One cannot learn a language without l earning vocabulary; ho wever, vocabulary learning is never an easy task for senior high school students,… [601712]

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CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE REVIEW

2.0 Introduction
One cannot learn a language without l earning vocabulary; ho wever, vocabulary
learning is never an easy task for senior high school students, especially Senior I
students. They had just left junior high schools and faced a huge amount of
vocabulary, which is overwhelmingly much larg er than that they learned in junior
high school. According to Senior High Sc hool English Curriculum Guidelines ( ৷ॴ
ʕኪߵ˖ሙ೻ᅺ๟ ) (1996), senior high students ar e expected to learn 2,800 words
totally with 700 vocabulary items in their first year, 900 and 1,200 words in their
second and third year respectively. M eanwhile, the 700, 900 and 1,200 new words
are chosen within 5,000, 6,000 and 7,000 frequen tly used words respectively. It is
not surprising to find that there exists a gap of vocabulary amount between junior and
senior high schools and that “too many words” are ofte n what senior high school
students complained most about English learni ng and that they thi nk it is difficult to
learn so many words in a short time. Most junior high school gr aduates would find
it much more difficult in l earning vocabulary when they become Senior I students,
since they are expected to learn about only 1,000 new word s in junior high schools.
Therefore, it is very important to find out Senior I students ’ vocabulary learning
difficulties and help them effectively deal with vocabulary. In this chapter, the following important aspects of vocabulary te aching and learning will be explored:
first, the definition of a wor E
second, vocabulary size of Taiwanese EFL learners;
third, the relationship be tween vocabulary and readi ng comprehension; fourth,
vocabulary teaching techniques. Next, vo cabulary practice activities and vocabulary

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7 assessments used by teachers will be re viewed. Finally, vocabulary learning
strategies adopted by ESL/EFL learners will be reviewed.

2.1 The Definition of Knowing a Word
Many students think that knowing vocabulary is simply knowing its forms and
translated meanings. However, many lexical researchers have mentioned that many
types of vocabulary knowledge are necessary to be mastered in order to “know” a
word. Nation (1990), for example, suggest s that knowing a word means knowing its
written and spoken forms, its meanings, it s grammatical patterns, its collocations,
associations, the frequency as well as its register. Laufer (1997) reviewed several
researchers’ definitions of a word and summa rized a list of word features involved in
the learning of a new word, including word form, that is, pronunciation and spelling,
word structure such as roots, derivations and inflections, its syntactic patterns, its
multiple meanings, metaphorical, affective and pragmatic meanings, its relations with other words such as synonyms, antonyms, hyponyms, and its common collocations.
Gairns and Redman (1986) offered severa l aspects of knowing a word—a word’s
conceptual meaning, its polysemous meani ngs, its homonyms, its affective meanings,
its style, register, and dialect, its sens e relations such as synonyms, antonyms, its
associations, its L1 translation equivalents, its multi-word verbs, idioms, collocations,
its semantic relations, its grammar and pronunciation.
The various types of vocabulary knowledge mentioned above manifest that the
nature of vocabulary acquisition is increm ental, complex and time– consuming and it
is impossible to learn all of these type s of vocabulary knowledge instantaneously
(Schmitt, 2000). Therefore, vocabulary knowledge, in terms of receptive or productive use, has two categories (Na tion, 1990). One is receptive knowledge,

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8which means being able to recognize words while reading or liste ning; the other is
productive knowledge, which means being able to produce words when speaking or writing.

2.2 The Vocabulary Size of Taiwanese EFL Students
In order to know how many words that Taiwanese students really know, several
research studies have been carried out to find out the vocabulary sizes that Taiwanese
students in different school levels have. Chen (1998) us ed two vocabulary size tests
to measure the vocabulary size of 174 first- year students in a university. According
to the results of the two vocabulary tests, he found that about 60% to 70% of the
subjects reached the 2,000-3,000 word level, wh ile more than 30% of the subjects did
not reach the 2,000-word level. Less th an one fourth of them reached the
3,000-word level or above. He concluded that their average vocabulary size was
about 2,000-3,000 words.
You et al. (2000) investigat ed the vocabulary size of 55 first-year students
studying in a technological uni versity and their major was machinery engineering.
They adopted a short paragraph test and a vocabulary level test to estimate the
students’ vocabulary size. The results of the study indicated that the average
vocabulary size of these subjects was around 1,000-word level. Moreover, they found a big difference existed regarding vocabulary size among these subjects. That is, around 2,500 words were found as the bi ggest vocabulary amount, whereas there
were students whose vocabulary size wa s even less than 500-word level.
In Yang’s (2002) study, she developed a vocabulary size and analysis test for
assessing vocabulary sizes and reading leve ls of 57 first-year students from the

