed to provide unequivocal support of this hypothesis. The present study attempted to determine whether students do acquire measurable knowledge about unfamiliar words while reading natural text. Fifty-seven eighth-grade students of average and above average reading ability read either an expository or a narrative text about 1,000 words in length. After reading, subjects completed two vocabulary assessment tasks on 15 target words from each passage (thus serving as controls for the passage not read), an individual interview and a multiple-choice test, both designed to tap partial knowledge of word meanings. Results of within-subject, hierarchical regression analyses showed small but statistically reliable gains in word knowledge from context. Tentative extrapolations from the results and current estimates of the volume of children's reading lead us to believe that incidental learning from context accounts for a substantial proportion of the vocabulary growth that occurs during the school years. /// [French] Les écoliers semblent augmenter leur vocabulaire de milliers de mots par an. Nombreux sont ceux qui ont pour hypothèse qu'une large proportion de cette croissance intervient grâce à une acquisition accidentelle à partir d'un contexte écrit. Cependant, la recherche expérimentale n'a pas pu jusqu'à présent fournir un soutient univoque à cette hypothèse. L'étude présente essaie de déterminer si les élèves acquièrent en fait des connaissances mesurables sur les mots qui ne leur sont pas familiers au cours de la lecture de textes naturels. Cinquantesept élèves de quatrième à compétence de lecture moyenne et au-dessus de la moyenne ont lu un texte d'exposition ou de narration d'environ 1000 mots. Après la lecture, les sujets ont complété deux tâches d'évaluation de vocabulaire sur 15 mots cibles à partir de chaque passage (servant ainsi de contrôles pour le passage non lu), un entretien individuel et un test à choix multipes, désignés à aborder la connaissance partielle des significations de mots. Les résultats des analyses de régression hiérarchique de sujet unique ont montré des gains moindres mais statistiquement sûrs en connaissance de mots à partir d'un contexte. Des extrapolations d'essai à partir des résultats et des calculs courants du volume de lecture chez les enfants nous ont menés à croire que la lecture accidentelle à partir d'un contexte compte pour une proportion substantielle de la croissance du vocabulaire qui a lieu au cours des années scolaires. /// [Spanish] Al parecer, alumnos incrementan su vocabulario con miles de palabras cada año. Muchos han avanzado la hipótesis que una gran proporción de este incremento ocurre por medio de aprendizaje incidental del contexto escrito. No obstante, investigación experimental no ha provisto evidencia irrefutable para esta hipótesis. Este estudio trató de determinar si los alumnos adquieren conocimiento medible de palabras desconocidas durante la lectura de textos normales. Cincuenta y siete alumnos de octavo grado, de habilidad normal y superior en lectura, leyeron un texto descriptivo o narrativo, de approximadamente 1000 palabras. Después de la lectura, los alumnos completaron 2 actividades de evaluación de vocabulario sobre 15 palabras específicas de cada pasaje (sirviendo así como control de los pasajes no leídos), una entrevista individual y un test de elección múltiple, ambos diseñados para descubrir conocimiento parcial de significado de palabras. Los resultados por individuo, utilizando análisis de jerarquía de regresión, mostraron pequeño pero estadísticamente fiable progreso en el conocimiento de palabras por medio de contexto. Extrapolaciones tentativas de los resultados y cálculos presentes del volumen de lectura de alumnos, nos llevan a deducir que aprendizaje incidental del contexto da cuenta de una proporción considerable del incremento de vocabulario que ocurre durante los años escolares.
Studies of vocabulary size based on dictionary sampling have faced several methodological problems. These problems occur in trying to answer the following three questions: (I) How do we decide what to count as words? (2) How do we choose what words to test? (3) How do we test the chosen words? The present study attempts to overcome these problems and checks in several ways to see if the problems have been overcome. The results indicate that what were previously thought of as conservative estimates of vocabulary size are likely to be the most accurate. These estimates suggest that well-educated adult native speakers of English have a vocabulary of around 17,000 base words. This represents an acquisition rate of around two to three words per day.
An Academic Skills Questionnaire was distributed at San Diego State University to 200 randomly selected faculty from all departments in order to determine which skills (reading, writing, speaking or listening) were most essential to non-native speaker success in university classes. The receptive skills, reading and listening, were ranked first by faculty teaching both lower division and upper division/graduate classes. The faculty of all departments but Engineering ranked General English above Specific Purposes English. This study concludes with implications for testing, literacy requirements and curriculum development.
