UNIVERSITATEA “DUNĂREA DE JOS” DIN GALAŢI

DEPARTAMENTUL PENTRU PREGĂTIREA

PERSONALULUI DIDACTIC
FACULTATEA DE LITERE
SPECIALIZAREA: LIMBA ENGLEZĂ

LUCRARE METODICO-ȘTIINȚIFICĂ
PENTRU OBȚINEREA GRADULUI
DIDACTIC I ÎN ÎNVĂȚĂMÂNT

COORDONATOR ȘTIINȚIFIC:
PROF. UNIV. DR. GABRIELA DIMA

CANDIDAT:
PROF. TOMA DONICI ANA
ŞCOALA GIMNAZIALĂ NR.1 REDIU
JUDEŢUL GALAŢI

GALAȚI

2019
0
 UNIVERSITATEA “DUNĂREA DE JOS” DIN GALAŢI
DEPARTAMENTUL PENTRU PREGĂTIREA
PERSONALULUI DIDACTIC
FACULTATEA DE LITERE
SPECIALIZAREA: LIMBA ENGLEZĂ

DEVELOPING VOCABULARY ACQUISITION

THROUGH INTERACTIVE STRATEGIES

COORDONATOR ȘTIINȚIFIC:
PROF. UNIV. DR. GABRIELA DIMA

CANDIDAT:
PROF. TOMA DONICI ANA
ŞCOALA GIMNAZIALĂ NR.1 REDIU
JUDEŢUL GALAŢI

GALAȚI

2019

1
 CONTENTS

Introduction 4

Chapter 1: A multifaceted approach to teaching English as a foreign language

1.1. Methods and approaches in teaching vocabulary 6
1.1.1. Grammar-translation method 6
1.1.2. The direct method 7
1.1.3. The audio-lingual method 7
1.1.4. Communicative approach 8
1.2. Ways of developing the four language skills – the fundamental aim in foreign
language learning teaching 10
1.2.1. Classification of language skills 11
1.2.2. Receptive skills 13
1.2.2.1. Listening 13
1.2.2.2. Reading 14
1.2.3. Productive skills 16
1.2.3.1. Speaking 16
1.2.3.2. Writing 17
1.3. Theoretical aspects of vocabulary teaching 19
1.3.1. Vocabulary – a key element in the development of the four language skills 19
1.3.2. Types of vocabulary 21
1.3.3. On the nature of words and vocabulary in English 24
1.3.4. A nutshell of principles in teaching vocabulary 28

Chapter 2: Methods and approaches in vocabulary teaching

2.1. Traditional approaches and techniques in vocabulary teaching 32
2.1.1. Guessing meaning from context 32
2.1.2. Teaching vocabulary with the semantic field theory 34
2.1.3. Teaching vocabulary using collocations and idioms 39

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 2.1.4. Expanding vocabulary by word formation 41
2.1.5. The use of dictionaries 43
2.2. New perspectives on teaching vocabulary 45
2.2.1. Interactive games and activities- classification and characteristics 46
2.2.2. Examples of interactive activities 49

Chapter 3: Classroom action research:

The effects of interactive strategies on developing vocabulary acquisition

3.1. Pre-experimental phase 56

3.1.1. Problem identification 57
3.1.2. Aim and objectives 58
3.1.3. Methods and techniques of investigation 58
3.2. Experimental phase 60
3.2.1. Establishing students’ actual level of proficiency 60
3.2.2. Improvement stage (The experiment) 63
3.3. Post -experimental stage 66
3.3.1. Data analysis 69

Conclusions 71

Bibliography 72

Appendices 75

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 Introduction

In my everyday teaching practice I see how students have a real problem when learning
and using vocabulary in the English language. Vocabulary is needed for expressing meaning and
in using the receptive (listening and reading) and the productive (speaking and writing) skills and
is one of the key building blocks in learning a new language. The more words students know the
more they will be able to understand what they hear and read and the better they will become at
expressing what they want to when speaking or writing. The larger a student’s vocabulary
becomes, the easier it will be for him to connect a new word with words he already knows. A
large vocabulary raises achievement and confidence and aids the student in becoming an
independent learner.
Teaching vocabulary is a very important field, and it is more than just presenting and
introducing new vocabulary to the learners. Knowing words is not filling papers with new words
and memorizing them. Copying definitions from the dictionary is not an effective way to learn
vocabulary. Passive learning hardly ever is. Memorizing may be good and useful as a temporary
technique for tests, but not for learning a foreign language. Language students need to learn
vocabulary of the target language in another way.
I have chosen “Developing Vocabulary Acquisition through Interactive Strategies”
because even though learning vocabulary may not be the most exciting thing students do at
school, by using interesting and fun ways to teach vocabulary words, we can increase students’
interest and help with both memorization and retention. Vocabulary is not the easiest thing to
teach, but adding fun ways to teach vocabulary words can help keep the process fresh and
entertaining.
I have divided the paper is divided into three main chapters.
The first chapter reviews the existing literature regarding the methods and approaches in
teaching vocabulary, from the Grammar Translation Method and the Audio-Lingual Method to
the Communicative Approach. A special focus is placed on the theoretical aspects, as well as the
principles of English vocabulary teaching and the relation between vocabulary and the
development of the four language skills.

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 The second chapter examines the traditional approaches in vocabulary teaching and the
ways of expanding the students’ vocabulary with the semantic field theory, collocations, idioms
and the use of dictionaries. It also presents new perspectives on teaching vocabulary and
describes some interactive strategies of teaching vocabulary in a fun and interesting way that
make students practice it in various communicative contexts.
The third chapter consists of an experimental research meant to investigate the impact of
interactive activities on students’ vocabulary acquisition and development of language skills,
giving a full and detailed account of the following stages: problem identification, preliminary
investigation, aim and objectives, organization of the research group, establishing the procedure
and the instruments of data collection, the final assessment and the interpretation of relevant
results followed by conclusions.
This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of interactive strategies on developing
vocabulary acquisition in the English language class in terms of both language performance and
competence, communication, motivation and actual involvement.

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 Chapter 1. A Multifaceted Approach to Teaching English as a Foreign Language

1.1. Methods and approaches to vocabulary teaching

In modern methodology two main tendencies set apart: methods in which the teacher has
the most important role and chooses the items students will learn opposing the one where focus
shifts away from the teacher to the students. This makes students more responsible for their own
learning and allows to meet the individual needs of each student. In recent years, there has been a
major shift in perspective within the language teaching profession concerning the nature of what
is to be taught. In simple terms, there has been a change of emphasis from presenting language as
a set of forms (grammatical , phonological, lexical) which have to be learned and practised, to
presenting language as a functional system which is used to fulfil a range of communicative
purposes, which is described as communicative competence.

1.1.1. Grammar-translation method

The Grammar-Translation Method is one of the most traditional methods, being

originally used to teach “dead” languages (and literatures) such as Latin and Greek. The
principal characteristic of the grammar-translation method is a focus on learning the grammar
rules and their application in translating texts from one language into another. Most of the
teaching is provided in students’ first language. Vocabulary is presented mainly through direct
translation from the native language and memorization, using bilingual word lists. Students
spend most of the lesson time completing grammar exercises, where the main emphasis is laid on
accuracy and following given structure. The grammar is presented systematically, in students’
native language and practiced through translation from one language to the other.
In regard to language skills reading and writing are distinctively preferred to speaking
and listening. Little time is spent on oral practice and students have not enough opportunities to
produce sentences on their own. Though utilizing grammar rules raise students’ correctness,
when speaking they incline to have a hesitant style that is often difficult to listen to. They plan
their utterance while their conversational partner is talking. Their output may be accurate, but
they all too often do not pay enough attention to what the other person is saying. Students often

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have difficulties “relating” to the language, because the classroom experience keeps them from
personalizing it or developing their own style.
The Grammar-Translation method should be tempered with other approaches to create a
more flexible and conducive methodology otherwise it “will have a harmful effect on students’
interest and motivation and this will eventually lead to frustration and lack of confidence in
language usage. On the other hand, for students who respond well to rules, structure and
correction, the grammar-translation method can provide a challenging and even appealing
classroom environment”(Thuleen, 1996: 29-30).

1.1.2. The direct method

This method of teaching was developed as a response to the Grammar-Translation

method and sought to immerse the learner in the same way as when a first language is learnt.
The direct method of teaching, sometimes called the natural method, is often (but not
exclusively) used in teaching foreign languages and refrains from using the learners' native
language and uses only the target language. All teaching is done in the target language, grammar
is taught inductively, there is a focus on speaking and listening, and only useful “everyday”
language is taught.
When using the direct method the teacher explains new vocabulary using realia, visual
aids or demonstrations, the emphasis is on listening and speaking and the teacher uses the target
language for all class instructions. In general, teaching focuses on the development of oral
skills. Other characteristic features of the direct method are: teaching grammar by using
an inductive approach (i.e. having learners find out rules through the presentation of adequate
linguistic forms in the target language), centrality of spoken language (including a native-like
pronunciation) and focus on question-answer patterns. Few words were introduced and most
often, they were limited and related to the grammar structures taught.

1.1.3. The audio-lingual method

This method paid systematic attention to intensive drills of basic sentence patterns and
their pronunciation. Because the emphasis was on teaching grammatical and phonological
structures, the vocabulary needed to be relatively simple, with new words introduced only as
they were needed to make the drills possible (Larsen-Freeman 2000; Zimmerman 1997). The

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assumption was that once students learned the structural frames, lexical items to fill the
grammatical slots in the frames could be learned later, as needed. The main activities used in the
audio-lingual method are repetitions, reading aloud dialogues, drill exercises, etc. When using
this method, the students are expected to produce correct input and to use correct grammar, even
though no explicit grammatical usage is given but instead it is taught inductively. The teachers
also pay attention on correct pronunciation and the target language is only the language used in
the classroom.

1.1.4. The communicative approach

The beginning of 1970s brought a major change in teaching English. The focus turned
from the Direct Method and Audiolingualism to the Communicative Approach which
emphasized the importance of teaching vocabulary. Students were exposed to diverse vocabulary
and speaking activities. Many words began being introduced during such courses and students
were encouraged to express themselves as much as possible.
The beginning of 1970s brought a major change in teaching English. The focus turned
from the Direct Method and Audiolingualism to the Communicative Approach which
emphasized the importance of teaching vocabulary. Students were exposed to diverse vocabulary
and speaking activities. Many words began being introduced during such courses and students
were encouraged to express themselves as much as possible.
The first concern of communicative approach is language acquisition rather than
conscious learning. According to Krashen, “acquisition is a natural process, similar to the way
children develop ability in their first language. It is subconscious process when students are not
aware of the fact they are acquiring language but are using the language for communication”
(Krashen 1987: 10).
Communicative language teaching (CLT), or the communicative approach asserts
interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of study. The students learn and practice the
target language through the interaction with one another and the instructor, the study of authentic
texts (those written in the target language for purposes other than language learning), and
through the use of the language both in class and outside of class. This approach involves
cooperation within the group and lays emphasis on students’ responsibility for their own
learning. Moreover, it encourages learners to incorporate their personal experiences into their

8
language learning environment, and to focus on the learning experience in addition to the
learning of the target language. Teachers use topics outside of the realm of traditional grammar,
in order to promote language skills in all types of situations, shifting the focus from sentence-
level forms to discourse level functions (e.g., requests, greetings, apologies, and so on) and
setting up situations that students are likely to encounter in real life. According to the
communicative language teaching, the goal of language education is the ability to communicate
in the target language, the teacher being a facilitator rather than an instructor.
With the communicative approach the development of the four skills — speaking,
listening, reading and writing — is integrated from the beginning, since communication
integrates the different skills. An important principle of CLT is that learning a language means
learning to communicate using the target language and the language used to communicate must
be appropriate to the situation, the roles of the speakers, the setting and the register.
Communicative activities, such as games, problem-solving tasks and role-play are essential and
they should be presented in a situation or context and with a communicative purpose.
The resources used must be authentic, such as newspaper and magazine articles, poems,
manuals, recipes, telephone directories, videos, news etc. and the topics should be selected and
graded regarding age, needs, level, and students’ interest. Communicative approach is student-
orientated, as it follows students' needs and interests and the role of the teacher is that of a guide
or a facilitator; motivation is central and therefore teachers should help learners in any way that
motivates them to work with the language. Error is considered part of the learning process and
evaluation concerns not only the learners’ accuracy but also their fluency and there should be
feedback involved in every activity.
On the other hand, the adoption of a communicative approach raises important issues for
teacher training, materials development, testing and evaluation. Questions that have been raised
include whether a communicative approach can be applied at all levels in a language program,
whether it is equally suited to ESL and EFL situations, whether it requires existing grammar-
based syllabuses to be abandoned or merely revised, how such an approach can be evaluated,
how suitable it is for non-native teachers, and how it can be adopted in situations where students
must continue to take grammar-based tests.

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 1.2. Ways of developing the four language skills – the fundamental aim in foreign
language teaching
Language is essentially a skill, that is the ability to speak which distinguishes man from
other living beings, the same as swimming, playing, etc., skills which people perform after
acquiring them. Knowing about these things is an intellectual exercise (cognition) and using or
doing them is a skill (action). Language is a complex system, involving various levels, which
blend in the acquisition of a foreign language into listening, speaking, reading and writing, which
play a vital role in any language learning quest. The four skills are the pinnacles of language
which are bound together into an inseparable unit.

Figure 1: Language skills

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 1.2.1. Classification of language skills

The four fundamental language skills (Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing) may be
further divided into two parts- Receptive Skills and Productive Skills, or Active Skills and
Passive Skills.