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9mechanical engineering department in a t echnical university. This vocabulary size
and analysis test with seven vocabulary levels consisted of 140 vocabulary items
chosen from English textbooks used by ju nior high schools, vo cational high schools,
and vocabulary reference books used in colle ges. The results of the study found that
the students’ average vocabulary size was around 1,400-word level. None of them
achieved above 2,700-word level. Five st udents’ vocabulary level achieved between
2,150-2,700 word level, whereas one student knew only 341-700 words.
Unlike the above studies focusing on investigating unive rsity students’
vocabulary sizes, Huang (2000) conducted a more comprehensive study to investigate
the vocabulary sizes and reading comprehe nsion of different students studying in
three junior, three senior high schools and four college/universi ties. Eight hundred
and seventy-three subjects participated in his study, who was made up of 290
third-year junior high school students, 254 third-year senior hi gh school students and
329 college/university juniors. Each par ticipant was given the same time period to
complete a vocabulary level test, two readi ng passages, the recall protocol test in
Chinese and a questionnaire written in Ch inese. He found that the junior high
students did not reach the 1,000-word level, while the senior high students reached the
1,000-word level, but did not reach the 2,000- word level. The college/university
students passed the 2,000-word level a nd almost reached the 3,000-word level.
Studies focusing on senior high school st udents seem comparatively few.
Hung’s (2003) study investigated the voca bulary size and reading comprehension of
senior high school students. The subjects were 347 third-year students from five
different senior high schools. The instru ments of this study included a vocabulary
level test, an English reading text, a recall pr otocol test in Chinese and a questionnaire
written in Chinese. The findings of th e study showed that the average vocabulary

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10size of these third-year high school stude nts was between 1,000 and 2,000 word level.

2.3 Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension
Vocabulary plays an important role in listening, speak ing, reading, and writing.
The present study focused on vocabulary and re ading comprehension. It is generally
agreed that there is a strong relati onship between vocabulary and reading
comprehension (Laufer, 1997; Nation, 1990; Nation & Coady, 1988). Coady et. al.
(1993) also found in their study that vocab ulary not only has a positive effect on
reading comprehension but also leads to r eading proficiency. Despite the fact that
vocabulary is a major factor in reading co mprehension, research has showed that
many Taiwanese students still regard vocabular y as their greatest reading difficulty or
think that their lack of an adequate vo cabulary hampers them from comprehending
English texts or academic readings (cf. Gi & Cher n, 1989; Haynes & Baker, 1993;
Huang, 2000, 2003). How much vocabulary is necessary for EFL Taiwanese
students to possess so that they will be ab le to comprehend English texts with ease?
Laufer (1997) discusses the minimu m vocabulary needed for reading
comprehension and suggests that “the turn ing point of vocabular y size for reading
comprehension is about 3,000 word families … or about 5,000 lexical items” (p. 229). In other words, 3,000 word families or 5,000 lexical items are the vocabulary
threshold that ESL/EFL readers need to po ssess in order to comprehend an English
text. She further claims that vocabulary size is related to reading comprehension
score and that when reaching this vocabul ary threshold (i.e. 3,000 word families or
about 5,000 lexical items), good L1 readers are more likely to transfer their L1
reading strategies to L2. However, if readers’ vocabulary size is below this vocabulary threshold, reading comp rehension difficulties arise.

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11According to the studies examining Ta iwanese EFL students’ vocabulary sizes
mentioned above, it is very clear yet surpri sing to find that most of these students,
even university students, did not reach the vocabulary threshold, since they are supposed to know about 3,850 words when graduating from senior high schools
(Huang, 1997). Their lack of sufficie nt vocabulary hinders them from
comprehending authentic English texts. As a result, these students usually will not
have time to apply their L1 reading strategi es when reading an English text for they
are busy decoding unknown words due to thei r insufficient knowledge (Laufer, 1997).

2.4 Vocabulary Teaching Techniques
Traditionally, vocabulary is taught in isol ation with a word list which contains
English definitions, L1 meanings, exampl e sentences, synonyms or antonyms.
Nevertheless, traditional ways of vocabulary teaching has b een criticized (Kang, 1995;
Yuan & Lin, 2001). In light of this, many scholars have suggested various important
vocabulary teaching techniques or instructiona l strategies such as teaching prefixes,
suffixes, and roots, teaching collocations , polysemous words, words in context,
guessing words from context, teaching cultu re, translation, songs, and dictionary
skills to help students lear n vocabulary (Nation, 1990; S ökmen, 1997; Lewis, 1993;
Kang, 1995; Channell, 1981; Chia, 1996; W u, 2002; Huang, 1997; Vanniarajan, 1997;
Parry, 1991). What vocabulary teaching t echniques do Taiwanese teachers actually
use in classroom? Related studies on vocab ulary teaching techniques or strategies
adopted by Taiwanese teachers will be reviewed and discussed as follows.
Chi & Chern (1989) developed questionnair es to find out teaching and learning
situations of English readi ng in senior high schools. Three hundred and thirty-eight
third-year high school student s and thirty-seven teachers from three senior high

