ENHANCING VOCABULARY ACQUISITION

WITH SHORT STORY AS AN AIDE FOR ESL

LEARNERS
1
P.Lavanya (18MEN016), 2S.Dhaarani (18MEN008)
1,2
PG Student
1,2
Department of English,
1,2
PSG College of Arts and Science, Coimbatore, India

ABSTRACT: This study is about boosting vocabulary for second language learners through listening short
story. Though there are lots of techniques involved in enriching vocabulary, students learn significant
amount of words and related meanings when they are exposed to oral presentation. Listening to short stories
will induce the eagerness to learn new words. The other benefit in listening technique is that they get
stronger in pronunciation part as well as in grammatical part. Various classroom activities are conducted
among children that help them to retain the vocabulary for long time. Children’s interest, concentration and
eagerness is necessary for their successful progression. When children listen to short stories they acquire
many new words and they become familiar with partially known words. Activities like conducting multiple
choice questions, interactive sections will enable them to participate actively. In this article an experiment is
undertaken which involves a pre-test and post-test that marks the improvement of vocabulary acquisition.
INDEX TERMS- Boosting vocabulary; listening short story; MCQs; pronunciation; experiment.

I.INTRODUCTION
Nowadays children are made to learn a foreign language from their primary schools. So the foreign
language teaching has become established in all primary schools. The foreign language teaching helps in
improving communicative skill and language skill. They tend to learn English words from different media
like radio, television or internet. Vocabulary growth is closely linked to school progress.Other benefit is that
they develop the capability to communicate in English without learning many words and structures. As a
result, children’s motivation to learn the foreign language retains (CF.Christiani&Cwik 2008,P.7f). To
children, listening stories is an interesting activity. It improves vocabulary skill along with children’s
eagerness and interest to learn a language. Studies of (Chomsky,1979;Clark;1976; Durkin,1966, Teale,
1978; Wells, 1986) early readers have consistently shown that children who have been read regularly in
their preschool years make rapid strides in their reading and language development at school. Few studies
shown that reading aloud regularlyto the students at elementary school level, in a context of shared reading,
produces measurable gain in reading and listening skills (Cohen 1968; Elley 1980; Elley and Mangubhai,
1983; Feitelson, Kita; and Goldstein,1986; Ricketts, 1982).

II. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ‘HEARING’ AND ‘LISTENING’.

The important question to be considered while dealing with listening skill in foreign language teaching is,
how is “hearing” different from listening? Though the two terms ‘hearing’ and ‘listening’ are often used
interchangeably, there is an important difference between them. Hearing is with the ears, listening is with
the mind. Hearing is a process where the ears pick up the sound waves being transmitted by the speaker,
whereas listening involves making sense out of what is transmitted. “Although both hearing and listening
involve sound perception, the difference in terms reflects a degree of intention” (Rost, 2007, 27).

1
III. WHY LISTENING IS IMPORTANT?
“Listening comprehension is a very complex process in which different types of both linguistic and non-
linguistic knowledge are involved” (Muller-Hartmann &S von Ditfurth 2004, p.73).Listening is the
fastest way to acquire much number of words. Even the less able students learn certain new words through
listening. ‘Listening is a fundamental language skill, but it is often ignored by foreign and second language
teachers’. (Rebeccal, 1993).Teachers have a main role in this process of acquisition.Teachers’ major duty is
to provide as many listening task to the children in the class using materials like CD’s, tapes or podcasts.
Teacher should know the fact that children will acquire new language in a defined order. This is nothing but
LSRW technique. The first and foremost way they encounter a new language is through listening to
someone’s speech. Then they try to repeat those learnt words, this will enhance their reading habit.
Eventually they end up with writing new words of their own(cf. Clausen 2009, p.8). Therefore, listening is
a basic skill which is a foundation for any other skill such as speaking, reading and writing(cf.
Chistiani&Cwik 2008, p.43). The most important factor to be considered is that listening gives some direct
attention to pronunciation from the beginning stage of language acquisition.

IV. TARGET LISTENERS

We have taken 12 year old children studying state board syllabus, who are learning English as their second
language. Here, their behaviour and psychological aspects are examined for giving them a better learning
experience. This enables us to get a clear picture of their mindset so that we can provide appropriate method
of teaching. These children, who are learning English as a second language, do not have strong foundation
in the subject. As they are preteen children they require more attention, because they will have lots of
distraction at this age. They are marked by significant personality changes. Children at this age show erratic,
inconsistent behaviour. This is the high time for them to develop social cognition (understanding of how
social situations work, how to use pragmatic language and communication skills) to successfully navigate
social and academic interaction, and learn to relate to world, other people and experiences as an individual.
To do this they need interpersonal skills, problem solving skills, conflict resolution skills and survival skills.
To these kinds of children, vocabulary continues to expand, often in direct relation to the amount they read.
A child in this age may learn between 8000-14000 words. Children’s vocabulary can be fostered by
encouraging them to take a look at WORD DYNAMO. It is an useful site for learning new words by
vocabulary enhancing games. At this time it is highly necessary to teach them how to use those words in
context. This helps them to use language functionally and adjust their choice of words.
Vocabulary acquisition can be made possible for state board children by incorporating short stories in their
syllabus. Vocabulary plays an important role in language teaching. Without this learners will not be able to
develop other skills successfully, since knowledge of vocabulary is a raw material for all thoughts and
feeling to be delivered through the medium of language.
For students studying in state board, English is not taught properly. As majority of students are from
rural areas, bilingual method is used in language classes. To learn English, requires constant practise and
patience. The kind of feeling that prevails among state board students is that it is not possible to achieve
fluency or mastery over English language. This kind of tendency prevents students from learning English.
Most of the state board children are made to study English from examination point of view, so they are not
able to write even a single sentence without grammatical error. Furthermore required practise is not given to
students to learn a language. It is the responsibility of the teacher to change the mindset of the second
language learner and to make them believe that the second language can be acquired with little effort.