Figure 2: Classification of language skills

(http://www.teacherbilly.com/postprimary.html)

Speaking and writing are called productive skills because, when using them, a learner/
user of language is not only active, but also produces sounds in speaking and symbols (letters,
etc.) in writing. On the other hand, listening and reading are considered receptive skills because
here the learner is generally passive and receives information either through listening or reading.
The following table gives a better idea of these skills:

Language Skills Oral Written

Receptive Listening Reading

Productive Speaking Writing

Table 1: Classification of language skills

(https://slideplayer.com/slide)

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The same idea can be shown through a flow chart as given below:

Language skills

Aural-Oral Skills Graphic-Motor

Skills

Listening Speaking Reading Writing

Figure 3: Classification of language skills

(https://languageinstinct.blogspot.com/2006/10/aural-and-oral-skills.html)

Listening and speaking, the two most basic language skills, sound exactly alike when we
describe them as oral and aural skills. Aural language, of course, refers to language as we hear it,
while “oral” language is what we say. There is no good reason why these two words should be
homophones, but they are. While these two skills cannot be separated, they need to be developed
in different ways.
Logically, listening should be the first skill we teach. In practice, however, many foreign
language textbooks, and of course many teachers, focus the lessons on the speech and try to
make the students talk from the first day of class, having a tendency to downplay the importance
of listening, even though this skill is probably the most important skill involved in learning a
foreign language, as it certainly is in the acquisition of one’s native tongue.
The term graphomotor skills describes the more technical motor processes that are
necessary for writing, colouring or drawing but the term is also includes the interactive
environmental factors of writing.

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 1.2.2. Receptive skills
1.2.2.1. Listening

To listen means “to pay attention to somebody/something that you can hear” (Hornby,
2007: 750). This implies understanding the message you hear, so that you can respond to it and
interact with the person you hear. It is “perhaps the most challenging of the skills to master in a
second language” because “spoken language (…) is different from written text. In English,
speakers may miss a subject or verb, or may break off their sentence in the middle, (…) or
hesitate to think about what he is going to say next, (…) or include words, phrases, or ideas that
are not strictly necessary.” (Hadfield, 2008: 72). According to Ur (1996:111), it is important to
work on the development of listening comprehension, since “students should learn to function
successfully in real-life listening situations.”
Harmer (2007:134) mentions two different kinds of listening. On one hand, Extensive
Listening “refers to listening which the students often do (…) for pleasure or some other reason.
The audio material they consume in this way – often on CDs in their cars, on MP3 players,
DVDs, videos or on the internet–should consist of texts that they can enjoy listening to because
they more or less understand them without the intervention of a teacher or course materials to
help them”. This kind of listening is very important from the motivational point of view, because
it “increases dramatically when students make their own choices about what they are going to
listen to”. On the other hand, Intensive Listening is the one in which “students listen specifically
in order to study the way in which English is spoken. It usually takes place in classrooms or
language laboratories, and typically occurs when teachers are present to guide students through
any listening difficulties, and point them to areas of interest”.
In order to develop listening skills, (Hadfield, 2008:77) mentions different kinds of
activities and strategies: listening with a purpose, which is important because learners “can adapt
the way they listen to their aims” paying more attention to the information they need to extract
from the listening text; listening for gist, when the teacher sets “a question or task which” is
given to the “learners before they listen so that they know what information they are listening
for; listening for specific details, which means that to “listen with a clear purpose in mind means
that learners develop the ability to filter out everything they do not need to know” (Hadfield,
2008: 72).

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 Students usually find listening a very difficult skill because they feel under the
unnecessary pressure to understand every word. To achieve the aims related to the listening skill,
the teacher plays an important role that is defined in the following steps. First of all, the teacher
must ensure that the pupils understand the language they need to complete the task and are fully
aware of exactly what is expected of them. They need to be prepared for the listening task well
before they hear the text itself. Also, the teacher must reassure the pupils that they do not need to
understand every word they hear. The second step is to encourage pupils to anticipate what they
are going to hear. To help the students to decode the oral message, the teacher can use
illustrations or other visual clues, can ask further questions to encourage the students to guess the
answer even before they hear the text. It is also recommended that the listening activity be
presented within the context of the topic of a teaching unit.
During listening, the pupils should be able to concentrate on understanding the message
so make sure they are not trying to read, draw, and write at the same time. Always give a second
chance to listen to the text; this will provide a new opportunity to those who were not able to do
the task, and at the same time allow the students who completed the task successfully to listen for
confirmation and check the answers for themselves.

1.2.2.2. Reading

Harmer (2007:99) states that there are two types of reading: extensive and intensive
reading. The first term refers to the reading that students often do for pleasure, usually but not
necessarily away from the classroom: magazines, novels, blogs, websites etc. The teacher should
encourage the students to read, give them the opportunity to choose what they want to read and,
if possible, to share their reading experience. In the classroom intensive reading activities
include skimming a text for specific information, answering true or false statements, filling gaps
in a summary, scanning a text to match headings to paragraphs, scanning jumbled paragraphs
and then reading them carefully to put them into the correct order etc. The goal of intensive
reading is to absorb as much information from the text as possible. This is an activity that
requires great mental effort and focus and therefore the texts must be interesting and short, this
way the students read only for brief periods of time and when they have the most mental energy.
If students and teachers want to get the maximum benefit from reading, learners need to be in
involved in both intensive and extensive reading.

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 To develop reading skills, teachers play a crucial role. They should help students to focus
on their reading, in the way they read for meaning instead of getting involved on individual
words or unimportant details or losing the main meaning of a text. Also, teachers need to help
them to read in diverse ways: reading for a gist is another strategy that implies reading with a
purpose in mind; reading for detail is considered as a strategy.
Hadfield (2008:91) also talks about three reading sub skills: activating background
knowledge, predicting and using linkers.
Activating background knowledge helps learners to understand a text by discussing the
topic before reading. Useful techniques to do this include brainstorming and mind-mapping. The
first one is a very effective way of generating many ideas on a specific topic and encourages
everyone to participate while the second one helps organising the ideas and identifying the
relationships between them: causality, chronology, contrast, comparison, etc. These two
activities help to activate vocabulary learners already have. Predicting can be done by looking at
titles, pictures or words from the text. Students can make mini-predictions throughout the whole
reading. The last sub-skill is using linkers. Linkers are words that act as signals that show the
structure of a text and help to understand when a new piece of information is coming. The use of
these sub skills can be very helpful in the development of reading skills.
In order to make reading an interesting challenge as opposed to a tedious chore, it is
important that pupils do not labour over every word, whether they are skimming the text for
general meaning or scanning it to pick out specific information. Also, when choosing texts
teachers should consider not only their difficulty level, but also their interest, so that the students
will want to read for the same reasons they read in their own language.
As with listening activities, it is important to spend time preparing for the task by using
the illustrations and key vocabulary to help the students to predict the general content of the text.
Teachers should discuss the topic and ask questions to elicit language and to stimulate the
students’ interest in the text before they begin reading. Also teachers must ensure that the
students understand the essential vocabulary they need to complete the task before they begin to
read, they should provide support if needed, encourage pupils to work out the meaning of
vocabulary as they come across it, using the context and the supporting illustrations.

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 1.2.3. Productive skills
1.2.3.1. Speaking

According to Hadfield (2008:105), this presents the necessity of interaction among

people, which is not only “putting a message together” but also the response that the listener
might give to the speaker. However, this interaction presents a difficulty for learners of English
as a foreign language, since “they need to think of something to say (…) and feel confident
enough to try to express it”. Then, they have to use what they have learned in terms of
vocabulary and grammar to produce a message that other people can understand. There are
various ways in which the teacher can help students to develop their speaking skills. First of all,
he should give the students ideas such as asking them to read a text concerning the topic that is
being discussed, so that students can use some vocabulary about it. This is also helpful together
with giving them some role cards with an outline or suggestions of what they can say.
In order to help students to develop their confidence for speaking, teachers should allow
the students to practice in pairs, so that they will feel more confident to develop fluency, the
most useful tool being to ask them to speak, presenting different and interesting topics or
communicational situations. Another important aspect to consider in the development of
speaking skills is the feedback that the teacher gives to students. The teacher should avoid
“interrupting learners to correct them while they are speaking” because this could mean “that
they will not get the chance to develop fluency” (Hadfield, 2008:107).
In order to developing speaking skills, first of all, we must take into account that the level
of language input (listening) must be higher than the level of language production expected of
the students. So, we have many speaking activities used in the first levels that enable students to
participate with a minimal verbal response. However, advanced students are encouraged to begin
to manipulate language and express themselves in a much more personal way. In primary
schools two main types of speaking activities are used. The first type, songs, chants, and poems,
encourages students to mimic the model they hear on the CD. The students can master the
sounds, rhythms, and intonation of the English language through simple reproduction. The
games and pair work activities on the other hand, although always based on a given model,
encourage the students to begin to manipulate the language by presenting them with a certain
amount of choice. Once the activity begins, the teacher should be sure that the children are
speaking as much English as possible, without interfering to correct the mistakes that they will
16
probably make, and instead, praise the utterance and simply repeating it correctly without
necessarily highlighting the errors.
For the teaching of English to be successful, the four skills, listening, speaking reading,
and writing, should be integrated in an effective way. These skills should be addressed in a way
that helps students meet the standards the teacher sets for them and develop their communicative
competence gradually. Listening and speaking are highly interrelated and work simultaneously in
real life situations. Therefore, the integration of the two aims at fostering effective oral
communication. This integration will assure real-life and purposeful communication. Reading
and writing form a strong relationship with each other as skills. They are tools for achieving an
effective written communication. Students need opportunities to develop their reading and
writing skills. Developing students’ competence in reading and writing requires exposing
students to gradually challenging reading materials and writing tasks. The aim is making students
read and write effectively.
In fact, the integration of listening and speaking with reading and writing will make
learners good listeners, speakers, readers and writers so as to be able to communicate effectively.
The mastery of these skills is a gradual process. Teachers, for instance, should expose learners to
gradually challenging tasks and material.

1.2.3.2. Writing

Richards & Renandya (2002:303) state that writing is the most difficult skill for second
language learners, because they need to generate ideas, organize them and to translate these ideas
into speech and that can be very difficult for students.
Harmer (2007:121) mentions some important aspects that are considered in writing:
handwriting, spelling, layout and punctuation. Even though communication takes place mostly
electronically nowadays, handwriting still remains very important as there are instances in which
students write by hand, for example in language exams. Spelling is also a main issue in writing
and one of the reasons why spelling is difficult for students of English is that the correspondence
between the sound of a word and the way it is spelt is not always obvious. A single sound may
have many different spellings and the same spelling may have many different sounds; the layout
and punctuation rules are also essential in writing.

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 Many authors agree that there are some issues that help in the development of writing.
One of those issues is genre, which, according to Harmer (2007:113), represents the norms of
different kinds of writing. It helps to recognize an advertisement, poetry format and formal letter.
A good way to teach genre is when teachers show models of what they want learners to write and
then, using these techniques, students try to do their own work.
Another aspect of writing is cooperative work. Although many students write on their
own, it is much better to use the cooperative writing in classes, because group writing allows
giving more detailed and constructive feedback. To write in groups, whether as part of a long or
short process, is very motivating for students. Creative writing is the approach that suggests
imagination as the base in writing poetry, stories and plays. According to Ur (1996:169) “most
people feel pride in their work and want it to be read”. But this situation is most common when
people talk about creative writing instead. Students feel more motivated when teacher gives
imaginative writing tasks, because they feel engaged and try to do their best in producing a
variety of correct and appropriate language product than they might for more routine
assignments.
As writing is an important ability, it is necessary to build a writing habit in students.
Doing this, students will recognize writing as a normal part of classroom practice and they come
to writing assignments with much enthusiasm. The writing process consists of dividing the
activity in several stages, each of which practices an important sub-skill. Brainstorming is also a
good technique.
In primary schools, EFL students progress from writing isolated words and phrases, to
short paragraphs about themselves or about very familiar topics (family, home, hobbies, friends,
food, etc.). At this level many students are not yet capable, either linguistically or intellectually,
of creating a piece of writing from scratch, that is why it is important first of all to build up the
language needed and then to provide the students with a model on which they can base their
own efforts. The writing activities should therefore be based on a parallel text and guide the
students, using simple cues and should take place towards the end of a unit, so that students have
had plenty of exposure to the language and practice of the main structures and vocabulary they
need.

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 Note that at this stage, the students’ work will invariably contain mistakes and we, as
teachers, should try to be sensitive in our correction and not necessarily insist on every error
being highlighted. A piece of written work covered in red pen is demoralizing and generally
counter-productive. Where possible, we should encourage students to correct their own mistakes
as they work, to decorate their written work and where feasible to display their efforts in the
classroom.

1.3. Theoretical aspects of vocabulary teaching

“Words, so innocent and powerless as they are, standing in a dictionary; how potent for
good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to choose and combine them.”
Nathaniel Hawthorne

Far from being an element which is merely incidental to language learning, current
thinking advocates that vocabulary is crucial to the development of language performance
overall.
Nation and Waring (1997:6-19) state that “such as writing and reading, vocabulary
knowledge is one of the components of language skills” while Harmer mentioned that “if
language structures make up the skeleton of language, then it is vocabulary that provides the vital
organs and the flesh” (1993:153). If one wants to use language effectively, he/she must have
good stock of vocabulary. Language is made up of words and words are the building block of
language. Nagy (2003:1) appropriately remarks that “vocabulary knowledge is fundamental to
reading comprehension; one cannot understand text without knowing what most of the words
mean”. Teaching vocabulary well is a key aspect of developing engaged and successful readers.