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12schools participated in this study. Based on the results of study, they found that, in
terms of vocabulary instruction, 30% of the teachers used example sentences to
explain new words; 25% of them explaine d new words in both Chinese and English;
less than 20% used prefixes, suffixes and r oots to explain new words; more than 50%
of them encouraged their students to a dopt guessing meanings from context when
encountering unfamiliar words; 40% of them encouraged their students to check up new words in dictionaries; only few teachers encouraged students to skip new words and continue reading. The researchers emphasize the importance of guessing from
context and suggest that teachers should teach their students how to guess words’ meanings from context by means of prefixes , suffixes and roots, contextual clues and
discourse markers when reading.
Lee (1987) employed polysemous vocabul ary to make junior high school
students understand that words often have multiple meanings in different contexts. She used polysemous words that students were already familiar with such as “lie,” “tear,’ “book,” “spring,” to teach her third-year juni or high school students.
Examples were “He burst into tears. Don’t tear that piece of paper.” and “I have a
book. I have booked two tickets for the play.” She further offered lots of interesting
example sentences with polysemous words to raise students’ vocabulary learning
interests. “Jack needs a j ack to lift his car. ” and “Tom found a tom turkey in his
yard” were two examples. She claimed that, by effectively teaching polysemous
words that students have already known, st udents’ vocabulary could be broaden both
in quantity and in quality without increasing their vocabulary learning burden.
Hsieh (1996) investigated the effect of group work on vocabulary learning.
Ninety-seven English majors studying in a junior college joined the study. In the study, the researcher presented new words to her subjects by using word definitions,

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13prefixes, suffixes and roots, word asso ciations, and semantic mapping. These
students were divided into groups to complete a projec t of choosing and studying a
root, prefix, or suffix and ma king a semantic map. Each group also had to share and
present their project. At the end of the study, students were as ked to fill out a
questionnaire to see their reactions to vo cabulary group work instructional strategy.
The results revealed that about 70% of the students thought that group work vocabulary study increased their vocabulary knowl edge of prefixes, suffixes and roots.
She concluded by suggesting that since most Taiwanese students are vocabulary
passive learners, group work is a good instructional strate gy to encourage students to
be actively involved in vocabulary learning.
Again, Hsieh (1999) investigated the effects of pre-reading vocabulary
instruction and cultural b ackground knowledge activation on Taiwanese learners’
reading comprehension. One hundred and eighty-nine fourth-y ear students studying
in a junior college participated in this study and were grouped into four and received
four different treatments—with vocabular y instruction, with cultural background
knowledge activation, with bot h of them and with none of them respectively. The
results of the study indicated that, first, mo st of the students cons idered that to have
both pre-reading vocabulary instruct ion and cultural background knowledge
activation benefited their reading compre hension most. Second, most of them
mentioned that the most popular pre-reading activity their teacher s did before reading
was teaching vocabulary. Thus, many teachers often placed more emphasis on
teaching vocabulary than on teaching cu ltural background knowledge. Third,
vocabulary pre-teaching increased students’ vocabulary knowledge but did not have
significant effects on their reading comp rehension. She suggests that teachers
should know the importance of pre-read ing activities and integrate both the
pre-reading vocabulary instruction and cultural background knowledge activation in

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14their reading classes.
Unsatisfied by traditional ways of teachi ng vocabulary in isolation in junior and
senior high schools, Yuan & Lin (2001) indicated that most high school English
teachers neglect one crucial aspect of teaching vocabulary, that is, teaching
collocations. They argued that most high school English teachers only teach idioms but they neglect teaching collocation, which is at least as important as teaching idioms (Farghal & Obiedat, 1995). Consequent ly, EFL teachers tend to teach words
individually rather than collocationally. Furthermore, Yuan & Lin claimed that the above inefficient methods of teaching voca bulary words and the neglect of teaching
collocations cause college freshmen’s lack of active vocabulary knowledge.
To have a better underst anding of first-year coll ege students’ collocational
competence, Yuan & Lin (2001) administered a translation test which contained 15
items of verb-noun collocation patterns to two groups of university freshmen. One
group comprised 56 non-English majors, while the other group was made up 32 English majors. None of them had rece ived any collocation in struction before.
The results of the tests revealed that these subjects of both groups did not have
collocational competence and their collocational errors were because of L1 interference. Also, no significant differen ce of test performa nce was found between
these two groups. Their failure on collocati on tests supports Bahns & Eldaw’s (1993)
claim that “collocation are not taught, lear ners do not therefore pay any attention to
learning them” (p. 109).
Having found no studies conducted to ex amine Taiwanese senior high school
students’ collocational knowledge, Tseng (2002) investigated the collocational
knowledge of 94 second-year students studying in a senior high school. They were
divided into the experimental group and the control group. The experimental group

