TEACHING NEW VOCABULARY TO IRANIAN YOUNG FL LEARNERS: USING TOTAL PHYSICAL RESPONSE AND KEYWORD METHODS

Amir Toghyani Khorasgani, Mansour Khanehgir

Abstract


Early language learning for children is increasingly common, and the majority of parents and the public do not see it as superfluous or overburdening children. Moreover, teaching a foreign language to very young children has been an increasingly dominant trend in most globalized societies. While there is abundant literature that supports teaching a foreign language at an early age through language immersion programs, little is known about the efficiency of strategies used to explicitly teach new vocabulary words in a foreign language to young learners. This empirical investigation aimed to assess and compare the efficiency of two mnemonics that have been traditionally used to explicitly teach new foreign language words: the Keyword Method (KWM) and the Total Physical Response (TPR). Results indicate that the KWM is more effective than TPR in teaching new vocabulary words in a foreign language to early elementary school children.

Keywords


foreign language vocabulary; total physical response; keyword method; young learners; presenting vocabulary.

Full Text:

PDF

References


Asher, J, J. (1966). The learning strategy of the Total Physical Response: A review. The Modern Language Journal, 53(1), 79-84. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/323182

Asher, J, J. (1969). The total physical approach to second language learning. The Modern Language Journal, 53(1), 3-17.

Asher, J. J, & Price, S. P. (1967). The learning strategy of Total physical response: Some age differences. Child Development, 38(4), 1219-1227. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1127119

Asher, J.J., Kusudo, J. A., & de la Torre, R. (1974). Learning a second language through commands: The second field test. The Modern Language Journal, 58(1-2), 24-32. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/323986

Atkinson, R. C., & Raugh, M. M. (1975). An application of the mnemonic keyword method to the acquisition of Russian vocabulary. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory, 104, 126-133. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.1.2.126

Avila, E., & Sadoski, M. (1996). Exploring New Applications of the Keyword Method to Acquire English Vocabulary. Language Learning, 46(3), 379-395. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-1770.1996.tb01241.x

Bayliss, D. M., Jarrold, C., & Greene, R. (2015). How quickly they forget: The relationship between forgetting rate and working memory performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 41(1), 163-177. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0037429

Beaton A., Gruneberg M., Hyde C., Shufflebottom A., Sykes R. (2005). Facilitation of receptive and productive foreign vocabulary learning using the keyword method: The role of image quality. Memory, 13, 458–471.

Brainerd, C. J., & Reyna, V. F. (1995). Learning rate, learning opportunities, and the development of forgetting. Developmental Psychology, 31(2), 215-262. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.31.2.251

Cameron, L. (2001). Teaching languages to young learners. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Dale, E. (1969). Audio-Visual Methods in Teaching (3rd ed.). New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.

DeKeyser, R. (2003). Implicit and explicit learning. In Doughty & Long (Eds.), The Handbook of Second Language Acquisition (pp. 313-348). Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756492.ch11

Dolean, D. D. (2013). Mnemonics used in learning concepts in English as a foreign language. In M. Ionescu (Ed.), Studii de pedagogie aplicata, Cap. 6. Cluj-Napoca: Eikon.

Dolean, D. D. (2014). Using the Keyword Method in the classroom: Is the interacting imagery necessary? System, 45, 17-26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2014.04.003

Dolean, D. D. (2015). How early can we efficiently teach a second language? European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 23(5), 706-719. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2015.1104047

Folse, K. (2004). Vocabulary Myths: Applying Second Language Research to Classroom Teaching. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.3998/mpub.23925

Gebauer, S. K., Zaunbauer, A. C. M., & Moler, J. (2013). Cross-language transfer in English immersion programs in Germany: Reading comprehension and reading fluency. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 38, 64-74. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2012.09.002

Genesee, F., & Jared, D. (2008). Literacy development in early French immersion programs. Canadian Psychology, 49(2), 140-147. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0708-5591.49.2.140

Hermanto, N., Moreno, S., & Bialystok, E. (2012). Linguistic and metalinguistic outcomes of intense immersion education: how bilingual? International Journal of Billingual Education and Billingualism, 15(2), 131-145. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2011.652591

Hogben, D., & Lawson, M. J. (1994). Keyword and multiple elaboration strategies for vocabulary acquisition in foreign language learning. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 19, 367-376. http://dx.doi.org/10.1006/ceps.1994.1027

Krashen, S. D., & Terrell, T. D. (1983). The natural approach: Language acquisition in the classroom. Essex: Pearson Education Limited.

Kunihira, S., & Asher, J. J. (1965). The strategy of the total physical response: An application to learning Japanese. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 3(4), 277-289. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/iral.1965.3.4.277

Linse, C. T. & Nunan, D. (Ed). (2005). Practical english language teaching: Young learners. New York: McGraw-Hill ESL/ELT.

Matusz, P. J., Broadbent, H., Ferrri, J., Forrest, B., Merkley, R., & Scerif, G. (2015). Multi-modal distraction: Insights from children’s limited attention. Cognition, 136, 156-165. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2014.11.031

Muñoz, C., & Singleton, D. (2011). A critical review of age-related research on L2 ultimate attainment. Language Teaching, 44, 1-35. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0261444810000327

Nation, I. S. P. (2001). Learning Vocabulary in Another Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139524759

Paivio, A. (1971). Imagery and verbal process. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Paivio, A., Yuille, J. C., & Madigan, S. A. (1968). Concreteness, imagery, and meaningfulness values for 925 nouns. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 76(2). http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/h0025327

Sagarra, N., & Alba, M. (2006). The key in the keyword: L2 vocabulary learning methods with beginning learners of Spanish. The Modern Language Journal, 90(6), 228-243. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.2006.00394.x

Shepard, R. N. (1967). Recognition memory for words sentences and pictures. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 6, 156-163. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0022-5371(67)80067-7

Special Eurobarometer 243. (2006). Europeans and their languages. Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_243_en.pdf

Standing, L. (1973). Learning 10,000 Pictures. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 25, 207-222. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14640747308400340

Van Hell, J. G., & Mahn, A. C. (1997). Keyword mnemonics versus rote rehearsal: learning concrete and abstract foreign words by experienced and inexperienced learners. Language Learning, 47(3), 507-546. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/0023-8333.00018

Vetter, H., O’Connor, N., O’Dwyer, R., & Orr, R. (2015). Active learning: Effectiveness of learning a numeracy skill with physical activity, reducing sedentary time in school children. Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport, 19(e12). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jsams.2015.12.408

Wang, A. Y., & Thomas, M. H. (1995). Effect of keywords on long-term retention: help or hindrance? Journal of Educational Psychology, 87, 468-475. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.87.3.468

Wei, Z. (2015). Does teaching mnemonics for vocabulary learning make a difference? Putting the keyword method and the word part technique to test. Language Teaching Research, 19, 43-69. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1362168814541734

Wyra, M., Lawson, M. J., & Hungi, N. (2007). The mnemonic keyword method: The effects of bidirectional retrieval training and of ability to image on foreign language vocabulary recall. Learning and Instruction, 17, 360-371. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2007.02.008




DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17509/ije.v10i1.5961

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2017 Amir Toghyani Khorasgani



Lisensi Creative Commons
This work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.