1.3.1.Vocabulary – a key element in the development of the four language skills

Vocabulary represents one of most important part of language necessary for teaching and
learning a foreign language. Swan and Walter state that “vocabulary acquisition is the largest and
most important task facing the language learner” (1984: 14). It is the basis for the development
of all the four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing. When confronted with a native
English speaker, when watching a movie without subtitle or when listening to a favourite English
song, when reading a text or when writing a letter to a friend, students will always need to

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operate with words. In what follows, the focus of this chapter was on why vocabulary is
important, on what makes words difficult, on the main reasons for which students often forget
the words they learn and on some techniques which help them remember and use vocabulary.
Vocabulary learning is an essential part in English language teaching as the meanings of
new words are very often emphasized, whether in books or in classrooms. Recent research
indicate that teaching vocabulary may be problematic because many teachers are not confident
about the best practice in vocabulary teaching and at times do not know where to begin to form
an instructional emphasis on word learning.
Talking about the importance of vocabulary, the linguist David Wilkins argued that:
“without grammar little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed”
(1972:111). Indeed, people need to use words in order to express themselves in any language. It
is a fact that many students usually find it difficult to speak English fluently; they usually
encounter difficulties in speaking and writing activities and the main reason for such
communication problems is the lack of vocabulary.
Vocabulary learning and teaching focuses initially on current issues in teaching: deciding
which items to teach and how to teach them; on explicit and implicit learning and vocabulary
learning strategies; and on the role of collocations. Vocabulary learning is central to language
acquisition, whether the language is first, second, or foreign. Although vocabulary has not
always been recognized as a priority in language teaching, interest in its role in second language
learning has grown rapidly and specialists now emphasize the need for a systematic and
principled approach to vocabulary by both the teacher and the learner. The increased interest in
this topic is evidenced by a rapidly expanding body of experimental studies and pedagogical
material, most of which addresses several key questions of particular interest for language
teachers. For example, what does it mean to know a word? Which words do learners need to
know? How will they learn them? These questions reflect the current focus on the needs of
learners in acquiring lexical competence and on the role of the teacher in guiding them toward
this goal.
Taylor (1990:1-3) provides a description of the extent of word knowledge in terms of 5
stages, where the student has:
1. no knowledge about the word.
2. a general sense of the word.

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 3. a narrow, context-bound knowledge about the word.
4. a basic knowledge of the word and is able to use it in many appropriate situations
5. a rich, de-contextualized knowledge of the word and can use it in various appropriate
situations.
Knowing a word implies knowing many things about the word: its literal meaning, its
various connotations, its spelling, derivations, collocations, frequency, pronunciation, the sort of
syntactic constructions into which it enters, the morphological options it offers and a rich variety
of semantic associates such as synonyms, antonyms, homonyms (Nagy and Scott, 2000:273).
For example, a student who knows the word write will know that: its past tense and past
participle forms are wrote and written; written is spelled with double t; writing is a verb that is
used in the present continuous tense and it can also serve as a subject noun e.g. The writing is on
the wall. The student would be aware of the various synonyms of writing such as compose, drop
a line, record, scribe and draft and also know that its collocations are subject to syntactic
modifications such as write effectively and effective writing. The student will also be able to use
the word within various registers.

1.3.2. Types of vocabulary

Vocabulary is needed for expressing meaning and in using the receptive (listening and
reading) and the productive (speaking and writing) skills. It should be considered as an internal
part of learning the English language since it leads the way to communication.
In everyday conversation we speak of vocabulary in the singular; we speak of a person’s
vocabulary. The American Heritage Dictionary 2019 defines vocabulary as “the sum of words
used by, understood by, or at the command of a particular person or group”
(https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html). However, it is important to mention that there are
some differences in the number of words that a student understands and uses. A distinction must
be made here between receptive vocabulary and expressive vocabulary.
Receptive vocabulary refer to words that learners recognize and understand when they are
used in context, but which they cannot produce. It is vocabulary that learners recognize when
they see or meet in the reading text but do not use it in speaking and writing (Stuart Webb,
2009:33-52).

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 Productive vocabulary refers the words that the learners understand and can pronounce
correctly and use constructively in speaking and writing. It involves what is needed for receptive
vocabulary plus the ability to speak or write at the appropriate time. Therefore, productive
vocabulary can be addressed as an active process, because the learners can produce the words to
express their thoughts to others (Webb, 2009: 33-52).
Another distinction can be made between meaning or oral vocabulary, which refers to the
combination of listening and speaking vocabularies, and literate or written vocabulary, which
refers to the combination of our reading and writing vocabularies.
Some experts divide vocabulary into two types: active and passive vocabulary. Harmer
(1991:159) distinguishes between these two types of vocabulary. The first type of vocabulary
refers to the one that the students have been taught and that they are expected to be able to use.
Meanwhile, the second one refers to the words which the students will recognize when they meet
them, but which they will probably not be able to pronounce. Haycraft, quoted by Hatch and
Brown (1995:369), indicate two kinds of vocabulary, namely receptive vocabulary and
productive vocabulary.
In order to understand the language, vocabulary is crucial to be mastered by the learner.
Vocabulary mastery is needed to express our ideas and to be able to understand other people's
sayings. Hornby (1995:721) defines mastery as complete knowledge or complete skill. From that
definition, mastery means complete knowledge or great skill that makes someone a master in a
certain subject. But the specificity of any individual’s vocabulary knowledge depends on the
person and his motivation, desires, and need for the words (Hatch and Brown, 1995:370).
Vocabulary mastery refers to the great skill in processing words of a language. It is an individual
achievement and possession. For that reason, the biggest responsibility in increasing the
knowledge is in the individual himself. The success in widening the vocabulary mastery requires
their own motivation and interest on the words of a language.
Another question that emerges is whether effective vocabulary learning should focus on
explicit or implicit learning (intentional learning or unintentional learning).
In explicit vocabulary learning students engage in activities that focus attention on
vocabulary, the goal being to build a large recognition vocabulary, to integrate new words with
old, to provide a number of encounters with a word, to promote a deep level of processing, to use
a variety of techniques and to encourage independent learning strategies. Schmitt states that

22
deliberate vocabulary learning gives the learners the “greatest chance” for acquiring vocabulary,
as it focuses their attention directly on the target vocabulary. He presents an important concept
from the field of psychology: “the more one manipulates, thinks about, and uses mental
information, the more likely it is that one will retain that information” (2000:121). The deeper
the processing, the more likely it is for the newly learned words to be remembered. Therefore,
explicit attention should also be given to vocabulary, especially when the aim is language-
focused learning (Nation, 2001:296-316).
Incidental vocabulary learning is learning that occurs when the mind is focused
elsewhere, such as on understanding a text or using language for communicative purposes. It is
also referred to as passive learning or implicit learning (Schmitt, 1992) is the process of
acquiring vocabulary without placing the focus on specific words to be learned. Various
researchers have concluded that learners should be given explicit instruction and practice in the
first two to three thousand high-frequency words (i.e., word families). Beyond this level, most
low-frequency words will be learned incidentally while reading or listening. A two to three
thousand word base is considered a minimum "threshold" that enables incidental learning to take
place when reading authentic texts.
Therefore teachers need to expose students to extensive reading, according to their level.
For beginners, graded readers will probably give the best access to a large amount of input. For
intermediate students it may be appropriate to read numerous authentic texts, but all on the same
topic (narrow reading) so that the texts will provide multiple exposure as topic specific
vocabulary is repeated throughout. Advanced students, on the other hand, should be encouraged
to read a wide variety of authentic texts (wide reading). This type of exposure is important
because meeting a word in different contexts expands what is known about it, thus improving
quality of knowledge, with additional exposures helping to consolidate it in memory.
From the definitions and classifications above, we can conclude that vocabulary mastery
is an individual’s great skill in using words of a language, which is acquired based on their own
interests, needs and motivation. Vocabulary mastery plays an important role in the four language
skills and it has to be considered that vocabulary mastery is one of the needed components of
language.

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 1.3.3. On the nature of words and vocabulary in English

With hundreds of thousands of words in the English language, teaching vocabulary can
seem like a difficult task. But we have to remember though that the average native speaker uses
only around five thousand words in everyday speech. Moreover, our students won't need to
produce every word they learn, some they will just need to recognize. Selecting what to teach,
based on frequency and usefulness to the needs of your particular students is therefore essential.
Once we have chosen what to teach, the next important steps are to consider what students need
to know about the items, and how we can teach them. The concept of a word can be defined in
various ways, but three significant aspects teachers need to be aware of and focus on are form,
meaning, and use. Students should understand not only the mechanics of the language, but also
how, why, and where a particular structure, word, or phrase gets used.

Figure 4: Aspects of vocabulary

(http://www.algeriatesol.org/frameworks/fump-/form-meaning-use-framework)

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 Form. When talking about the form of a word, students need to know if it is a verb / a
noun / an adjective etc to be able to use it effectively. According to Nation (2001), the form of a
word involves its pronunciation (spoken form), spelling (written form), and any word parts that
make up this particular item (such as a prefix, root, and suffix).
Pronunciation and spelling can be particularly problematic for learners of English
because there is often no clear relation between how a word is written and how it is pronounced.
Most words have only one pronunciation, but sometimes a word can have two or more
pronunciations, for instance the word “present” can be pronounced /’preznt/ or /pri’zent/ and the
word “read can be pronounced /ri:d/ or /red/. It is very important to use the phonemic script so
the students have a clear written record of the pronunciation before showing the written form of
the word.
Prefixes, suffixes, and roots are also important, especially at the intermediate and
advanced levels. With an understanding of prefixes and suffices, Students should be able to
breakdown the components of a word to guess at the meaning, and the teachers should not
always have to scurry for a dictionary every time the students encounter an unknown word. Take
the following prefixes, for example: biannual – “bi” means twice, so the new meaning is “twice a
year”; dishonest – “dis” means not, so the new meaning is “not honest”
underage – “under” means not enough, so the new meaning is “not old enough”. Another
example for word parts can been seen with the word uncommunicative, where the prefix un-
means negative or opposite, communicate is the root word, and -ive is a suffix denoting that
someone or something is able to do something. Here, they all go together to refer to someone or
something that is not able to communicate, hence uncommunicative.
Meaning is the mental image/comprehension that is generated by the vocabulary. It is
vital to get across the meaning of the item clearly and to ensure that the students have understood
correctly and they have connected the form of the word with its meaning. Nation (2001:47)
stated that meaning encompasses the way that form and meaning work together, in other words,
the concept and what items it refers to, and the associations that come to mind when people think
about a specific word or expression. A word may have a different meaning because of the
sentence in which it appears, and in addition, when someone uses a word, there may be other
associated word choices selected or triggered.

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 Use
Usage involves the grammatical functions of the word or phrase, collocations that
normally go with it, and finally any constraints, in terms of frequency, level, and so forth. Some
words are more often used in writing, while others are more often used in speaking. And many
words have specific uses and appear in written communication like academic essays or business
correspondence. Student must know these points for effective vocabulary use, especially at the
higher-levels when they acquire words with less concrete meanings. In addition, students must
also realize what words or types of words are commonly associated with the vocabulary. They
should also know the collocation or the way that words occur together. The connotations that an
item may have is also very important (bachelor is a neutral/positive word whereas spinster
conjures a more negative image) as well as the situations when the word is or is not used (Is it
formal/neutral/informal? For example, spectacles / glasses / specs. Is it used mainly in speech or
in writing? To sum up is usually written whereas mind you is spoken.
Teaching and learning vocabulary is challenging, because, according to Harmer, just as in
English there is no readily discernable correspondence between sounds and spelling, there are
frequent instances, too, where the same language forms can be used to express different
meanings, or where a meaning can be expressed by many different forms.
There are words that can mean more than one thing, for example the word book has
several meanings = something to read, to make a reservation, beat = win, mix, hit; can = ability,
permission, probability or a container made of metal. With so many available meaning for a
words, it is the context which the word occurs in which determines the meaning referred to. On
the other hand, a meaning can be expressed in many different ways, for example, we can
describe an intelligent person by using a number of different words: intelligent, smart, clever,
brainy, bright etc., each of these words having a different connotation.
For form, meaning, and use, Nation (2001:49) declared there is both a receptive and
productive dimension, so knowing these three aspects for each word or phrase actually involves
18 different types of lexical knowledge, as summarized in Table 2. When teachers teach
vocabulary to build students’ knowledge of words and phrases, helping them learn any and all of
these different components, assist them in enhancing their English vocabulary knowledge and
use.

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Aspect Component Receptive Knowledge Productive Knowledge

Form Spoken What does the word sound How is the word
Written like? pronounced?
Word parts What does the word look How is the word written
like? or spelled?
What parts are What word parts are
recognizable in this word? needed to express the
meaning?
Meaning Form and meaning What meaning does this What word form can be
Concept and referents word form signal? used to express this
Associations What is included in this meaning?
concept? What items can the
What other words does concept refer to?
this make people think of? What other words could
people use instead of this
one?
Use Grammatical In what patterns does the In what patterns must
functions word occur? people use this word?
Collocations What words / types of What words / types of
Constrains on use words occur with this words must people use
(register, frequency one? with this one?
etc) Where, when and how Where, when and how
often would people expect often can people use this
to meet this word? word

Table 2: What is involved in knowing a word (Nation 2001: 27)

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 1.3.4. A nutshell of principles in teaching vocabulary

What to teach
There are several general principles for successful teaching, which are valid for any
method. According to Wallace (1982:144) the principles are: aim (what is to be taught, which
words, how many), need (target vocabulary should respond students’ real needs and interests),
frequent exposure and repetition and meaningful presentation (clear and unambiguous
denotation or reference should be assured).
Learning vocabulary is a complex process. The students’ aim to be reached in learning
vocabulary process is primarily their ability to recall the word at will and to recognize it in its
spoken and written form. Generally, knowing a word involves knowing its form and its meaning
at the basic level. In deeper aspects it means the abilities to know its (Harmer 1991:158):
- meaning, i.e. relate the word to an appropriate object or context;
- usage, i.e. knowledge of its collocations, metaphors and idioms, as well as style and
register (the appropriate level of formality), to be aware of any connotations and associations the
word might have;
- word formation, i.e. ability to spell and pronounce the word correctly, to know any
derivations (acceptable prefixes and suffixes);
- grammar, i.e. to use it in the appropriate grammatical form.
Many researchers now advocate that learners should initially be taught a large productive
vocabulary of at least two thousand high frequency words. Meara (1980:3), for example, argues
against earlier “vocabulary control” approaches in which students were taught only a basic
vocabulary of several hundred words. He maintains that students should learn very large
vocabularies when they first start to acquire a language mainly because any given language has a
small number of words that occur many times in materials we see most often. “Knowing these
words gives access to about 80 percent of the words in any written text and thus stimulates
motivation since the words acquired can be seen by learners to have a demonstrably quick
return” (Carter 1998: 207).
A second reason why we should teach beginners a very large vocabulary very quickly is
that most learners expect to have to learn vocabulary, and it would be a mistake not to capitalize
on these expectations.