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15received explicit collocation instruction, while the control group did not receive any
instruction in collocations. The instrume nts, a questionnaire, two collocation tests
and two compositions, were used to test th e subjects’ collocational knowledge. The
results of the study manifested that the subjec ts were severely deficient in collocations
and that senior high school st udents were not able to learn collocations heuristically.
Moreover, the results showed that explicit collocation instruction has positive effects
on raising students’ awareness in notici ng collocations and learning collocation
knowledge.
Su (1994) carried out an instructional e xperiment for one semester to assess the
effectiveness of monolingual English dictionaries in word definition processing.
Sixty-one college students participated in the study, in which they received training of
text reading and dictiona ry checking per week. The training of monolingual
dictionary skills had been already started fr om the previous semester and continued in
this semester. In other words, student s had been trained the skills of using
monolingual dictionaries to fi nd correct definitions of new words in a reading text for
more than one semester. During the inst ructional experiment period, every week,
students chose their own interested Engl ish text, looked up unfamiliar words in
monolingual dictionaries and turned in thei r English texts with a list of unfamiliar
words and their corresponding word definitions.
Their assignments were collected and an alyzed and their definition mistakes
were categorized. The results of the study showed that around 23% of the collected
assignments were found to have definition mi stakes. In general, most subjects tried
their best to find proper definitions fo r the unfamiliar words they encountered.
Therefore, monolingual dictionaries have pos itive effects on the definition process.
The majority of the mistakes belonged to the categories of inco rrect sense selection

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16and incorrect grammatical category. For ex ample, some students were confused by
the multiple meanings of new words and found the wrong word definitions. In addition, some students often found the new wo rds’ correct meanings but with wrong
part of speeches. Also, some student s had problems in defining idiomatic
expressions and phrasal verb s. The researcher concluded that using monolingual
dictionaries is a complex process and that students should be taught and trained how
to effectively use dictionaries.

2.5 Vocabulary Practice Activities
A number of researchers (Garins & Re dman, 1986; Nation, 1990; Schmitt, 2000;
Waring, 2001) have indicated that, when learning vocabular y, if it is not repeated,
forgetting is quite normal and thus prac ticing and reviewing previously taught
vocabulary is very important. Moreove r, Schmitt (2000) claimed that since
forgetting is natural and vocabulary learning is incremental, words are learned gradually from numerous exposures. Nati on (1990) reviewed pr evious studies on
word repetitions and found that five to sixteen repetitions are necessary for learners to
acquire a word. Similarly, a more recent study on the effect of exposure frequency
on vocabulary acquisition conducted by Rott (19 99) showed that six exposures during
reading significantly increased more voca bulary growth. Vanni arajan (1997) also
proposed that it is necessary for teachers to provide multiple exposures with an
unfamiliar word in different contexts to learners.
A wide range of vocabulary practice or learning activities have been suggested
by lexical researchers. Despite the fact that practicing and reviewing vocabulary
previously learned is considered important , it seems that empirical research focusing
on vocabulary practice or learni ng activities is lacking and their effectiveness is still

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17underinvestigated. Therefore, vocabulary prac tice or learning activities that are most
frequently suggested in the litera ture are introduced and discussed.
Vocabulary games are often used to ra ise students’ interests in practicing
previously learned words. For example, Allen (1983) recommends using game-like
activities and crossword puzzles to let students of intermediate levels have the chances to use and practice words they have learned. Gairns & Redman (1986) offer
seven different vocabulary prac tice activities for students of different proficient levels
to review and practice vocabul ary and suggest that they ca n be used as warm-up or
end-of-class activit ies (pp. 163-170). Huyen & Nga (2003) used vocabulary games
such as crossword puzzles and concluded that games are interesting and effective
tools and can be used in class for practice and review language lessons. In order to
increase students’ interests and help st udents memorize learned words, You et al.
(2000) used vocabulary games like Bingo, Cr ossword puzzles and Dissembled words
to help students review previous learned words. S ökmen (1997) suggests that some
interesting and competitive word games su ch as Scrabble and Bingo can be employed
in class to recycle vocabulary.
Semantic exercises or activities are another kind of vocabulary practice or
learning activities recommended to review vocabulary. They require students to
deeply process words, form word associa tions, and relate new words with old ones
(Sökmen, 1997). S ökmen (1997) lists four techniques for semantic
elaboration—semantic mapping, semantic f eature analysis, ordering, and pictorial
schemata (i.e. scales, clines, and diagrams). She states that through these semantic
techniques, related words are visually or ganized and their meanings are clearly
distinguished. As Channell (1981) argues that semantic feature analysis (i.e. grids)
and scales “certainly tell the learner more th an isolated dictionary entries or textbook