This empirical study explored the relationships between depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension in English as a second language (ESL). Using multivariate analyses, the study examined the roles of depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge in assessing the performance of a group of young adult ESL learners with a minimum vocabulary size of 3,000 word families in carrying out general academic reading comprehension tasks. The results support the hypotheses that (1) scores on vocabulary size, depth of vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension are highly, and positively, correlated; and (2) scores on depth of vocabulary knowledge can make a unique contribution to the prediction of reading comprehension levels, in addition to the prediction afforded by vocabulary size scores. The findings from this study call for a recognition of the importance of improving depth of vocabulary knowledge in learners' ESL learning processes.
This article overviews current research on second language vocabulary learning. It concludes that a large vocabulary is necessary to function in English: 8000—9000 word families for reading, and perhaps as many as 5000—7000 families for oral discourse. In addition, a number of word knowledge aspects need to be learned about each lexical item. Taken together, this amounts to a substantial lexical learning challenge, one which many/most learners fail to meet. To facilitate adequate vocabulary learning, four vocabulary learning partners (students, teachers, materials writers, and researchers) need to contribute to the learning process. Vocabulary learning programs need to include both an explicit, intentional learning component and a component based around maximizing exposure and incidental learning. The four learning strands (meaning-focused input, meaning-focused output, language-focused learning, and fluency development) suggested by Nation (2001) provide a structure by which to integrate intentional and incidental vocabulary learning. The overriding principle for maximizing vocabulary learning is to increase the amount of engagement learners have with lexical items. All four learning partners need to acknowledge the incremental nature of vocabulary learning, and to develop learning programs which are principled, long-term, and which recognize the richness and scope of the lexical knowledge that needs to be mastered.
This paper reports a preliminary evaluation of the Y/N technique for producing tests of vocabulary knowledge. The results obtained suggest advantages over the more traditional multiple choice format for testing vocabulary.
This article has two goals: to report on the trialling of fourteen 1,000 word-family lists made from the British National Corpus, and to use these lists to see what,vocabulary,size is needed for unassisted,compre- hension,of written and spoken,English. The trialling showed,that the lists were,properly,sequenced,and there were,no glaring omissions,from the lists. If 98% coverage of a text is needed for unassisted comprehension, then a 8,000 to 9,000 word-family vocabulary is needed for comprehension of written text and a vocabulary of 6,000 to 7,000 for spoken text. Résumé : L’article a pour objectif de parler des essais menés sur
This critical volume, provides an in-depth analysis of second language reading's multiple dimensions. The paperback edition describes the complexity of reading and explains how reading differs in a first and second language. The book is broad in scope, covering all major aspects of the reading process and synthesizing all current reading research. The author provides a cross-linguistic orientation, explaining how first and second languages can mutually facilitate one another. This important volume offers strategies for enhancing literary acquisition, second-language learning and bilingual processing, and will serve as a valuable guide for graduate students, professors, researchers and foreign language teachers.
ABSTRACTSThe purpose of the present study was to investigate the development of and interrelations between the language proficiencies and reading abilities of children learning to read in either a first language or a second language. The authors compared the reading-comprehension, word-decoding, and oral-language skills of both high and low SES Dutch third and fourth graders to the skills of low SES minority third and fourth graders from a Turkish or Moroccan background living in the Netherlands. Several tests of reading comprehension, word decoding, oral text comprehension, morphosyntactic knowledge, and vocabulary knowledge were administered at the beginning of third grade, the end of third grade, and the end of fourth grade. The results showed the minority children to be faster decoders than the Dutch low SES children. With respect to reading comprehension and oral language proficiency, however, the minority children were found to lag behind the Dutch children in all respects. With respect to the interrelations between oral-language skills and reading skills, the development of reading comprehension was found to be influenced more by top-down comprehension-based processes than by bottom-up word-decoding processes for both the first- and second-language learners. The oral Dutch skills of the minority children played a more prominent role in the explanation of their reading-comprehension skills than the oral-language skills of the Dutch children, however.