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 Quantity
The teachers have to decide the quantity of vocabulary to be learnt. The number of words
depends, of course, on factors varying from class to class, from student to student.
One factor is the students’ level of English and the amount of vocabulary they can cope
with. The more advanced the learner, the easier for them will be to use conscious and
subconscious learning strategies to acquire vocabulary. But if there are too many new words,
some students might feel discouraged and frustrated, or, in the opposite case where the student is
not ’stretched’ and makes less progress than he or she could. If the teacher feels some of the
students could cope with a larger vocabulary input, he may decide to supplement the students’
vocabulary from sources other than the course-book.
Another factor is depth of knowledge. Knowing a word entails knowing many things
about the word: literal meaning, various connotations, spelling, derivations, collocations,
pronunciation, the syntactic constructions it is used in, the morphological options it offers and a
rich variety of semantic associates such as synonyms, antonyms, homonyms. How deep one
intends to go will entail spending more time hence teaching fewer words.
The quantity of vocabulary taught also depends on Receptive and Productive knowledge.
As Nation notes vocabulary items in the learners’ receptive vocabulary might not be readily
available for productive purposes, since vocabulary reception does not guarantee production.
Recognition is a lot easier than production, therefore a vocabulary item can only be said to be
fully acquired when it can be produced spontaneously (and correctly) within the context it was
taught as well as unfamiliar contexts (2001:25).
Word learnability
According to McCarthy (1990:86) “the difficulty, or lack of difficulty, a word presents
may override its frequency and/or range, and decisions to bring forward or to postpone the
teaching of an item may be based on learnability”. Learnability refers to the level of challenge a
word poses to the learner. For instance, words with spelling or phonological difficulties, or long
polysyllabic words with unfamiliar phonemes will be harder for beginners to retain; abstract and
connotative words are usually more difficult to acquire than concrete and denotative lexis,
words very close in meaning and difficult to separate (for example “make- do”) and false friends.

29
 The numbers of words to be taught will also depend on how many chances the students
have to recycle them, because there has to be a certain amount of repetition until there is
evidence that the student has learned the target words. Teachers need to check whether the
student can recognize the target word and identify its meaning, and also the student must be
given the opportunity to use it. The more words the teachers aim to teach, the more the effort
they will have to put in follow-up lessons to create recycling opportunities.
Frequency & Range
Although English dictionaries have between 500,000 and 600,000 entries (Clark 2003:7),
only a small number of these appear frequently in the materials we read, for example. Therefore,
it would seem sensible to teach the most frequent words in any language before the more unusual
ones are taught. However, Sinclair and Renouf (1991:151) state that the most frequent words are
not necessarily the most useful ones for learners of that language and that common sense
demands that the most frequent words would be supplemented by intuition, the “list will include
words related to domestic reality, such as day of the week and kinship terms, words referring to
physical sensations and personal emotions, words used in making evaluation, and other common
lexical sets”.
If we want to organize our vocabulary teaching on a subject basis it may be a good idea
to work out what the most frequent words are in that subject either intuitively or with the help of
dictionaries, e.g. topic dictionaries. Even though the frequency of a word might seem significant,
its range might be quite small. For instance, a word may be quite frequent but the majority or
even all its occurrences might be in just one or two texts. Therefore, we should teach our
students words which are frequent and which occur across a wide variety of texts.
Availability
Wallace states that “Words may be learnt or taught because they are seen to be of
special relevance to particular situations in which the learner finds himself, or might find
himself” (1988:16). Availability refers to the words that name things which the students can see
and touch, and which the teachers can use in their teaching. The classroom will often dictate the
need for certain vocabulary without which the students may fail to understand their teacher, their
classmates or the activity they are engaged in. Some of these areas include the items which
appear in language activity instructions, grammatical terminology, phonological terminology etc.

30
 Need
The choice of vocabulary must relate to the aims of the course and the objectives of
individual lessons, but at the same time the students should feel that they need the target
vocabulary, just as they would in a situation outside the classroom. Of course, it is possible for
students to be interested in or to feel that they need different words than those presented by the
teacher or suggested by the textbook. The teachers’ challenge is therefore to combine the
collective and the individual in such a way that all the students are encouraged to recognize their
own needs and assisted in developing their ability to pursue those needs in organized and
productive ways (McCarthy 1990:90).

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 Chapter 2. Methods and Approaches Used in Vocabulary Teaching

2.1. Traditional approaches and techniques in English vocabulary teaching

2.1.1. Guessing meaning from context
It is widely believed among teachers that the acquisition of a vast vocabulary is important
for comprehension and communication and that there is a strong correlation between vocabulary
and academic achievement. If this is true, then it follows that teaching a lot of vocabulary is an
important part of a reading lesson. However, researchers and teachers do not agree on what is the
most effective way to teach vocabulary to students.
Klesius and Searls state that vocabulary instruction involves both direct and indirect
instruction. On one hand, with direct instruction, the teacher explicitly presents information to
the students while “with indirect instruction the teacher orchestrates various aspects of the
classroom environment in ways that lead students to specific outcomes” (Klesius & Searls,
1991:165).
Constructing meaning from context is an effective method of teaching vocabulary, which
involves both direct and indirect instruction, and at the same time one of the most useful
strategies for proficient readers. When it comes to guessing word meaning from context, the
teacher assists the students in learning to recognize clues to guessing word meaning from
context, thus building the students’ confidence and competence. This vocabulary learning skill is
effective for learning low-frequency vocabulary, particularly in reading authentic texts.
When guessing from context as a way of dealing with unfamiliar vocabulary, Nation and
Coady (1980: 102) claim that there are two types of contexts. The first type is the minimal
context within the text which ought to be rich enough to provide adequate clues to guess a word's
meaning and it should include morphological, semantic and syntactic information in a specific
text. Because many contexts are not rich enough, a single context is often not sufficient to allow
students to guess the full word meaning. The second one is the general context, which is the
background knowledge about the topic, knowledge that the reader has about the subjects being
read. The specific context represents the other words and sentences that surround that unknown
word and which often “throw light on” its meaning. These other words can be found in the same
sentence as the unknown word or in other sentences.

32
 In order to guess the word meaning from the context, the first step is to get the learner to
look closely at the unknown word, the next step is to look at its immediate context, and then to
take a much broader view of how the clause containing the word relates to other clauses,
sentences, or paragraphs.
There are several steps for learners to check that the guess they made was the best one
possible. The first step is to decide the part of speech of the unknown word (e.g., noun, verb,
adjective, adverb) and then to examine the context in which the word occurs. Another important
step is to look at the relationship between this clause or sentence and other sentences or
paragraphs: coordination or subordination, compare or contrast, cause and effect, inclusion, time,
exemplification, and summary. In order to determine the relationship, students must look at the
key words such as like, similarly, in the same way, as, just as (which show similarity) or but,
instead of, even though, in contrast to, in spite of (which show contrast). Another important clue
is punctuation. For instance, semicolons usually signal a list while dashes signal clarification.
The final step includes using knowledge gained from such clues to guess the meaning of the
word, and then checking in to see if the guess is correct.
This strategy implies focusing mainly on context rather than looking at word parts, this
being the last step. According to Nation (2001:150-156) the reason is that using affixes and roots
alone is not a very reliable aid to guessing, whereas using the context is more likely to lead to
correct guesses. He also states that once the strategy is mastered, learners can begin to skip some
of the steps and the other steps will become more automatic. Learning from context not only
includes learning from extensive reading, but also learning from taking part in a conversation,
and learning from listening to stories or to the radio, watching films or television.
There are four interconnected elements when activating guessing in a written or spoken
text: the reader, the text, unknown words, and clues in the text including some knowledge about
guessing. The absence of one of these elements may affect the learner’s ability to guess.
There are many clues learners can use to establish meanings for themselves, such as
illustrations, similarity of spelling or sound in the mother tongue, and general knowledge
(Walters, 2004:01). It is important to provide learners with strategies for inferring the meaning of
unknown vocabulary from the context in which it occurs instead of getting them to memorize
long lists of words or look up unknown words in a dictionary which would make the reading
process slow and tedious and which would probably not contribute to the actual learning of

33
vocabulary. For improving learners’ skills in inferring meaning from context teachers can use
cloze or gap exercise in which words are deleted from a text, words-in-context exercises and
context enrichment exercises.
There are many reasons why teachers should choose to teach vocabulary in context, the
more important being that it develops an attitude of self-confidence, contributes to learner’s
autonomy and facilitates the transfer of knowledge. Students are instructed to develop strategies
like anticipating and inferring, which are highly beneficial learning processes.

2.1.2. Teaching vocabulary with the semantic field theory

Vocabulary learning and teaching has received much attention in recent years, the main
questions being how learners can learn vocabulary conveniently or how it can be taught
effectively. Other important issues regarding vocabulary learning are concerned with which
words should be taught, in which order, and how they should be presented. Webb highlights that
researchers and teachers must be very careful in selecting target words, as “the type of words
chosen, and their L2 relationships may determine the size of gains” (2007:77).
Many textbooks provide vocabularies that are semantically related words in a way, each
unit usually containing related words that the teacher should present in one session and the
students should learn them all together.
Words do not exist in isolation: rather, they form different semantic fields, such as
animal-field which contains all kinds of words that denote animals: horse, cow, sheep, dog,
giraffe, wolf, bear, lion. Words that belong to the same semantic class are in the same semantic
field. According to the theory of semantic field, the meaning of a word is decided by its
relationships with other words in the same semantic field. There are various kinds of such sense
relationships, for example, hyponymy, part/whole relationships, synonymy and antonymy.
English is particularly rich in synonyms. As synonyms convey the same concept, we often use
them to explain new words in vocabulary teaching. In teaching the word peer, we can elicit from
the students words bearing the meaning look, soon we get glance, glimpse, stare, gaze, glare,
watch. Then more synonyms peep, peek are introduced and the differences of these words are
also explained.

34
 Development in lexical semantics and the mental lexicon have prompted the development
of the semantic field theory, semantic networks or semantic grid strategies, which present and
organize words in terms of interrelated lexical meanings (Gus and Johnson, 1996:64). A simple
example of a semantic field is the set of kinship terms: father, mother, brother, sister, son,
daughter, uncle, aunt or the various body parts learned as a subset. Words may be grouped
together (related to each other) according to different criteria. Animals for example may be
grouped in terms of physical or perceptual features such as pet, wild, food etc.
Because students usually remember words that are semantically related rather than
unrelated words, they need direct systematic instruction, which enables them to recognize the
semantic relation between words. Therefore, teachers should make use of the semantic field
theory to assist the students to learn vocabularies so that the students’ willingness to learn can be
promoted and the effectiveness of vocabulary learning can be reinforced.
Synonymy
A synonym is a word or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another lexeme
(word or phrase) in the same language. Words that are synonyms are said to be synonymous, and
the state of being a synonym is called synonymy. The term synonymy can be defined either as
“similarity of meaning” or “identity of meaning”, respectively. Synonyms with the exact same
meaning are sometimes called absolute or perfect synonyms (myopia~near-sightedness) and they
are substitutable in all possible contexts in all possible (semantic, grammatical, sociolinguistic)
ways. On the other hand, words which are typically synonymous in one particular sense or words
with inexactly similar meanings are called near-synonyms. For example, long and extended in
the context long time or extended time are synonymous, but long cannot be used in the phrase
extended family.
Synonymy is a relation between individual senses of words, so that a single word
typically has different sets of synonyms for each of its senses. For example, the words begin,
start, commence, and initiate are all synonyms of one another. There are many occasions when
one word is appropriate in a sentence, but its synonym would be odd. Synonymous forms may
also differ in terms of register. The sentence My father purchased a large automobile seems
much more serious than the following casual version, with four synonymous replacements: My
dad bought a big car. (Yule,1996:117). Synonyms may also be categorized by their non-
referential meaning differences, such as dialect (highway~motorway), or language (dog~caine).

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 For our students, it is usually difficult to memorize a word; hence synonymy plays an
important role. A synonym may be used to help the student to understand the different shades of
meaning, if the synonym is better known than the word being taught. Adjectives often have
several synonyms, and also phrasal verbs which usually have a non-phrasal verb equivalent. In
teaching, we may use synonyms to help students enlarge their vocabulary. For example, when
the teacher utters the word glimmer, he or she can also tell the synonyms of glimmer, such as
beam, gleam, glow, glitter, shine, flash, dazzle, shimmer, etc. Then he can ask the students to
memorize these words together, and try to make the differences among them. The teacher needs
to highlight the fact that “true” synonyms are relatively rare and the answers will often be near-
synonyms. The students could make crosswords, word snakes or other puzzles for each other
using these synonyms. Nevertheless, if not taught properly, synonymy may reduce the chances
of vocabulary acquisition because students often make mistakes using synonyms because some
of them could be substituted effectively in some contexts but not in others. For example, strong
and powerful have similar meanings, but usually tea is only strong while engines are powerful.
Antonymy
Along with other lexical-semantic relations such as synonymy and hyponymy, antonymy
has often been taken as a primitive by linguists, psychologists, and lexicographers. All these
relations have the basic quality of being found in all natural languages and they seem to be
characterized more easily by examples than by explanation; as an illustration, if we want to teach
someone what the word antonym means, the easiest way would be to provide some examples:
hot/cold, wet/dry, old/new, good/bad, clean/dirty and so on. These pairs are all antonyms in the
technical sense of the word as used by most linguists-they are all gradable adjectives which have
opposite meanings-but in its wider sense, as it is used by some lexicographers and most lay
people, the class of antonyms (or opposites) includes nouns, verbs, adverbs, and prepositions as
well e.g., male / female, true / false, friend / enemy, front / back, beginning/end, love/hate,
pass/fail, quickly/slowly, in/out, and up/down etc.
The contrastive distribution of antonyms is made evident by syntactic parallel
constructions and the use of copulative, disjunctive and adversative conjunctions. According to
their form, antonyms are classified as:

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 a) Root antonyms (also called absolute or radical antonyms) e.g., cause-effect, light-dark,
sick-well, to come-to go, friend-enemy, to remember-to forget, life-death, above-below etc.
To this group there are also added nouns that denote persons and animals of opposite
sexes, e.g., man-woman, stallion-mare, male elephant-female elephant, he-parrot--she-parrot.
Such compounds and similar root antonyms are bound together in the sense that a certain
concept immediately evokes the contrary one, e.g., abstract generates the concept concrete. One
can notice an agreement between language and experience. A word may have more than one root
antonym, for example: bad - good, moral, virtuous; love - hate, antipathy, aversion, hostility.
A word's grammatical category plays an important part in the selection of antonyms. As a
verb, love has the antonyms hate, despise, loathe. Polysemantic words may also have several
antonyms, e.g.: to part -to gather, to part - to remain; black – white, black – bright etc.
b) Derivational antonyms (also called affixal antonyms) do not achieve opposition
through the change of the root, but through various affixes attached to a common stem. These
affixes are negative prefixes and suffixes.
The prefixes dis-/un meaning “opposite of”, “contrary to” and “do the opposite of, the
reverse of a specific action” is used to form the counterterm in such pairs as: appear-disappear,
belief-disbelief, helpful-unhelpful, dressed-undressed, employed-unemployed, fold-unfold etc.
The allomorphs in-, im- , ill- or ir- appear in such antonymic pairs as in: active-inactive,
mature-immature, literate-illiterate, rational-irrational etc.
Suffixes may be used in forming antonymic pairs as in: hopeless-hopeful, peaceful-
peaceless, remorseful- remorseless. Sometimes they can be completed by prefixes, as in
spiritless-unspirited. The most dominant single factor affecting antonym sequence is
morphological derivation: correct / incorrect, prove / disprove, directly / indirectly, officially /
unofficially, agree / disagree, legal /illegal, honest/ dishonest, advantage/disadvantage,
encourage/ discourage.
In order to help students better grasp more words quickly, teachers often use “contrast”
(compare). With the method, students can easily remember pairs of antonyms with appropriate
usage. However, not all the words have a fixed antonym. Take “fresh” for example; it can make
up of a lot of phrases such as fresh bread, fresh air and fresh flowers. If some corresponding
antonyms are given, such as stale bread, stuffy air, faded flowers, then the meaning of the word
fresh will be clear for students.

