基于形式和意义的词汇教学有效性研究

Chapter 1 Introduction

1.1 Background of the Study
Lexicons are the fundamental components of language and it is on the basis oflexicons that the sentences uttered by people make sense. If we compare language to aman, the structure of grammar makes up the skeleton of the language, and lexiconsare flesh and bloods of it. As Wilkins (1972) said: “without grammar, we can hardlysay anything. But without lexis, we can say nothing”. Therefore the proficiency ingrasp and use of lexicons is of special importance. Because of the significance oflexicon, lots of educators, teachers and students all have attempted to find out anefficient and effective way to acquire lexicons. The acquisition of lexicons is ofcentral focus in the second language acquisition. And lexical acquisition has been theheated topic among linguists and educators.The studies on lexical acquisition are conducted from different perspectives,such as the way of lexical acquisition, representation of mental lexicon, theconstruction of lexical meaning and the connection of form and meaning. Thoughthese researches provide more new ways for learners to learn language, some studies of second language acquisition contribute less to the gains in language learningprocess. How to learn lexicons effectively bothers teachers and students. Massiveattempts have been made to help students develop their competence in using lexicons.
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1.2 Significance and Purpose of this Study
According to the above situations, we need to find out a way to contribute to theadvance both in language competence and in the acquisition of vocabularies oflearners. This study aims to study the influence of different aspects of lexical aspects, namely form and meaning, on the lexical acquisition. It emphasizes to provide apromising tendency for the learners to learn language. A communicative environmentneeds to be created for learners, under which the lexicon’s meaning and form can beunderstood and memorized. The attention of learners should be directed to thelexicons in the lexical learning process. Mental processing is also needed in theacquisition process to improve the memory effects. Through this study, a newperspective on lexical learning and teaching is provided for the teachers and learners,which will shed light on the puzzled teachers and learners. This study will give theteachers another teaching option to teach vocabularies and strengthen the effects oflexical learning.This thesis aims to study how lexical form and meaning effect the acquisition oflexicons respectively in a communicative learning situation, and which aspect leads toa better acquisition effect and a longer retention in the learning process. It also aims togive some evidences on the importance of lexical form and meaning, and givelearners an impetus in changing their habit of leaning vocabulary. The results of thestudy will enlighten the language learners and teachers.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review

2.1 Lexical Acquisition
Lexical acquisition is the fundamental and foremost part of languageacquisition and it provides solid foundations for the acquisition of other languageitems. Therefore it is of significant value to figure out the various aspects of lexicalacquisition. Lexicon, which can be also called vocabulary or word, is a set of lexemes,including single words, compound words and idioms. According to Hu (2001), “wordis a unit of expression that has universal intuitive recognition by native speakers,whether it is expressed written or spoken. A word has three characteristics, namely, aphysically definable unit, the common factor underlying a set of forms, and agrammatical unit”(Hu, pp. 76-77).As for lexical knowledge, though there is no agreement reached on the nature oflexical knowledge, many researchers claim that vocabulary knowledge is not isolatedbut some kind of continuum connected with one another. Lexical learning is the internalization of the existing words’ knowledge. And vocabulary learning is not onlyabout the study of single word, because there are many lexical phrases and idiomsexisting in the language system, and they are essential components of the language.Therefore it also involves the acquisition of those longer lexical elements.As to vocabulary acquisition, there is not a universally accepted definition,different researchers have different criteria. According to some influential definitions,some common elements are recognized. When a word is acquired, its form can berecognized and its meaning can be understood no matter it appears alone or in context,and it can be used naturally by the learners and applied appropriately to the givensituation.
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2.2 Word’s Form and Meaning
Word’s form and meaning are the two very important aspects of a word. In thissection, the definition of lexical form and lexical meaning are given, and the role theyplay in the lexical acquisition is also given. Form is a term which is often applied to refer to the form of grammar. Thisnarrows form down to a very small field. According to Ellis (1994), form can beapplied to the form of sounds, lexicons, grammar and discourse as well. AsVanPattern et al (2004) pointed out Form was considered as the surface feature of anylanguage or the surface manifestation of an underlying representation, and form wassome kind of lexemes, inflections, and functors.In this study, the researcher combines Ellis’ claim and Van Pattern’s claim together. In this study, Form contains three main aspects, namely the componentletters of words, the morphological features of words and the grammatical features ofwords.
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Chapter 3 Methodology ......27
3.1 Research Questions .........27
3.2 Subjects....27
3.3 Instrument ......28
3.4 Procedure .......29
3.5 Data Collection and Analysis ......32
Chapter 4 Results and Discussion .......35
4.1 Results .....35
4.2 Discussion......42
Chapter 5 Conclusion .........54
5.1 Major Findings of the Study........54
5.2 Pedagogical Implications.......55
5.3 Limitations of the Study ........57
5.4 Suggestions for Further Researches ........59

Chapter 4 Results and Discussion

In this part, the results of the two tests are given and discussed. The two testsare carried out to examine the effects of the lexical acquisition in the experiment,namely the immediate post-test and the delayed post-test. Both of the tests include atranslation test and a multiple-choice test. The discussions on the two researchquestions are also included in this part. The reasons why the Form Groupoutperformed the Meaning Group are clarified and stated clearly.

4.1 Results
In this part, the results of the experiment are given, and the figures are analyzedaccording to the research questions one by one, which provides a statistic basis for thediscussion of the research questions. Two tests are carried out to examine the effectsof the lexical acquisition in the experiment, namely the immediate post-test and thedelayed post-test. Both of the tests include a translation test and a multiple-choice test.The score of each test is collected and added up for every subject. The score of theimmediate post-test is considered as the effect of lexical acquisition and the score ofthe delayed post-test is considered as the effect of lexical retention.

Conclusion

In this chapter, four main questions will be discussed, namely the majorfindings, the pedagogical implications which enables the learners to have a new wayto learn vocabulary, the limitation of the study and the implications and suggestionsput forward for further investigation. This thesis studies the promising way of lexical learning for English Majors in auniversity of China. The research is implemented in the extensive reading class,which is an incidental and communicative learning context. It takes a new perspective,and emphasizes the division of words’ two aspects, form and meaning, to study theacquisition of the words in incidental learning class. The result of this experimentmanifests that the two groups both acquire some of the target words in the experimentand both of the form-focused lexical teaching and meaning-focused lexical teachingcontribute to the lexical acquisition. But the Form Group acquires more words thanthe Meaning Group, which confirms form- focused lexical teaching enables thelearners not only focus on the whole passage, but also on the words’ form. Thelearners in the Meaning Group pay all their attention to the passage, and they onlyexperience a meaning input process, and lack an information-processing process.
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References (omitted)