EFL learners in two countries participated in two parallel experiments testing whether retention of vocabulary acquired incidentally is contingent on amount of task-induced involvement. Short- and long-term retention of ten unfamiliar words was investigated in three learning tasks (reading comprehension, comprehension plus filling in target words, and composition-writing with target words) with varying “involvement loads”—various combinations of need, search, and evaluation. Time-on-task, regarded as inherent to a task, differed among all three tasks. As predicted, amount of retention was related to amount of task-induced involvement load: Retention was highest in the composition task, lower in reading plus fill-in, and lowest in the reading. These results are discussed in light of the construct of task-induced involvement.
This study investigated the role of higher–level syntactic and semantic processes and lower–level word recognition and graphophonic processes in adult English as a second language (ESL) reading comprehension. In particular, the study examined the extent to which these processes can discriminate skilled from less–skilled readers in a sample of fairly advanced ESL readers. Measures of reading comprehension, syntactic, semantic, word recognition, phonological, and orthographic processing skills were used. One–way discriminant function analysis revealed that lower–level component processes, such as word recognition and graphophonic processes, in addition to higher–level syntactic and semantic processes, contributed significantly to the distinction between skilled and less–skilled ESL readers. These findings suggest that efficient lower–level word recognition processes are integral components of second language reading comprehension and that the role of these processes must not be neglected even in highly advanced ESL readers.
The present study was conducted in the context of Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) 2000 research to conceptually validate the roles of breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension in academic settings and to empirically evaluate a test measuring three elements of the depth dimension of vocabulary knowledge, namely, synonymy, polysemy, and collocation. A vocabulary size measure and a TOEFL vocabulary measure were also tested. The study found that the dimension of vocabulary depth is as important as that of vocabulary size in predicting performance on academic reading and that scores on the three vocabulary measures tested are similarly useful in predicting performance on the reading comprehension measure used as the criterion. The study confirms the importance of the vocabulary factor in reading assessment.
Bibliography: leaves 40-43 Supported in part by the National Institute of Education under contract no. US-NIE-C-400-76-0116
Performance on the Yes/No test (Huibregtse et al., 2002) was assessed as a predictor of scores on the Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT), a standard test of receptive second language (L2) vocabulary knowledge (Nation, 1990). The use of identical items on both tests allowed a direct comparison of test performance, with alternative methods for scoring the Yes/No test also examined (Huibregtse et al., 2002). Overall, performance on both tests by English L2 university students (n - 36) was similar. Mean test accuracy on the various Yes/No methods ranged from 76-82%, comparable to VLT performance at 83%. However, paired t-tests showed the scoring methods used to correct raw hit performance increased the difference between the Yes/No test and criterion VLT scores to some degree. All Yes/No scores were strong predictors of VLT performance, regardless of method used, r = .8. Raw hit rate was the best predictor of VLT performance, due in part to the >5% false alarm rate. The low false alarm rate may be due to the participants, drawn primarily from non-Latin alphabet first languages (L1s), and the nature of the instructions. The results indicate the Yes/No test is a valid measure of the type of L2 vocabulary knowledge assessed by the VLT, with implications for classroom application.
This handbook will be useful for both beginning and experienced teachers who want to improve their practical strategies in teaching second language reading and their understanding of the reading process. The book examines a variety of approaches from classrooms and research that are used in teaching reading, and explores teaching methods focused on strategies. Teachers are encouraged to think about their own beliefs and opinions on the nature of reading and to examine their own personal reading activities.
Building a validity argument for the Test of English as a Foreign Language The Economist The development of IELTS: A study of the effects of background knowledge on reading compre-hension
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Reading development in a second language Predicting individual differences in learning to read The science of reading
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Reading and language learning: Crosslinguistic constraints on second language reading development Reading and language learning (pp. 1–44) Special issue of Language Learning Supplement What percentage of text-lexis is es-sential for comprehension
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Discourse comprehen-sion
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Preventing read-ing difficulties in young children The role of readers' standards for coher-ence in the generation of inferences during read-ing Linguistic knowledge, processing speed, and metacognitive knowledge in first-and second-language reading comprehension: A componential analysis
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Reading in a second language: Moving from theory to practice
- W Grabe
Grabe, W. (2009). Reading in a second language: Moving from theory to practice. New York: Cambridge Uni-versity Press.