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 Hyponymy
Hyponymy is a relation of inclusion. A hyponymic relation includes the meaning of a
more general word. The more general term is called the superordinate or hypernym. Much of the
vocabulary is linked by such systems of inclusion, and the resulting semantic networks form the
hierarchical taxonomies. For example, pigeon, crow, eagle and seagull are all hyponyms of bird
(their hypernym), which, in turn, is a hyponym of animal. Other names for hypernym include
umbrella term and blanket term. Incorporating hyponymy into vocabulary teaching activities can
effectively enhance students’ vocabulary and strengthen memory effect through in-depth
understanding of the lexical meanings. Related words or words that are grouped are much easier
to remember than a random list. Teachers can fully play a leading role in helping students learn
word meaning, where necessary, to sum up the same types of words, and give demonstrations of
one or two examples of hyponyms and then to mobilize the enthusiasm of students in active
thinking, meanwhile the classroom atmosphere will be active.
Homonymy and Polysemy
Homophones are words of the same language that are pronounced alike even if they
differ in spelling, meaning, or origin, such as pair and pear. Homophones may also be spelled
alike, as in bear (the animal) and bear (to carry). But this list consists only of homophones that
are not spelled alike: ant/aunt, eye/I, ate/eight, fare/fair, bear/bare, sea/see, son/sun, steal/steel,
threw/through, throne/thrown, be/bee, blew/blue, by/bye/buy, beach/beech, cell/sell,
cent/scent/sent, cereal/serial, die/dye etc
Homographs are pairs of words that have the same spelling but different pronunciation:
for example bow rhyming with go when referring to the instrument for shooting arrows, and
bow rhyming with cow when indicating the bending of the body as a form of respectful greeting.
The ability to use word meaning correctly and appropriately is an important part of
linguistic competence. Given the complexity of word meaning and semantic relations involved,
“the acquisition of word meaning is neither a simple process nor one that is ever complete”
(Wilkins, 1972:178). Since the acquisition of word meaning is difficult and everlasting, the
exploration of effective methods for the teaching of word meaning is also a challenging and
continuous process.

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 2.1.3. Teaching vocabulary using collocations and idioms

Most studies done in the area of lexis argue that vocabulary should be placed at the centre
of language teaching because language consists of grammaticalised lexis, not lexicalized
grammar. Lewis argued that, the lexical approach is a shift in language teaching from grammar
to vocabulary teaching, as “language consists not of traditional grammar and vocabulary, but
often of multi-word prefabricated chunks” (1997:3). These chunks include idioms, collocations,
fixed and semi-fixed expressions and are also called “formulaic language”. Schmitt argued that
“formulaic language occupies a crucial role in facilitating language; it is the key to fluency and
motivates the learner” (2000:79).
Collocations
Vocabulary is often considered only in terms of single words and word families.
However, vocabulary knowledge doesn‘t only involve just knowing the meaning of a word in
isolation, but includes knowing the word that usually co-occurs with it. These words that tend to
co-occur with high frequency are called collocations and they are partly or fully fixed
expressions that become established through repeated context-dependent use. Such terms as
heavy rain, strong possibility, deep feeling, and hard work are examples of collocated pairs of
words. The connection between words is so strong that it would sound strange to replace either
word for one with the exact same meaning. For example we say fast food but not *quick food,
quick meal but not *fast meal, even though the words quick and fast mean the same thing.
Collocations fall into two main syntactic groups. They may be either grammatical
collocations or lexical collocations (Benson, Benson and Ilson 1986, cited in Bahn 1992:57)
Grammatical collocations are those in which a noun, verb, or adjective frequently co-
occurs with a grammatical item, usually a preposition. Examples are: reason for, account for, by
accident, in fact, rely on, believe in , proud of, afraid of, angry with/at etc
Lexical collocations differ in that they do not contain grammatical words, but consist of
combinations of full lexical items, i.e., nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. They include
combinations such as:
- verb + noun: spend money, inflict a wound, make a decision, take place/part
- adjective+ noun: rancid butter, dense fog, strong/weak tea, best regards, a quick meal
- verb + adverb: laugh loudly, argue heatedly, appreciate sincerely
- adjective + adverb: quite safe, deeply absorbed.
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 - adverb+adjective: highly successful, deeply concerned, absolutely impossible, fully
aware.
When teaching collocations, teachers should treat collocations as single blocks of
language, teach them as individual blocks or chunks, and learn strongly support, not strongly +
support. Also teachers should present collocations in groups, by topic (time, number, weather,
money, family) or by a particular word (take action, take a chance, take an exam).
Collocations are important in vocabulary learning because, as Nattinger notes, “the
meaning of a word has a great deal to do with the words with which it commonly associates”
(1988:69). These associations help students in learning these words and also in defining the
semantic area of a word.
Idioms
Unlike collocations, which are words that often go together, idioms are full expressions,
whose meaning is distinct from the words’ individual, literal meanings. Idioms are completely
fixed and have a unitary meaning that cannot be derived from the meanings of the component
parts. That is, the combination of words in blow one’s mind have the unitary meaning astonish;
those in be under the weather have the unitary meaning feel ill. It is the unitary meaning of
idioms that makes them particularly troublesome for second language learners since the meaning
cannot normally be guessed by the meaning of the words that make them up.
Learners are likely to be confused by idioms such as to let the cat out of the bag/ to spill
the beans -to reveal a secret, to cost an arm and a leg -to be very expensive, to shed crocodile
tears -to be insincere, or to rain cats and dogs -to rain heavily. On the other hand, they are likely
to be entirely misled by what appears to be a transparent literal meaning of other idioms such as
to have cold feet -to lack courage, to have second thoughts -to have doubt, to tighten one's belt-
to be more economical, to have a good heart - to be a kind person), to break the ice -to relieve
the tension (http://theroundtable.partium.ro/Current/Language/Claudia_Leah_Idioms).
Idioms are a commonly occurring type of multiword unit in English, especially in
informal conversational settings, and should not be ignored in vocabulary studies. Although it is
uncommon for our students to use them comfortably and effectively, if we choose not to teach
them idioms, they will be missing an important cultural element of the language they strive to
speak fluently. However, it stands to reason that idioms should be taught to upper-intermediate
or advanced students, individuals who are ready to take their English fluency to the next level.

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 2.1.4. Expanding vocabulary by word formation

A characteristic of all human languages is the potential to create new words. Throughout
the history of both the English and Romanian languages new words have been incorporated into
the language through borrowings as well as through the application of morphological and
derivational rules to existing words and morphemes.
Compounding is the combination of two or more roots. In English the roots which
are combined to form compounds are usually nouns, adjectives, verbs or prepositions. The most
common type of word formation is the combination of two (or more) nouns in order to form a
resulting noun, for instance, landmine, wallpaper, toothbrush. The first of the two compounds
may be descriptive (i.e. tablecloth- a cloth spread over a table), or both compounds may create a
whole new meaning altogether (i.e. railroad, fireworks, waterfall). It is also possible to form
words whose components are equally important to or descriptive of its meaning, for example, a
washer-dryer refers to an object combining two functions.
Compounds are sometimes written as a single word, sometimes with a hyphen, and
sometimes as separate words. From this classification derive the three types of compounding:
solid compound, temporary compound and open compound.
Solid compounds or compounds written as one word are the most common type of
compounds. Also called “closed” forms in which two usually moderately short words appear
together as one, for example housewife, lawsuit, wallpaper, basketball, etc.
Combinations of words in solid compounds are:
- adjective + noun (blackboard)
- noun + adjective (goldfish)
- with an adverb in initial position (background)
- adverb + verb (overcome, outline)
- noun +noun (handwriting)
Temporary compounds have the hyphenated form in which two or more words are
connected by a hyphen. Compounds that contain affixes, such as house-build(er) and single-
mind(ed)(ness), as well as adjective-adjective compounds and verb-verb compounds, such as
blue-green and freeze-dried, are often hyphenated. Compounds that contain articles, prepositions
or conjunctions, such as long-term solution, up-to-date and salt-and-pepper, are also often
hyphenated.
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 Open compounds consist of two or more words written separately. According to Richard
(2000), a typical feature of English compounds is that many of them are unstable. Even the same
author may use some lexical group as word group in one place and as compounds in another
place. Scientific compounds are usually not hyphenated and are open compounds: e.g.: full
moon, real estate, living room, coffee table. A classifying genitive plus a noun is also an open
compound for e.g.: a child’s play, a bird’s nest). Adjective plus noun (public school, young man)
are open compounds.
Conversion
Conversion refers to the creation of a new word without altering the shape of existing
word by affixation. Conversion changes the grammatical category of the word. There are five
types of conversion:
- verbs derived from nouns (nurse, cash, ship, mail)
- nouns derived from verbs (dance, love, doubt, turn, laugh)
- verbs derived from adjectives (open, calm, empty, clean, dirty)
- noun derived from adjectives (the rich, the young, the poor)
- verbs derived from prepositions (to down a beer, to out somebody)
Other means of word formation are backformation and blending.
Backformation is a process in which a new word is created by shortening the existing
word, for example abled (disabled), to explete (expletive), to enthuse (enthusiasm), to liase
(liason); to burgle (burglary), to edit (edition, editor), to peddle (peddler), to scavange
(scavanger).
Blends are words created by connecting parts of two words, for example brunch (from
breakfast and lunch), smog (from smoke and fog).
Other types of word formation in English are: clipping or abbreviation (phone, vet, lab,
Maths, gym, exam, fridge, ad, sitcom etc) acronyms (CD, RAM, PC, NATO etc), and
onomatopoeia (hiccup, buzz, sizzle) but these are surely not as productive as the other types
mentioned above.

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 2.1.5. The use of dictionaries

Dictionary use has long been recognized as one of vocabulary learning strategies. Despite
the important role of the dictionary for learning English and the relatively long history of the
research on vocabulary learning through dictionary use in the domain of English vocabulary
acquisition, “interest from a research perspective has been limited and sporadic over the years”
(Ronald 2003: 285).
Some researchers (e.g. Cohen 1988 cited in Nesi 2000: 37–39, Heijnen 2000 cited in
Welker 2010: 177–178) identified a non-significant relation between dictionary accommodation
and test scores of reading comprehension and reported a significant benefit of dictionary use
only for the intermediate-level students, but not for lower or higher level proficiency students.
In contrast, other studies demonstrated a positive correlation between dictionary use and
vocabulary comprehension. Tono (2001:75–83), showed that a significant difference in
performance existed between reading comprehension with dictionaries and that without
dictionaries. Similar findings were obtained by Bogaards (2002, cited in Welker 2010: 178–179)
whose study confirmed a mildly positive influence of the dictionary on the comprehension of
contextually modified idioms.
So, should we encourage students to use dictionaries? Yes, because dictionaries develop
students’ autonomy, they are a handy resource for researching different meanings, collocations,
examples of use and standard pronunciation.
A great technique for students to develop and increase their vocabulary is to increase the
availability and use of dictionaries in class and for homework assignments. It is important that
students learn how to improve English vocabulary by themselves.
There are many reasons for using a dictionary. A dictionary is a very important tool for
students who are learning a new language. With a good dictionary they can look up the meaning
of an English word they see or hear and find the Romanian translation of that word. Students can
check the spelling of a word, the plural of a noun or past tense of a verb or find out other
grammatical information about a word. Using a thesaurus dictionary they can find the synonym
or antonym of a word or look up the collocations of that word etc
It is also very important that students know what to use the dictionary for, when to use it
and which is the best dictionary for their purposes need. In order for students to see dictionaries
as a valuable resource, they not only need to learn how to use them, but also, they need to make
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use of them for different activities during their course of studies on a regular basis. The more the
students use this tool, the better they will be at using it and the more value they will find in it.
What is more, in the course of looking up a certain word, they might stumble upon other new
words that catch their attention and they might be tempted to read the definitions.
It is important to remember that looking up a word in a dictionary and / or reading its
definition does not guarantee that a student will learn this word and use it in their next writing or
speaking assignment. It is important that students understand the word and its meaning in
English, and see the word used correctly in an example.
However, each group or level of students will respond differently to different kinds of
dictionaries. For instance, beginner students will benefit with any dictionary that has pictures and
examples while lower intermediate to intermediate level students should have dictionaries that
have simple word definitions and clear examples. For certain words, having a picture available
would be very useful for this level as well, even though it is not indispensable. Advanced level
students should use regular dictionaries that have not been edited or changed for English
language learners, or dictionaries that provide information about proper collocations as well as
complete definitions. A thesaurus would also be very helpful for students at this level, as well as
information on words that are usually confused or misused (https://how-to-teach-
english.ontesol.com/ideas-improve-english-vocabulary-using-dictionaries ).
Nowadays there is a great variety of dictionary to choose from. Paper dictionaries, which
can be bought cheaply and last a very long time, should exist in each student’s house and in each
classroom. Many traditional dictionaries have online editions and, of course, students would
prefer online dictionaries. Cambridge, for example, have an online advanced learners' dictionary
at https://dictionary.cambridge.org , which is easy to use and provides examples of word use.
There are some excellent and specialised ones, such as www.etymonline.com, an
etymological dictionary (dictionary that explains the origins of words) which can be used in class
with higher level learners: www.urbandictionary.com is a web-based slang dictionary. Like
www.wiktionary.com, users can add content. Some of the content here is obscure, not all the
definitions are accurate and many are vulgar. Their value lies in ease of access to students who
own computers, but it is probably also a good idea to direct your learners to traditional ones first.
A clear distinction must be made between monolingual and bilingual dictionaries. Some
teachers are opposed to bilingual dictionaries on principle. They believe that learners should

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think in English as much as possible. I believe that learners should have a bilingual dictionary on
hand as a supportive tool but that training should focus on monolingual dictionary work. This is
because sometimes a quick translation works best, as in the case of many concrete nouns, but it
is a good idea to foster thinking and explanation in English. Bilingual dictionaries can also
enable students to express something they want to say when they don't know the correct words in
the target language.