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18definitions” (p. 119). However, Nation ( 1990) reminds the dangers of presenting
words of similar meanings together that could cause interference and make related
words difficult to learn. Therefore, he recommends that it is better to use these
semantic activities as review activities and related words’ meanings can be deeply
understood by learners.
Collocation exercises are also often advi sed as important vo cabulary practice or
learning activities. Nation (1990) provides some practical collocation exercises and
claims that collocation exercises are able to help learners expand their knowledge of
words that they have already known. Cha nnell (1981) and Gairns & Redman (1986)
suggest using collocationa l grids as useful visual displa ys to let students know words’
possible collocations and restrictions. Le wis (1997) stresses th at teachers should
make students aware of “the word partners hips”, that is, collocations, and provide
many opportunities for students to practice collocations. He illustrates different
collocations exercises to raise students’ cons cious awareness of di fferent patterns of
collocations. Several exercise types are with the aim to raise awareness of strong word partnerships. Some exercise type s are focusing on practic ing de-lexicalized
verbs such as “TAKE.” To make colloca tion practice more enjoyable and diverse,
he further gives some additional exercise s like lexical crosswords, jigsaw dialogues
and lexical dominoes. Furthermore, he assert s that it is necessary to show efficient
formats to teach students how to record and or ganize collocations in or out of class so
that students can retrieve and review them easily.
Nation (1990) argues that it is worth learning common and useful Latin affixes
and roots and knowing their corresponding me anings. He suggests several exercises
for recognizing and practicing affixes and roots. First, students are offered words to
practice breaking words into parts. Second, words with a wide ra nge of prefixes are

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19given so that students can be familiar with different prefixes. Third, teachers can use
the game Wordmaking and Wordtaking to le t students understand how prefixes, roots
or suffixes combine to form words. Add itionally, teachers can use the game Stemgo,
similar to Bingo, to let stude nts practice combing words w ith the given prefixes or
stems. Moreover, Schmitt (2000) suggests that the most regular prefixes and
suffixes should be taught and learned first. Special attention should be paid to
suffixes to promote the learning of word families. Teachers, for example, have
students understand and practice derivational suffixes to make word families rather than just let students know individual words.
Liu (2001), in her researc h, suggests that students s hould be trained to notice
collocations. Also, teachers should get students familiar with different common types of collocations such as verb + noun, adj. + noun, adv + adj., and noun + verb;
it’s better to draw students’ attention to only one pattern at a time. Liu also provides
different exercises to practice collocation for teachers to use. For instance, teachers work with students and ask students to find collocations in a text. Doing so, students
will become more sensitive to different collocation patterns and probably can find different collocations on their own out of cl ass. Next, teachers can give exercises to
make students distinguish synonyms or ant onyms in collocations. One example is
asking students to find a list of adjectives that mean “very” for a list of adjectives by
using collocation dictionaries. Furthermore, teachers can focus on collocations that
do not have direct Chinese equivalents and as k students to translate them into Chinese
to let students understand the ideas of chunks and the im portance of collocations.
Using collocation games to familiarize students with different collocates of a keyword is also a good way.

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202.6 Vocabulary Assessment
Since vocabulary is widely recognized as one of the key co mponents necessary
for second language proficiency, vocabulary assessment is inevitable in measuring
learners’ progress in vocabulary learning. However, according to the literature we collected, it was found that little empiri cal research focusi ng on second language
vocabulary assessment has been carried out. As Read (2000) states “surprisingly
few studies have been conducted throughout the twentieth century on aspects of
second language vocabulary assessment” (p.77 ). One exception he mentioned is the
research studies (Schmitt, 1999) related to vocabulary items in the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). Read ( 1997) mentioned that many recent books on
language testing pay less atte ntion to vocabulary testing. One example is Hughes
(1989), which covered vocabular y testing in only half of a chapter on grammar and
vocabulary testing. Likewise, research st udies on vocabulary testing are lacking as
well in Taiwan EFL context. Most studies are related to examining test types and
items developed in high school or college entrance English exams (Lu, et al., 2003;
Shih, et al., 2000). Therefore, various vocabulary tests used in ESL/EFL context
will be introduced and discussed as follows.
Ur (1996) listed many useful vocabul ary testing techni ques including
multiple-choice tests, matching tests, senten ce making, dictation, dictation-translation,
blank-filling, translation tests and the like. He also gave comments on these
different techniques. For example, he mentioned that designing multiple-choice tests is time-consuming and tricky, but their answer s are clear and easy to score. As for
sentence making, he remarked that it is difficult to grade them objectively.
Schmitt (2000) discussed four frequently used test formats to test vocabulary
size—multiple-choice, matching, giving L1 eq uivalent, and blank- filling items. He

