The effects of data-driven learning upon vocabulary acquisition for secondary international school students in Vietnam

Within the field of computer assisted language learning (CALL), scant literature exists regarding the effectiveness and practicality for secondary students to utilize data-driven learning (DDL) for vocabulary acquisition. In this study, there were 100 participants, who had a mean age of thirteen years, and were attending an international school in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This particular milieu unsurprisingly comprised ‘third culture kids’ (TCKs) and ‘cross-cultural kids’ (CCKs). They were assigned to a control and experimental group; both had several intensive weeks of online-dictionary learning training, while the experimental group also experienced intensive DDL training. This was done prior to the start of the eight-week longitudinal study. Major findings included a significant longitudinal main effect for both groups, significantly overall higher results for the experimental group than the control, and a significant difference among subjects’ grade level was discovered. Furthermore, the experimental group exhibited a significantly marked increase in vocabulary results in the later weeks of the experiment. In general, these results show that DDL can be successful in the secondary school English as a foreign language (EFL) context and that it promotes significantly better vocabulary acquisition when used in conjunction with online-dictionary vocabulary learning methods, especially for a sustained longitudinal period of time.

[1]  I.S.P. Nation,et al.  Research into practice: Vocabulary , 2011, Language Teaching.

[2]  Joe Geluso,et al.  Discovering formulaic language through data-driven learning: Student attitudes and efficacy , 2014, ReCALL.

[3]  Alex Boulton,et al.  Testing the limits of data-driven learning: language proficiency and training , 2009, ReCALL.

[4]  María Moreno Jaén,et al.  Exploring new paths in language pedagogy : lexis and corpus-based language teaching , 2010 .

[5]  Tom Cobb,et al.  Can Learners Use Concordance Feedback for Writing Errors , 2004 .

[6]  Tita Beaven.  Vivre en Aquitaine: pedagogy, audience, design , 2012 .

[7]  Tom Cobb,et al.  Is There Any Measurable Learning from Hands-On Concordancing?. , 1997 .

[8]  Anne Wichmann,et al.  Teaching and Language Corpora , 1997 .

[9]  J. Hulstijn.  Intentional and incidental second-language vocabulary learning: A reappraisal of elaboration, rehearsal and automaticity , 2001 .

[10]  David C. Pollock,et al.  The third culture kid experience : growing up among worlds , 1999 .

[11]  John Sinclair,et al.  How to use corpora in language teaching , 2004 .

[12]  Glenn Stockwell.  A review of technology choice for teaching language skills and areas in the CALL literature , 2007, ReCALL.

[13]  Averil Coxhead.  A New Academic Word List , 2000 .

[14]  Kiyomi Chujo,et al.  An Effective Way to Use Corpus Exercises to Learn Grammar Basics in English , 2010 .

[15]  S. Knight.  Dictionary Use While Reading: The Effects On Comprehension and Vocabulary Acquisition For Students Of Different Verbal Abilities , 1994 .

[16]  S. Goźdź-Roszkowski.  Explorations across Languages and Corpora , 2012 .

[17]  Yu-Chih Sun.  Learning process, strategies and web-based concordancers: a case study , 2003, Br. J. Educ. Technol..

[18]  Marlise Horst,et al.  EXPANDING ACADEMIC VOCABULARY WITH AN INTERACTIVE ON-LINE DATABASE , 2005 .

[19]  Touraj Talai,et al.  Data-driven Learning: A Student-centered Technique for Language Learning , 2012 .

[20]  Tom Cobb,et al.  Computing the vocabulary demands of L2 reading , 2007 .

[21]  Sylviane Granger,et al.  Computer Learner Corpora, Second Language Acquisition and Foreign Language Teaching , 2002 .

[22]  John Paul Loucky.  Combining the benefits of electronic and online dictionaries with CALL web sites to produce effective and enjoyable vocabulary and language learning lessons , 2005 .