2.2. New perspectives on teaching English vocabulary

Over the last few decades, teaching English has become extremely important, especially
to young learners. Like any other children, Romanian students acquire new foreign languages
easily, but they get bored very fast if the teacher uses old conventional methods and techniques.
We, as teachers are responsible for finding out interesting and attractive ways to teach and
motivate our students.
Didactic games used in the teaching process are met with growing interest and
recognition at schools and in institutions. The recent years have witnessed some kind of
renaissance of games and plays. Games are one of the methods that could be used in order to
avoid boredom in the classroom and they should have a special role in any foreign language
teaching. Both students and teachers will benefit from including games during class time.
Furthermore, teachers may achieve all the educational outcomes through applying the use of
games especially when teaching vocabulary. Although language structure is considered “the
skeleton of the language”, it agreed that vocabulary is “the vital organs and flesh” (Harmer,
1991:153). Vocabulary is the basic part and a key element to learn any language. Teaching
vocabulary through the use of games has become crucially important for English language
learners because they sustain enjoyment and interest in learning and encourage using the
language in a fearless and creative manner.
According to Harmer (2005: 7), the age of students is a major factor in our decision about
how and what to teach. People of different ages have different needs, competences and cognitive
skills. Young children acquire much of a foreign language through play, whereas adults have a
greater use of abstract thought. Therefore, teachers of young learners should spend plenty of time
examining and understanding how their students operate and think. Teaching young learners is
very difficult compared with teaching teenagers or adults because young learners get distracted

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very fast. Children love to have fun and play, so teachers should choose suitable teaching
methods that cater to children’s nature.
Young learners must practice through variety and appropriate techniques that aid their
information process and simultaneous operations of the language. Through games young learners
could interact, discover, and experiment with their surroundings. Using games not only enhances
students’ motivation, but also provide an incentive and stimulus to use the language.
While using games, we should take into account Allen’s thoughts as she expresses that
games are helpful because they can make students feel that certain words are important and
necessary, because without those words, the object of the game cannot be achieved (1983:52).

2.2.1. Interactive games and activities: classification and characteristics

In order to get students’ attention and facilitate learning, teachers should consider
integrating a variety of activities into the English class, especially when teaching vocabulary
because it brings about interaction and variety which can help to enliven the classroom
atmosphere and encourage deeper learning for every student.
Hadfield (1998: 4) defines it as “an activity with rules, a goal and an element of fun” but
there are several other factors that should be taken into account. Competences acquired when
playing didactic games, e.g. cooperation, critical thinking or readiness to take risks, are also
important aspects when talking about interactive games and activities. Toth (1995: 8) highlights
the importance of students being acquainted with the goal of the game from the very beginning.
In addition, she states that the students should also be provided with the instructions before
beginning the game to avoid problems afterwards. She suggests the teacher asking a few students
to come to the front of the class to give a demonstration first before handing out the material to
the remainder of the students. They may not listen to the instructions and become distracted if
they are given the material first.
Different writers have different classification of games.
Hadfield (1999:102 -104) provides a classification specifically for vocabulary games
depending on their aim: linguistic games and communicative games. She states that the former’s
aim is to recall the correct word, i.e. linguistic accuracy, whereas the latter’s aim is not accuracy,
but to conduct a task which requires the use of the language to be completed. She classifies
games into: sorting, ordering, or arranging games, information gap games, guessing games,

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search games, matching games, labelling games, exchanging games, board games and role-play
games.
Lee’s classification (2000: 65) includes structure games (focused on syntax and technical
aspects of language), vocabulary games (focused on developing learners’ L2 lexicon), spelling,
pronunciation or number games, listen-and-go games, games and writing, miming and role-play,
as well as discussion games.
Shifting the focus on the structure of games it is possible to distinguish various types
depending on the tools and physical materials used in order to play it. Such a classification is put
forward by Lewis and Bedson (1999:17), who distinguished the following games: movement,
card games, board games, dice, drawing, guessing, role-play, singing and chanting games, team
games and word games.
On studying these classifications, it can be deduced that each author dealing with
vocabulary games group games differently based on their particular way of making connections.
Each kind of game mentioned above focuses on a language component or a skill, so when
choosing games, one of the factors that teachers have to consider is the aim of the lesson. These
games can be played in pairs, groups, or with the whole class and they can be used at any stages
of a class (Harmer, 1991:101). Interactive games and activities have some characteristics that are
advantageous when teaching vocabulary.
Research indicates that classroom games are effective strategies that facilitate learning.
McCallum (1980:78) points out that games can function as reinforcement, review, and
enrichment. Games are a good way to increase exposure to vocabulary because while playing,
students need to use the language items and repeat patterns and that will contribute to the mental
processes of retention and remembering, developing and improving all four skills and enhancing
students’ vocabulary acquisition. Most vocabulary games provide students with intensive and
meaningful practice of language because they make learners use the language instead of thinking
about learning the correct forms (Lee, 1995: 78). Hadfield (1984: 127) shares the same view that
games can provide an opportunity for real communication and bridge the game between the
classroom and the real world.
Another important advantage of interactive activities is that they engage all students in
the learning process and encourage cooperation, team spirit, competition, and turn taking. These
activities provide an opportunity for students to collaborate and cooperate with each other, while

47
working towards a common goal, even though they may not realize that they are actually
learning. When students play games in pairs or groups, they have the opportunity to recognize
and appreciate the contributions of others and use team-building skills. When playing promoting
student-centred activities students are given an active role and they can develop their skills of
disagreeing in a polite way, asking for help, and working with others.
As games provide another encounter with the target words, they have the advantage of
being fun, competitive, and consequently, memorable. According to Uberman (1998:18),
vocabulary games provide a fun and enjoyable learning environment and students remember
things faster and better Because they are amusing and interesting games can maintain students’
motivation in vocabulary learning and make them interested to get involved and to participate
actively in the learning activities. Furthermore, games encompass a number of intelligences such
as visual intelligence when games involve drawing, interpersonal intelligence when they include
playing with others, and kinesthetic intelligence when they provide hands-on elements like cards.
On the other hand, Toth puts forward that games are sometimes perceived as “relaxation
activities in which the children are not really ‘studying’ English”. They are not taken seriously
and they are “often severely marginalised, and tend to be used for some ephemeral pedagogic
purpose – not as a means of learning” (Cook, 2000: 183).
Two other worrying aspects are noise and space. Firstly, playing games which encourage
speaking inevitably brings noise to the classroom and secondly, some classes’ present space
constraints and some are difficult to reorganise to play games.
Another aspect that concerns is time because games can be time consuming. For teachers
faced with multiple demands and a fast-paced curriculum, it can be hard to find time for play in
the classroom—much less play that is meaningful and allows students to deepen their
knowledge. Because the benefits of mentioned above outweigh the worrying aspects, we can
conclude that interactive games and activities are an effective tool to teach vocabulary because
students participate and pay more attention when they enjoy themselves and the classroom and
feel and do better during and after the game. Such play not only keeps students interested but
also helps make their understanding of the new words more precise. Through back-and-forth,
interactive play, students can also clarify misunderstandings without feeling embarrassed or
singled out.

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 Therefore, Lee (1995:78) suggests that games should not be regarded as “activities filling
in odd moments when the teacher and his/her class have nothing better to do”. They ought to be
at the heart of teaching a language in general and vocabulary in specific (Uberman, 1998: 20).

2.2.2. Examples of interactive activities

In my classroom, I combine different strategies: vocabulary lists, activities around

listening, speaking, reading and writing, as well as explicit vocabulary teaching. All of these
methods allow my students to develop the ability of understanding lexical items through repeated
exposure and variety. In addition, I combine “fun” ways of learning vocabulary, which can break
up the monotony of traditional vocabulary teaching methods. They include activities to expand
vocabulary, how to teach vocabulary as a starter, ways in which students can recycle previously
seen and taught vocabulary, as well as ways to improve their vocabulary through dictionary, pair
work and group work.
A variety of activities ensures that vocabulary instruction doesn’t become routine or
boring and helps both the students and the teacher avoid getting burned out or tired of working
with vocabulary.
In the next section, I have explored effective methods and techniques to improve
vocabulary acquisition as well as some fun ways to help students to learn words.

Semantic maps (https://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/word_maps)

In this activity, the teacher chooses a word and displays it for the class on a whiteboard,
etc. Students read the word and then think of words that come to mind when they see that word,
activating prior learning. A list is created of all of the words that come to mind, and then those
words are categorized. This can be done as a whole class or in small groups. Students then create
a “map” using a graphic organizer and discuss it. Additional or substitute categories can be
suggested. As students read through the text, they can add related words to the map.

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 The concept cube (https://www.teachhub.com ideas-instructing-vocabulary)
Students receive six-square pattern that can be folded up and taped into a three-
dimensional cube. Before folding, students write clearly in each square following the directions
below.
Each student is given one challenging vocabulary word and is asked to:
- write the assigned vocabulary word in one square.
- write a synonym (word or phrase) in another square.
- write an antonym (word or phrase) in another square.
- write a category or categories it could belong to.
- write the essential characteristics of the concept of this word.
Then they fold, and tape the cube. The next step is to roll the cube and read what comes
up on the “top”; each student must tell the relationship of that word or phrase to the original
word.

Hot seat (Hot potatoes) (https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/hot-seat-0)

This excellent activity for revising vocabulary is very lively and can be adapted to
different class sizes. If you have many teams, perhaps some teams wait to play. Or if the team
sizes are large, you can restrict how many team members do the describing.
First, split the class into different teams (two is best, but if you have a large class, any
number could be used). Sit the students facing the board. Then take an empty chair - one for each
team - and put it at the front of the class, facing the team members. These chairs are the 'hot
seats' .Then get one member from each team to come up and sit in that chair, so they are facing
their team-mates and have their back to the board. The teacher writes a word on the board, but
the student on the chair will not see it. The aim of the game is for the students in the teams to
describe that word, using synonyms, antonyms, definitions etc. to their team-mate who is in the
hot seat, who listens to their team-mates and tries to guess the word. The first hot seat student to
say the word wins a point for their team. Then change the students over, with a new member of
each team taking their place in their team's hot seat. Then write the next word and so on.

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 Guess the word (https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/word-guessing-games )
This game can be used especially for abstract nouns.
Choose five words relating to recent conversational themes and write sets of clues to help
students guess the words. This game can be played with whole class or with 2 or 3 teams. Use
one word per lesson over five lessons or use all words in one session as a longer game.
Example clues (word = freedom):
- I am a noun but I am very important.
- I begin with the letter ‘f’.
- People in prison have lost it and want it back.
- People demand it when it is taken away by dictators.
- It is related to speech.

Odd one out (https://www.englishhints.com/odd-one-out.html)

Choose four words related to the theme you are talking about, one of the words has to
have an ‘odd one out’ element. This activity works well as a starter to introduce a topic. It can be
used to teach new vocabulary, but is also a good method to recycle old vocabulary that will be
used in the ‘new’ topic. Quite often, I find that different students will choose a different ‘odd one
out’, to what I had originally considered. If this is the case, as long as they can justify their
choice, in the target language, they should get the credit.

Scrambled letters (http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Koprowski-RecyclingVocabulary.html)

The teacher writes up eight words with their letters shuffled (e.g. eicscen for science) on
the board. When the teacher says 'go', the students, individually or in pairs, try to untangle the
words as quickly as they can. The first student or pair to do so wins. The teacher can then
quickly run through each of the scrambled letter groups on the board, eliciting information about
each word or concept. The important thing to remember is not make them too difficult. Of
course, there are several variations of this game. There can also be used phrases with more than
two words, idioms or even proverbs (e.g. "you're having when time flies fun" for "time flies
when you're having fun").

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 Linear array (http://www.giftedguru.com/21_ideas_for_teaching_vocabulary)
In this strategy, students use a graphic organizer that is a rectangle, three ovals, and then
another rectangle, all in a line. The word in question goes in the rectangle on the far left. The
rectangle on the far right is filled in with a word that is the opposite. The centre three ovals are
filled in with words that go from the far left to the far right, gradually become less similar until
they reach the opposite. For example: microscopic, tiny, small, bigger, large.

Relay for words (http://www.giftedguru.com/21_ideas_for_teaching_vocabulary)

Print out words on one set of cards (copy this set a few times) and definitions, context, or
sentences in which they could be used (fill-in-the-blank) on another set (just one set). Jumble up
the words in a pile in the middle of the floor, and jumble up the definitions, context, and
sentences to keep with you. Break students into teams of five. Call out the
definition/context/sentence and give students some think time to talk about what word it might
be. After the discussion time, call out “Word!” One member from each team runs to the centre
and tries to find the word in the pile. I like having multiple sets of the words so more than one
team can get it. Check to make sure they’re correct, and then discuss it briefly before the next
round.