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21argues that these four items only show some partial knowledge of the target words.
Many features of the knowledge of the target words such as polysemy, grammatical
and morphological knowledge, register or coll ocations are not assessed. However,
he states that, in fact, a test item measur ing all possible aspects of the knowledge of
the target word seems impossible. In this regard, he claims th at “vocabulary tests
give incomplete information about an ex aminee’s lexical knowledge” (p. 178). Thus,
he emphasizes that teachers need to be clear about the purpose of the test so that the
most proper test can be developed.
Read (1997) argues that contex t plays an important role in vocabulary testing.
He gave TOEFL vocabulary test items as examples to show how vocabulary items
have changed from decontextualized test s (i.e. testing words in isolation) to
contextualized tests (i.e. embedding voca bulary items in reading comprehension
tests). Under the influence of comm unicative approach, he contends that
“vocabulary knowledge may need to be rec onceptualized within a broader framework
of communicative lexical abilit y” (p.318). He further cont ends that decontextualized
tests such as true/false and matching will have a negative washback effect and
students will continue studying words in isolat ion. He suggests that teachers need to
see context from a broader view to include whole texts or discourse. Finally, he
concludes by predicting that “the future tr end in vocabulary testing is likely to be
towards the design of integrative test format s that have a strong lexical focus but in
which vocabulary ability is one of several factors that contribute to test-taker
performance” (p.320).
In his handbook “Assessing Vocabular y,” Read (2000) proposes three
dimensions of vocabulary assessment to broade n the view of what a vocabulary test is
and to include a wide variety of vocabulary measures. The first dimension is discrete

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22and embedded vocabulary measures. The second is selective and comprehensive
measures. The third one is context-inde pendent and context-dependent vocabulary
measures. He argues that in addition to employing conventional vocabulary tests
that tend to discrete, selec tive and context independent, te achers should also utilize a
wider range of vocabulary tests that are embedded1, comprehensive and context
dependent to meet assessment needs and purposes.
He claims that conventional vocabulary tests have been mainly discrete, selective
and context-independent and, for their conveni ent use, are more possible to be used
regularly by classroom teachers for monitori ng students’ vocabulary learning progress.
Multiple-choice, blank-filling, translati on and matching are examples of popular
conventional vocabulary tests. He further states that, among them, multiple-choice items are particularly frequently used in standardized tests. Such phenomenon has
also existed in Taiwan’s EFL testing context. Furthermore, Read recommends several classroom progress tests used in his own class such as matching, blank-filling,
and sentence-writing items to check stude nts’ vocabulary lear ning progress. He
argues that sentence making can be used to measure whethe r students can write both
grammatically correct and appropriate sentences.
Another type of tests deserve mentioning is cloze tests which are also widely
used for testing reading comprehension or overall second language proficiency.
Read argues that cloze tests can be used as contextualized measures of vocabulary.
For example, in rational (also called selectiv e-deletion) cloze tests, targeted words to
be tested can be selectively deleted to assess students’ know ledge of the deleted
words. Then students’ performance on th e cloze tests is a measure of students’

1 An embedded vocabulary measure is one that forms part of the assessment of some other, larger
construct. (see Read, 2000, p. 9)

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23knowledge of the deleted target words. W ith respect to multiple-choice cloze tests,
reviewing related studies, Read indicates that multiple-choice cloze tests have some
advantages. First, they are practical, objec tive and therefore are used in standardized
tests like college entrance examinations a nd TOEFL tests. Second, the test items of
multiple-choice cloze procedure to be delete d in the text can be a word, a phrase or
even a whole sentence. Thus, the view of vocabulary is beyond the single word
level only. In sum, Read claims that it is very difficult to estimate the contribution
of vocabulary in cloze tests. As he stat es “a cloze tends to make a very embedded
assessment of vocabulary, to the extent that it is difficult to unearth the distinctive
contribution that vocabulary makes to test performance” (p.115).

2.7 Vocabulary Learning Strategies
According to the literature collected, there are many studies on language learning
strategies and they are main ly carried out to examine factors that affect language
learning strategy use such as gender (Chen, 2000), motivation (Chung, 2000), language proficiency (Bremner, 1998; Chamot & Kupper 1989; Chen, 2000; Park,
1997; O’Malley et al., 1985; Tzeng & Huang, 2000), type of language task (O’Malley
et al., 1985), learners’ beliefs (Yang, 1999) , learners’ learning style (Sy, 2003), and
cultural context (Bremner, 1998). A majority of these studies are based on Oxford’s
(1990) Strategy Inventory for Language Le arning (SILL) includi ng six strategy
categories: memory, cognitive, compensati on, metacognitive, affective and social
strategies. Also, some studies focused on language learning strategy instruction and
training (Chamot & Kupper, 1989; Cheng & Huang, 2002).
Nevertheless, compared with language lear ning strategies, rela tively few studies
have been conducted on vocabulary learning strategies. The three more