[23]  Tracey Tokuhama-Espinosa.  The Multilingual Mind: Issues Discussed by, for, and about People Living with Many Languages , 2003 .

[24]  Vaclav Brezina,et al.  Is There a Core General Vocabulary? Introducing the "New General Service List". , 2015 .

[25]  Keith S. Folse.  Is Explicit Vocabulary Focus the Reading Teacher's Job?. , 2010 .

[26]  Alex Boulton,et al.  What data for data-driven learning? , 2012, The EuroCALL Review.

[27]  S. Krashen.  We Acquire Vocabulary and Spelling by Reading: Additional Evidence for the Input Hypothesis , 1989 .

[28]  B. Kettemann.  On the use of concordancing in ELT , 1995 .

[29]  Helen Pain,et al.  An ESL Writer's Collocational Aid , 2000 .

[30]  Peter Robinson,et al.  Cognition and Second Language Instruction: COGNITION AND INSTRUCTION , 2001 .

[31]  Yu-Chih Sun,et al.  Concordancers in the EFL Classroom: Cognitive Approaches and Collocation Difficulty , 2003 .

[32]  Christopher N. Candlin,et al.  Concordancing and the Teaching of the Vocabulary of Academic English , 1998 .

[33]  史尚明.  Corpus Linguistics, Computer Tools, and Applications - State of the Art , 2008 .

[34]  R. Goulden,et al.  How large can a receptive vocabulary be? , 1990 .

[35]  Karin Aijmer,et al.  Corpora and Language Teaching , 2009 .

[36]  Stephanie A. Balunda,et al.  TEACHING ACADEMIC VOCABULARY WITH CORPORA: STUDENT PERCEPTIONS OF DATA-DRIVEN LEARNING , 2009 .

[37]  Joybrato Mukherjee,et al.  Bridging the Gap between Applied Corpus Linguistics and the Reality of English Language Teaching in Germany , 2004 .

[38]  Ulla Connor,et al.  Applied corpus linguistics : a multidimensional perspective , 2004 .

[39]  Tim F. Johns,et al.  Integrating corpus-based CALL programs in teaching English through children's literature , 2008 .

[40]  Nick C. Ellis,et al.  Psychology of Foreign Language Vocabulary Acquisition: Implications for CALL. , 1995 .

[41]  A. Boulton.  Data‐Driven Learning: Taking the Computer Out of the Equation , 2010 .

[42]  G. Aston.  Learning with corpora , 2001 .

[43]  Silvia Bernardini.  In the classroom: Corpora in the classroom: An overview and some reflections on future developments , 2004 .

[44]  Paul Nation,et al.  Teaching and learning vocabulary , 1994 .

[45]  I. Nation.  How Large a Vocabulary Is Needed for Reading and Listening? , 2006 .

[46]  Maurice Carder.  The development of ESL provision in Australia, Canada, the USA and England, with conclusions for second language models in international schools , 2008 .

[47]  Tom Cobb,et al.  Acquiring Vocabulary through Reading: Effects of Frequency and Contextual Richness , 2001 .

[48]  Charles Owen,et al.  Do concordances require to be consulted , 1996 .

[49]  Tom Cobb,et al.  Breadth and Depth of Lexical Acquisition with Hands-on Concordancing , 1999 .

[50]  Hyunsook Yoon,et al.  ESL student attitudes toward corpus use in L2 writing , 2004 .

[51]  John M. Swales,et al.  Corpus Linguistics in North America: Selections from the 1999 Symposium , 2001 .

[52]  Zeping Huang.  The effects of paper-based DDL on the acquisition of lexico-grammatical patterns in L2 writing , 2014 .

[53]  Ana Frankenberg-Garcia,et al.  The use of corpus examples for language comprehension and production , 2014, ReCALL.

[54]  Sabine Braun.  Integrating corpus work into secondary education: From data-driven learning to needs-driven corpora , 2007 .

[55]  Joel Bloch,et al.  The design of an online concordancing program for teaching about reporting verbs , 2009 .