Quick revision games (https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/quickrevisiongames)

Divide the class in two teams. Give each team a set of slips with five (or three or two,
depending on their level) things they have to name.
Examples:
- name five things that move
- name five drinks
- name five things you would be doing if you weren't here
- name five ways to get rich
- name five animals
A member of the team reads the category of things they have to name and the whole team
shouts the words. While team A is doing this, team B have to remain in silence. Then it's team
B's turn. Time each team. The faster team is the winner.

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 Last one standing (https://www.fluentu.com/blog/educator-english/vocabulary-games)
It is a great game for revision and to get students tuned into the lesson topic. It may also
be used to elicit from the student what they already know about a certain topic.
The teacher chooses a category (animals, colours, school objects, kitchen gadgets...) and
the students, standing up in a circle, have to say a word that belongs to that category. If a student
does not know, he / she stands up. Then, the teacher chooses another category the following
student starts again. In the following round, the student who's standing will have another chance.
If he / she can say a word that belongs to the new category, he / she can sit down. The last
student standing will be declared the winner.

Alphabet game (http://iteslj.org/Techniques/KoprowskiRecyclingVocabulary)

Divide the class into 3 or 4 teams and assign a secretary for each group. On one side of
the board, write down six categories related to the current topic or syllabus of your course (e.g.
countries, sports, jobs, movies, furniture, verbs, things that are round). To start the game, the
teacher randomly selects a letter of the alphabet and writes it onto the board. Each team must
then work together to quickly find a word for each of the six categories that starts with the
chosen letter. The first team to complete all six categories shouts "stop!" The class then stops
writing, and a member of the team goes to the board to fill in the categories. The teacher then
checks each word with the class and also elicits what other teams had for each category. If the
quickest team has filled in each category correctly, they earn one point for their team. The
teacher then chooses a different letter and another round is played. The first team to score a
certain number of points wins.

Guess what I'm thinking (https://www.englishhints.com/question-game.html)

Students take turns describing something, like a place: “I’m thinking of a place that is so
huge it takes visitors hours to see all of it. It has stunning works of art. It is a breathtaking
building, very old, but with a modern glass pyramid in the front.” Students choose to be as
obvious or as cryptic as they like. Even little ones can do this with simple descriptions: “It's an
animal. It has a very long neck and big brown spots.” Or simply state a series of words: “Africa,
black and white, stripes”.

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 The revision box (https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/revision-box)
This activity can be used for all levels in teaching English as a second language. I use it
mainly for intermediate students and they find it interesting. The teacher uses a vocabulary box
that must mainly comprise of words on pieces of paper (verbs, adjectives, adverbs etc.) all said
by the learners themselves in previous lessons. Importantly a lot of words are required for this
activity. The box with all the words is circulated around the class. Each learner is given a chance
to pick a word from which he / she will have to construct a short and grammatical sentence. Each
sentence is written on the board just as the speaker said it. After 12 to 20 sentences the sentences
are analysed to see if they are grammatically correct with the emphasis placed mainly on the
word from the vocabulary box. Correction of the sentences can then be done and learners, again
depending on time available, prompted to produce the correct sentences with the same word
from the box. It really gets learners talking while at the same time identifying their mistakes.

Bingo (https://www.bookwidgets.com/blog/2014/11/fun-classroom-activity-bingo)
Bingo is an incredibly fun game to play in group, is very easy to play, and can help
rehearse anything from language vocabulary to math and historical facts. Everyone can play the
game together, regardless of level. And best of all, teachers or even students can create their
own, customized Bingo cards.
The basics of Bingo are as follows: each student gets a large card with squares containing
words, phrases or pictures. Everybody gets the same words, but in a different order. Each time
the teacher calls out a word, the student searches for the right square on his card, and marks it.
The first student to have five words highlighted in a row yells ‘Bingo’, and wins. There are lots
of small variations on the game to make the game more accessible to the students. We can
replace the words on the card with pictures, we can make students play in pairs or teams so they
can help each other finding the words more quickly or we can give hints that lead to what’s in
the square instead of calling out the words or pictures in the squares. After checking the answers
of the winner, the teacher should give the winner their price: a small treat, a “No Homework”
pass or, if they don’t have prizes to give out, the teacher can reward the winner by letting them
come in front of the class, and letting them take the role of the caller for the next round.

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 Kahoot! (https://kahoot.com)
Kahoot is a game-based learning platform, used as educational technology in schools and
other educational institutions. It is an incredibly engaging student-friendly teaching and learning
tool as it provides learning through creation of educational games and new understanding
through playing them. It is perfect for reviewing word lists and to challenge the students'
language skills as they can interact in real time.
Kahoot! was designed for social learning, with learners gathered around a common
screen such as an interactive whiteboard, projector or a computer monitor. Its learning games,
"Kahoots", are multiple-choice quizzes that allow user generation and can be accessed via a
phone or a tablet. The game design is such that the players are required to frequently look up
from their devices. It can be played using the Classic mode (Player vs. Player, 1:1 Devices) or
the Team mode (Team vs. Team, Shared devices). The game play is simple; each player or team
connect using a generated game PIN shown on the common screen, and use the device to answer
questions created by a teacher or other person. These questions can be changed to award points.
Points then show up on the leaderboard after each question.
Kahoot can be used to review students' knowledge, for formative assessment or as a
break from traditional classroom activities. I like to use Kahoot quizzes as a formative
assessment, where the students can have fun participating in the quiz (as well as learning new
information from the quiz). At the same time I am able to collect valuable data about where the
students are at with their learning. One of the best features of Kahoot is that it collates the data
for me in a downloadable spreadsheet, where I can see if students are struggling with anything in
particular.
Kahoot is first and foremost about creating a positive learning environment by bringing
collaboration, emotion and play together. Technology is merely facilitating the social learning
experience. The deepest way to use Kahoot in a classroom setting is to challenge students to
become the game designers and then to facilitate the gaming experience, playing with their
classmates - this encourages deep research, critical thinking, creativity, question design, as well
as facilitation and presentation skills.

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 Chapter 3. Experimental Research: Interactive Strategies used Developing English
Vocabulary Acquisition

3.1. Pre-experimental phase

Vocabulary is an important part of English language teaching and learning because
without a rich vocabulary students cannot understand others or communicate their own ideas.
According to Nagy & Anderson (1984), Singson, Mahony & Mann (2000) there is a strong
relationship between the individual’s vocabulary size and his/her general language proficiency.
Vocabulary provides much of the basis for how well learners listen speak, read and write.
Without an extensive vocabulary and being taught strategies for acquiring new vocabulary,
students often achieve less than their potential and may be discouraged from making use of
language learning opportunities around them such as listening to the radio, listening to native
speakers, using the language in different contexts, reading or watching television.
Vocabulary teaching and learning is a continuous challenge for teachers as well as
students because generally there has been a minimal focus on vocabulary teaching in the EFL
classroom. But since vocabulary teaching and learning is no longer overshadowed by grammar
instruction, its increase in status has led to research being conducted to investigate the
effectiveness of different methods used to learn and retain vocabulary, among which are
interactive activities.
Modern methodology comprises a rich variety of methods which should have some
common features: activities involving students and close to real-life situations. To be effective,
the methods follow after each other in a suitable order, and there should be a balance of teaching
focused on different aspects of the language. The teacher’s role is to choose the suitable
strategies and activities in order to teach English vocabulary.
When interactive strategies of teaching are used, the teacher is in the classroom to
encourage and help students to explore, try out, make learning interesting. I have chosen this
topic because I want to improve my students’ learning abilities, to involve them in learning, to
encourage them to speak confidently in English, to keep them interested and motivated and , of
course, to promote effective ways to learn English vocabulary in a relaxed manner.

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 In order to develop my research I have consulted teaching documents, works and books
related to this theme such as: the curriculum, training courses for teachers, articles and studies,
dictionaries, exercise-books and the course books, which are mentioned in Bibliography.

3.1.1. Problem identification

During my years of teaching English I have noticed that most of my students have a
receptive knowledge of a more or less wide range of vocabulary, which means they can
recognise words and their meaning, use them in various contexts, exercises or in sentences of
their own, with some help and guidance. Nevertheless, their productive use of a wide range of
vocabulary is normally limited, and this is one of the areas that need greater attention. At this
stage I am concerned not only with students’ understanding the meaning of words, but also being
able to use them appropriately, having the confidence to participate and speak freely in the target
language. My students can generally communicate well, having learnt all the basic structures of
the language. However, they need to broaden their vocabulary to express themselves more
clearly and appropriately in a wide range of situations.
Therefore, vocabulary is a constant in my classes. I usually rely on interesting literature
extracts in the textbook, which students seem to enjoy. In my two hours per week course I try my
best and engage all my students, regardless of their strengths, with concern for their learning
needs and ways of addressing them. I either give them a few more exercises to solve individually
as part of the remedial action, or revise the previously learned words, or at times, I ask their
peers to explain the words or translate them if needed.
I use alternative types of assessment, such as project work or personal language portfolios
which includes compositions, formal/informal letters, tests, drawings, songs, stories. But most
students seem not to take any interest in learning new words, and therefore, their achievement,
measured by tests, is generally low. Moreover, at the end of secondary school most of them still
have low levels of the English language knowledge, partly due to the little exposure they have to
English. Therefore, the need for a change of strategy is necessary for a real practical classroom
situation and this has led me to test different assessment methods in the first place.
As a consequence, I considered that the introduction of the interactive strategies in the
acquisition of English vocabulary could stir the students’ interest and have a positive impact on
them so as to change their attitude as well as their knowledge achievement. The underlying

57
assumption was that students could be taught to engage with each other with the task in a way
that would foster the creativity and exploitation of vocabulary learning opportunities.

3.1.2. Aim and objectives

The aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of interactive strategies on
developing vocabulary acquisition in the English language class and thus to assess students’
progress after being exposed to interactive activities for one school year. The following stages
will present the actual methods of teaching and provide a comprehensive view of the interactive
activities used in class and of their results which were assessed at specific times. This experiment
did not interfere with achieving the class objectives embedded in the curriculum, in fact it ended
up as a support in developing its main targets.
Regarding the interactive strategies used during this particular period, the aims of the
study were:
- to improve pupils’ vocabulary;
- to record and compare the results obtained by the students at the beginning and at the
end of the school year;
- to identify the proper methods of teaching vocabulary in order to promote pupils’
creativity and critical thinking;
- to boost involvement and stimulate motivation to learn;
- to improve group work dynamics by trying out the alternative cooperative learning
methods;
- to develop communication/ speaking and writing skills.

3.1.3. Methods and techniques of investigation

For this stage of this paper I devised an experiment to record and assess the progress of
the 5th grade students, before and after using interactive activities, designing my vocabulary
teaching classes. The experiment took place during the school year 2018-2019 school year at
Rediu Secondary School, Galați county.

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 The class consists of 22 pupils (9 girls and 13 boys). There is a boy with special
educational needs (learning disabilities) and three children (two boys and one girl) from broken
or dysfunctional families. Their achievements are very low.
Most of them come from common families and the main job of the parents is agriculture.
These children cannot be helped in learning English by their parents, but only by their elder
brothers and their teacher. About 50% of pupils have good and very good achievements at
school, and the rate of school abandonment is zero. There wasn’t noted any inadequate school
behaviour.
After choosing the experimental class, I decided to use the games described in the
previous chapter to check if interactive strategies were more efficient than traditional methods
when it comes to developing vocabulary acquisition in the English language class.
As a teacher, it was of course imperative that I took into consideration a few obvious
variables, as the students’ interest, their motivation, the different learning styles or different types
of intelligence. Consequently, one of my main teaching concerns related to the methods or
procedures which could be employed in order to enhance my students’ vocabulary acquisition
for longer periods of time, to encourage their initiative to speak the English language and help
them develop their fluency or improve their accuracy when writing compositions or sitting tests.
The 5th grade English textbook (Macmillan Educational – Litera Publishing House)
contains few vocabulary games and most of them are based on matching items to definitions,
synonyms or antonyms. Therefore, I usually combine traditional types of exercises with
interactive, collaborative activities as part of assessment, observing my students’ participation
during classes carefully. I use games within my classes, with the purpose of introducing new
items or as a review and reinforcement strategy, at the end of the class.
Although sometimes games are time-consuming and it is almost impossible to avoid
noise and movement, they are funny, challenging, motivating and involve everybody.
Nevertheless fair play and respect are values which have to be taught and reinforced with
teenagers, on daily basis, as part of the language games or everyday life. Moreover, games have
to be rigorously planned beforehand, so as to minimize potential negative effects. Also, a set of
rules must be established in order for the students to take the activity seriously and to achieve
real progress.

59
 When implementing such activities, I chose a few games which I found suitable for
classroom use and I had hoped that if adapted to the vocabulary under focus, they would improve
my students’ vocabulary acquisition as well as boost willing participation in class.

3.2. Experimental phase

3.2.1. Establishing students’ initial level of knowing English

The experimental class was represented by the 5th grade where, during the second
semester, modern interactive strategies were introduced as the independent variable. The study
consisted of a pre-test at the end of the first semester after using traditional strategies and the
results were to be measured against the grades the students obtained at the end of the second
semester, after the interactive active were introduced. The first stage in this experiment consisted
in gathering data on the students’ actual level of English vocabulary knowledge, therefore I
designed a pre-test at the start of the experiment. The information I received from this stage
served me in devising my strategy of teaching, but it also provided me with a threshold which the
students’ later progress would be compared with.

TEST PAPER
5th Grade

1. Read and complete the text with the correct word from the list below: (10x2=20p)
population attractions clocks meters years garden red visit capital palace

Famous for ………. double-decker buses, London, the ……… of the United Kingdom (UK),
is the most visited city in the world. London has a ………..of approximately 12 million people.
Queen Elizabeth II is monarch for more than 55 …….. . The Queen and her family live in the
Buckingham Palace. Located in Westminster, this grand ………….. has 775 rooms, and one very
large private …………… . Tourists can ………… some state rooms in August and September.
One of the most famous ……….. in London is Big Ben. Big Ben is the nickname of the
Great Clock situated in the Clock Tower of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the largest
four-faced ………. in the world. The tower is 96 …….…. tall and the bell weighs 13.8 tonnes.