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24comprehensive quantitative studies on vari ous vocabulary learning strategies are
Schmitt (1997), Chen (1998), and Gu & Johnson (1996). One qualitative, ethnographic study is on learners’ approaches to vocabulary learning (Sanaoui, 1995).
Other studies focused on one specific vo cabulary learning stra tegy like keyword
strategy (Lawson & Hogben, 1998), guessing st rategy (Parry, 1991; Fraser, 1999) or
focused primarily on combined strategi es of vocabulary l earning (Rodriguez &
Sadoski, 2000; Brown & Perry, 1991).
Since the present study’s concern is on vocabulary learning strategies employed
by Taiwanese EFL learners, the focus will thus be put on vo cabulary learning
strategies. Studies on vocabulary learning stra tegies will be reviewed and discussed.
Schmitt (1997) investigated Japanese EFL learners’ vocabulary learning strategies.
600 Japanese EFL subjects consisting of 150 junior high school students, 150 high
school students, 150 university students, a nd 150 adult learners participated in the
study. They were given a survey which c ontained 40 vocabulary learning strategies
and were asked to show their usage a nd perceptions of helpfulness of these
vocabulary learning strategies. The results of the survey manifested that the most used and helpful strategies have six in common. They are bilingual dictionary,
verbal repetition, written repetition, saying new word aloud, studying spelling and
taking notes in class. On the contrary, th ree least used strategi es are using physical
action, using cognates in study, a nd using semantic maps; three least helpful strategies
are imaging word’s meaning, using c ognates and using Keyword Method. The
results also reveal that shallow
2 strategies are preferred by the subjects than the
deeper3 strategies such as using Keyword Method and semantic maps (Schmitt,

2 Shallow strategies are mechanical, rote-learning strategies such as verbal and written repetition (see
Schmitt, 2000, p132).
3 Deeper strategies need elaborative mental processi ng and can facilitate long- term retention, such as
Keyword Method, inferencing and semantic mapping (see Schmitt, 2000, p132).

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252000).
Schmitt (1997) further indicated that some strategies like written repetition, word
lists and flash cards decrease while strategies which need deep processing like guessing increase as l earners become more language mature. One thing worth
pointing out is that culture background al so has an influen ce on the choice of
strategies. In other words, different learners from different cultures are very likely to
use and prefer vocabulary learning strategies differently.
From the point of view of the research er of the present study, it seems that
Schmitt’s vocabulary learning strategies need to be adapted when they are used to
examine vocabulary learning strategies us ed by different learners with different
language background. Take Chinese learners as an example, the strategy items of
checking for L1 cognate or using cognates in study should be deleted because cognates do not exist in Chinese. Sim ilarly, Bremner (1998) also questions the
appropriateness of Oxford’s (1990) SILL questionnaire items when they are
administered to learners of different cultural contexts. In addition, he points out that
learners may not be aware of some strategy items such as using rhymes or linking the
sound of a new word to an image or pictur e. Next, learners may respond to vague
strategy items with different interpretations.
Replicating Schmitt’s (1997) study, Chen (1998) investigated Taiwanese EFL
learners’ vocabulary learning strategies. 275 subjects comprisi ng 81 senior high
school students and 194 college freshmen jo ined the study. The same instrument
including 52 strategy items with six stra tegy items being deleted to simplify the
questionnaire was given to the subjects. The results of the study showed that
bilingual dictionary and verbal repetition are at the top of the most helpful strategies.

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26The results are consistent with that of Schmitt (1997). Both Taiwanese and Japanese
learners favor mostly shallow strategies such as written or verbal repetitions. Likewise, in a study conducted by O’Malley et al. (1985), repetition strategies are also
found as the most frequently used lear ning strategies adopted by ESL high school
students. Additionally, Chen found both Taiw anese and Japanese groups of learners
used more memory strategies. This agai n echoes a popular belief that Asian students
favor using memory strategies (Oxford, 1990).
Regarding the strategies questionnaire, Chen (1998) deleted some strategies
items without explicitly expl aining the reasons. One of the deleted items is using
Keyword Method. It seems hard to find an y reasons to justify such deletion, since
keyword method is generally regarded as an effective vocabulary learning strategy
(Hulstijn, 1997; Nation, 1990). Clearly, ow ing to language dist ance, the item of
checking for L1 cognate is deleted; however , the item of using cognates in study is
kept without giving reasons. The item of using cognates in study should be deleted
as well.
Gu & Johnson (1996) carried out a large- scale study investigating Chinese EFL
learners’ vocabulary learning strategies and learning outcomes. Eight hundred and
fifty Chinese EFL university students partic ipated in the study. They were given a
vocabulary learning questionn aire which contained the following sections—beliefs
about vocabulary learning, metacognitive regulation strategies, guessing strategies, dictionary strategies, note- taking strategies, memory strategies, and activation
strategies. Vocabulary size tests were also administer ed to the subjects. The
results of the study revealed that the s ubjects used a wide range of vocabulary
learning strategies. In addition, the subjec ts generally did not seem to favor rote
repetition strategies. Therefore, the resu lts are inconsistent with Schmitt (1997) and

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27Chen (1998).
Furthermore, based on the results of their study, Gu and Johnson classified their
subjects into five types of good and poor l earners with different preferred vocabulary
learning strategies. Among them, good learners are defined as Readers and Active
Strategy Users . Readers are those subjects who lear n vocabulary through reading,
guessing, and contex tual learning; active strategy users are those who use a wide
variety of strategies such as guessing, us ing dictionary, taking notes, using memory
strategies and actively making using of ne wly learned words. Both of these two
types of good learners are highly motivated to learn vocabulary.
Similarly, in order to have a thorough understanding of how ESL learners learn
vocabulary, Sanaoui (1995) conducted th ree consecutive studies to examine
approaches used by second language learners to learn vocabulary. The first study is
an exploratory study with 50 adult ESL uni versity students who enrolled in a
six-week vocabulary course. The subjects were asked to record and document the
approaches they used to learn vocabulary pe r day. They were also asked to report
and discuss their vocabulary learning appro aches with other subjects in the course.
Based on their self-r eported approaches to vocabul ary learning, Sanaoui found that
two types of learners with distinct approach es seemed to be generated. One type of
learners organized their voca bulary learning and the other ty pe of learners seemed to
learn vocabulary ad hoc. The former lear ners actively kept notebooks of new words
and created many opportunities to practice and review them regularly. By contrast,
the latter learners usually seldom took initiatives to lear ning vocabulary.
Four case studies of ESL learners were carried out right af ter the exploratory
study. The cases studies were also conducted in another six-week vocabulary course.
Four university students were also asked to k eep a daily record of the approaches they

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28used to learn vocabulary they encountered for four weeks. In the remaining two
weeks, they were asked to record mnemonic techniques they used to help them retain
vocabulary items they were learning. The approaches to vocabulary learning they
reported were quite similar. Like the subjec ts of the first study, three of the four case
study subjects also kept records of new words, regularly reviewing and practicing
them by taking advantage of many opportuniti es. In contrast, compared with the
three subjects, the fourth subject reported that she kept fewer records of the new words, seldom practiced and reviewed th em. The four subjects reported using
various mnemonic techniques to help them re tain vocabulary items such as repetition,
imagery, associating the new word to L1 or L2, using the new word in a sentence, and
drawing.
The third study is conducted to inves tigate eight FSL (French as a Second
Language) learners’ approaches and mnemonic procedures used to learn vocabulary.
The case studies of the FSL learners were conducted with similar methodology used
in previous studies of ESL learners. A ccording to their repor ted vocabulary learning
approaches, two groups of learners were cl assified. Group A learners also kept
records of the new words they were learning, reviewed and practiced them by various self-initiated learning activ ities. Contrasted with Group A, Group B learners
reported relying heavily on classroom instru ction to learn and practice vocabulary.
They seldom created opportunities to lear n vocabulary. The mnemonic procedures
used by the eight FSL learners were similar to those used by the ESL learners in the
second study.
According to the findings of the three st udies, Sanaoui found two major distinct
approaches to vocabulary learning—a stru ctured one and an unstructured one.
Learners structured their vocabulary learni ng, actively engaged in a wide range of

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29learning activities, regularly reviewed and practiced vocabulary items or they learned
vocabulary in an unstructured way. Moreover, the results also indicated that learners
who used a structured learning approach were more successful learners than learners
who used an unstructured learning approac h. To conclude, Sanaoui points out the
importance of “learners’ res ponsibility and engagement” in the learning process and
stresses that “efforts should also be di rected towards helping students become
autonomous learners who are able to buil d, expand, and refine th eir vocabularies on
their own, both in and outside classrooms” (p.25).

2.8 The Present Study
According to the literature reviewed a bove, few studies have been conducted to
examine Taiwanese EFL high school studen ts’ vocabulary learning difficulties.
More importantly, fewer studies have been undertaken to partic ularly investigate
Senior I students’ vocabular y learning difficulties. Th erefore, the present study
aimed to explore Senior I students’ vocabul ary learning difficulties in the following
aspects: vocabulary instruction, vocabul ary practice, vocabulary assessment and
vocabulary leaning strategies.