2. Match the two columns in order to make pairs of antonyms: (5x2= 10p)

1. tall a. fat
2. ugly b. curly

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 3. thin c. fair
4. straight d. short
5. dark e. beautiful

3. Put the words below in the correct column: fruit, vegetables, meat or dairy products:
(20x1=20p)
plum, sausages, garlic, lamb, melon, yoghurt, chicken ,cheese, pepper, butter,
pear, apricot, cucumber, cabbage , peach, beef , cauliflower, milk, ham, cream

4. Unscramble the words in order to make sentences: (5x4= 20p)

a. 20th/ birthday/on/ is/Adele’s/ September
b. your/ favourite/ who/ singer/is?
c. too/ are/ friends/ students/my
d. films/don’t / horror/we/ like
e. are/ London/ not/ they/ from.

5. Describe yourself or another person. Refer to physical appearance and moral qualities.(20p)

Table 3: Pre-test.

Item Grades 9-10 Grades 7-8 Grades 5-6

I1 -complete the text with -complete the text with 7-8 -complete the text with 4-6
9-10 words; words; words;
I2 -make 5 correct pairs of - -make 4 correct pairs of -make 2-3 correct pairs of
antonyms antonyms antonyms
I3 -categorize 18-20 words --categorize 10-18 words -categorize 5-10 words
correctly; correctly; correctly;
I4 -make 5 correct sentences -make 4 correct sentences -make 2-3 correct sentences
I5 -use appropriate -use appropriate vocabulary -use vocabulary ((with
vocabulary -use grammar structures and minor mistakes)
-use correct grammar connectors (with minor -use grammar structures
structures mistakes) and connectors (with minor
-cover the aspects -cover the aspects demanded mistakes)
demanded by the task by the task
Table 4: Pre-test. Performance descriptors

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The results of the pre-test are shown in Table 5 and Figure 5.

INITIAL TEST RESULTS

Grades Number of students Percentage
9-10 3 14%
7-8 7 32%
5 -6 8 36%
3-4 4 18%

Table 5: Pre-test results

Figure 5: Pre-Test Results

Analyzing the results I discovered that not all pupils have a rich and active vocabulary,
they make confusions between words with opposite meaning (antonyms), some could not
categorize the words correctly, they had difficulties in making sentences and writing short texts
(describing people).

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 Therefore, starting with the second semester, I introduced the experiment to class 5th , on
the assumption that the vocabulary games formats and conditions would result in considerable
improvement in vocabulary acquisition, communication and thus, greater motivation to learn the
English language in general.

3.2.2. Improvement stage (The experiment)

After collecting all data from the first evaluation stage, I went on to implement my
experiment on how to improve my students’ vocabulary acquisition. As stated before, the
process involved introducing more modern interactive strategies when teaching and assessing
vocabulary. In vocabulary teaching I applied modern strategies, but some traditional methods
too, the novelty was that I tried to reshape them from a modern perspective where it was
possible. So, I adapted them to cooperative, creative and active teaching-learning activities.
Some examples of interactive activities I used in the second semester, as part of the experiment
are presented below.

Mind map/Spider web method) (https://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/word_maps)

I used this method very frequently, in order to introduce new vocabulary, but also to
motivate pupils working with the dictionary.
Lesson: Rooms, furniture and gadgets
Aims:
- to practice vocabulary related to houses: rooms, furniture, gadgets and appliances
- to name and describe various types of homes
- to develop reading, speaking and communication skills
Procedure:
I divided the students in 5 groups which had to use words related to furniture in the
bedroom, the bathroom, the living room, the kitchen and the study. Each group received small
pieces of paper with words related to furniture, gadgets and appliances and they had to choose
only the words that corresponded to their group/room. (see appendix no.1)

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 Kahoot (https://kahoot.com)
I used this game-based platform in order to revise vocabulary, to create a cooperative
learning atmosphere and to activate pupils. It was my students’ favourite activity.
Lesson: Rooms, furniture and gadgets
Aims:
- to practice vocabulary related to houses: rooms, furniture, gadgets and appliances
- to develop communication skills
Procedure:
The activity is designed as an online quiz, Kahoot. The teacher uses the laptop and video
projector to ask the students some questions about houses, rooms, furniture, appliances and
gadgets. Using their mobile phones, the students read the questions and answer them. (see
appendix no.2)
The Mime game (https://www.teach-this.com/esl-games/miming-games)
This entertaining miming game can be played by students of all ages and levels and it can
be used to revise a variety of vocabulary items.
Lesson: What can you do?
Aims:
- use the modal verb “can” to express ability
- to practice the new vocabulary – activity verbs
- to develop speaking and communication skills
Procedure: I prepared some cards with verbs of activity and put them on the teacher’s
desk. Each student went in front of the class, picked a card and mimed the activity written on it.
The other students tried to guess the activity. (see appendix no.3)
Scrambled phrases (http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Koprowski-RecyclingVocabulary.html)
The use of scramble games in teaching vocabulary is very effective in improving the
students' vocabulary and students' interest.
Lesson: Countable and uncountable nouns
Aims:
- to get acquainted to new vocabulary related to food and drinks
- to make the difference between countable and uncountable nouns
- to express quantities

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 Procedure:
Each of the five groups of students received an envelope containing countable or
uncountable nouns written on 10 pieces of paper and expressions of quantity/measurements on
other 10 pieces of paper. Students were asked to make the correct pairs (e.g a glass of water, a
jar of jam, a loaf of bread etc) (see appendix no.4)
Quadrants method (https://www.scribd.com/doc/142055188)
This method is fruitful for selecting and classifying information from a written text. I
used it in order to create a cooperative –learning atmosphere, to activate pupils and to enhance
their critical thinking. I may say that my pupils were eager to learn in groups and to solve so
various tasks.
Lesson: The weather
Aims:
- to associate seasons with the corresponding months, weather and activities
- to write a project about a season
- to create a cooperative –learning atmosphere
Procedure:
Students listened to a short text about the four seasons of the year. First they were asked
to identify characteristics of each season and to complete a chart with the following information:
months, weather, colours, clothes and activities. Using the information in the chart, the students
divided in four groups (spring, summer, autumn, winter) had to write a project about the season
they represented. The leaders of the groups presented their projects in front of the class.
Cube method (adapted http://www.giftedguru.com/21_ideas_for_teaching_vocabulary)
Applying this method, pupils achieved vocabulary in a visible way, they improved their
ability to communicate using their own words, enhanced their creativity, and of course, I may
admit, that they worked with dictionaries in an efficient way. I applied it successfully in
evaluation, reinforcement and even recycling vocabulary lessons.
Lesson: Appearance
Aims:
- practice adjectives of physical description
- describe people in terms of physical appearance and moral qualities

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 Procedure:
Each group of students received a six-square pattern on which it was written an adjective.
The first task was to complete the remaining five faces of the cube with different words: a
synonym, an antonym, a description, a sentence, a picture/drawing. After folding the pattern into
a three-dimensional cube each student in the group had to roll the cube, read what came up on
the “top’’ and tell the relationship of that word or phrase to the original word.
Furthermore, I used worksheets with various exercises aiming to enlarge pupils’
vocabulary such as: exercises with antonyms, synonyms, crosswords, correct sentences and
words, and even short stories (see appendix no.12), compositions starting from pictures and
given words, questions, vocabulary games, role plays, and songs. I also used modern teaching
aids such as flashcards, charts, real objects, video-projector, DVD and CDs. (see appendix no.5)

3.3. Post-experimental stage

After the experimental lessons where I used modern strategies and during which the
students in the 5th grade were engaged in a student-centred, cooperative learning framework with
the teacher acting as facilitator of the activity rather than the sole communicator of information, I
administered a test in order to check their understanding of the course material. The test
consisted of items almost similar to those included in the initial test, i.e. fill in a gapped text,
choose the odd word out, match words, re-order sentences, composition. Thus, the relevance of
the experiment could be verified.

TEST PAPER
5th Grade

1. Read and complete the text with the correct word from the list below: (10x2=20p)
angels yellow great pool windy school morning seaside lemonade sky

Each season is unique and has something to offer. Spring is a good season because the
weather is warm, sunny and sometimes................ You can walk and smell the flowers, and the
birds start chirping early in the ................announcing that summer is near.
Summer is..................... because there is no more school and you can go to sleep late and wake
up late. You can go to the ...................or in the mountains or you can just relax in the swimming
....................drinking a cold................... .

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 Autumn is also a great season. The leaves turn.................., orange and red and then they
fall. Children start a new ................ year.
Winter is one of my favourite seasons because it is so beautiful to see everything
covered in snow. The weather is very cold and the ...............is grey. You can have fun making
snow................. and have snowball fights.

2. Match the two columns in order to make compound nouns: (5x2= 10p)

1. water a centre
2 sleeping b shop
3 shopping c bag
4 swimming d park
5 souvenir e pool

3. Circle the odd one out: : (10x2= 20p)

a. yoghurt milk biscuit cheese butter
b. coffee honey bread marmalade apple
c. mother step-mother grandmother uncle aunt
d. finger ear eye nose mouth
e. shoulder arm toe hand finger
f. British England Romanian Greek French
g. child woman foot men mouse
h. museum beach forest lake island
i. amazing amusing boring interesting exciting
j. dance act play sing Hit

4. Put the sentences in the correct order to make a dialogue: (10x2= 20p)
a. At 5:30 p.m. Anything else?
b. Excuse me!
c. What time does it close?
d. Yes, there is. It’s on the first floor.
e. No, thanks for your help.
f. Thanks. Is there a souvenir shop?
g. Can I help you?
h. Yes, there is. It’s on the ground floor, next to the toilets.
i. You’re welcome. Enjoy your visit.
j. Where is the cafe?

5. Describe your house. What is your favourite room in the house? Have you got your own
room? What is there in your room? What do you usually do in there? (20p)
Table 6: Post-test

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 Item Grades 9 -10 Grades 7-8 Grades 5-6

I1 -complete the text with -complete the text with 7-8 -complete the text with 4-6
9-10 words; words; words;
I2 -make 5 correct - -make 4 correct compound -make 2-3 correct compound
compound nouns nouns nouns
I3 -choose 9-10 correct odd -choose 7-8 correct odd -choose 4-6 correct odd
words; words; words;
I4 -arranges in correct order -arranges in correct order 7-8 arranges in correct order 4-6
all the sentences from the sentences from the dialogue; sentences from the dialogue;
dialogue;
I5 -use appropriate -use appropriate vocabulary -use vocabulary ((with minor
vocabulary -use grammar structures and mistakes)
-use correct grammar connectors (with minor -use grammar structures and
structures mistakes) connectors (with minor
-cover all the aspects -cover some aspects mistakes)
demanded by the task demanded by the task

Table 7: Post-test performance descriptors

The results of the post –test are shown in Table 8 and Figure 6.

POST TEST RESULTS

Grades Number of students Percentage
9 – 10 6 27%
7–8 9 41%
5–6 7 32%
3–4 0 0%

Table 8: Post- test results

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 Figure 6: Post-test results. Graphic representation

3.3.1. Analysis of the results

The results showed considerable improvement as it can be seen below:

Pre-test results Post-test results

Grades
Number of students Percentage Number of students Percentage

9 - 10 3 14% 6 27%

7-8 7 32% 9 41%

5-6 8 36% 7 32%

3-4 4 18% 0 0%

Table 9: Comparative results

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 Figure 7: Comparative graphic representation

Analyzing the tables and the graphics of the experiment, it comes out that the 5th grade
students made a visible progress after applying the improvement plan of the experiment. The
comparison of the pre-test and post-test results showed that the number of pupils who obtained
grades 9-10 and 7-8 increased from 14% to 27% and from 32 to 41% , respectively. The number
of students who obtained grades 5-6 decreased from 36% to 32% and the percentage of those
who obtained grade 4 was 0%.

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 Conclusions

The outcome of the research related to the use of modern interactive strategies to teaching
learning vocabulary lead me to discover that it numerous advantages.
Interactive activities provided students with a large amount of communicative language
practice as conventional drill activities, but in a more meaningful, memorable way, by relating
the target language to their immediate interests and realities, thus, making it easier to remember
their meanings and making students learn in a more natural way. Contests focused playful
activities make classes entertain and sustain effort and interest. They created a positive attitude
towards school and the teacher by creating a relaxed, supportive learning environment in which
students feel encouraged to use the language and take active part in the proposed activities,
success motivating pupils and turning them into more active learners. They also created an
atmosphere of meaningful communication where learners communicated before, during, and
after the game. The student talking time was increased while reducing teacher talking time to a
minimum required.
These types of activities involved all four language skills as they helped in forming
comprehensible input including what the students understand as they listen and read and
comprehensible output including writing and speaking. Furthermore, teaching vocabulary
through games promoted student interaction in the target language and developed interpersonal,
social relations. Interactive strategies gave students an active role, promoting student-centred
activities, but at the same time they encouraged cooperation, peer learning, collaborative
problem solving, team spirit, mild competition, and turn taking. Interactive activities appeal to
different learning styles and encompass a number of intelligences such as visual intelligence
when games involve drawing, interpersonal intelligence when they include playing with others,
and kinesthetic intelligence when they provide hands-on elements like cards.
In conclusion, my hypothesis, namely interactive activities are effective tools in
developing vocabulary acquisitions as well as increasing communication in class, has been
confirmed and therefore, the role of games and other interactive activities in teaching and
learning vocabulary cannot be denied.
However, in order to achieve the most from vocabulary games, it is essential that suitable
activities are chosen, according to the number of students, competence, cultural context, timing,
learning topic, and the classroom settings.
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 Appendices

Appendix no. 1- Spider web method

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Appendix no. 2- Kahoot

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Appendix no. 3 - The mime game

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Appendix no. 4 - Scrambled phrases

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Appendix no.5 - The cube method

79