V.WHY SHORT STORIES ARE BEST FOR ENGLISH LEARNING?

Though there are lots of techniques involved in acquiring vocabulary, short story is one of the best
methods. This method could be used wisely that they can transform the whole process of teaching and
learning of second language making it not only easy but also pleasurable and worth undertaking. In short
story the text is short, so that children can devote more time to learn how every single word is used. They
can read a whole story in a single sitting. Short stories are designed to give maximum information with
minimal effort. Short stories are best for consistency. Children cannot spend all their time learning
2
vocabulary and grammar, but listening to short story will help them to enhance vocabulary. “In using
stories in language learning, we are using something much bigger and more important than language
teaching itself.” This method of using short story as aide to enrich the vocabulary can be made possible by
follow experiment.

VI.EXPERIMENT
AIM:
This study aims to provide a more complete picture of vocabulary knowledge gain from listening to short
story. The following research gives the difference in acquisition of vocabulary before and after the
explanation of target words.

PARTICIPANTS:
A total of 100 participants took part in this experiment. All were second language learners from state
board medium. Out of 100 there were 54 girls and 46 boys. Children were not chosen according to their
rank instead they were just taken randomly to find whether this method is effective or not.

PASSAGE TAKEN:
We chosea short story named ‘The Necklace’ written by Guy de Maupassant.

PROCEDURE:
Our research on vocabulary enhancement contains both pre-test and post-test. The results were obtained
randomly by assigning the participants. In the beginning we read ‘The Necklace’ short story allowed in front
of the class of about hundred children. During this dictation, children were not given any sort of explanation
of hard words, instead they were given only the gist of the story. Only few children in the class were able to
relate the meaning of the hard words whereas others were not able to follow.
To find this difference we conducted a test. In this test we gave ten multiple choice questions to children
after reading out the story without explaining the difficult words. The questions were like finding the
synonyms, antonyms, homophones, homonyms, etc of the targeted words from the given choices.
By following the above format, only two to four questions were answered correctly by the children. This
is because it was hard for them to understand those arduous words. Again this short story was narrated to
same set of children but this time the tough words were given clear explanation and related words for better
understanding.
After taking the proficiency test, all participants had applied the same pre-test including other ten
vocabulary testing questions which was also of the above mentioned format. After the implementation of
this method, the participants took the post-test in order to find whether this trial is faithful to develop the
vocabulary acquisition or not.

3
 5
children
4

2
children
1

0
very good fair bored
intresting

Figure.1: this bar graph shows the opinion of children

Table.1: this shows the result of pre-test:

TOUGH WORDS NO. OF NO. OF

STUDENTS STUDENTS
ANSWERED ANSWERED
CORRECTLY INCORRECTLY
Frowsy 48 52
Garret 20 80
Chagrin 26 74
Clasp 30 70
Supple 13 87
Bewilder 15 85
Tapestry 38 62
Coquettish 10 90
Dainty 52 48
Gallantry 22 78
Triumphant 31 69
Throb 24 76
Ecstasy 32 68
Descended 24 76
Cloak 43 57
Ball 53 47

4
 Table.2: this shows the result of post-test

TOUGH WORDS NO. OF STUDENTS NO. OF STUDENTS

ANSWERED ANSWERED
CORRECTLY INCORRECTLY
Frowsy 72 28
Garret 85 15
Chagrin 73 27
Clasp 65 35
Supple 70 30
Bewilder 55 45
Tapestry 52 48
Coquettish 90 10
Dainty 89 11
Gallantry 79 21
Triumphant 75 25
Throb 62 38
Ecstasy 53 47
Descended 61 39
Cloak 73 27
Ball 56 44

Table.3: this shows the percentage of each test and the overall rise in percentage level after both the test:

PERCENTAGE OF PERCENTAGE OF OVERALL

PRE-TEST POST-TEST PERCENTAGE

42% 82.6% 94.9%

5
VII.COMMON PROBLEMS FACED BY CHILDREN DURING VOCABULARY ACQUSITION:
LACK OF CONCENTRATION AND ATTENTION:
Children in general are super active and its hard for them to sit down and concentrate on a
single task. Whenever a task seems hard, there is a high possibility that he/she will avoid it, even before
making an attempt at solving it. Common distractions are television, a gadget, social media, etc. Children
also lose concentrated when they have poor bond with their parents. Sleeping is an important part of every
child’s routine. A child needs sleep between 8-12 hours of sleep a day. Lack of sleep also affects their
concentration.

PROBLEMS RELATED TO PHYSICAL SETTING:

The physical structure of a classroom is a critical variable in affecting children’s learning.
Children’s involvement in the process of creating their environment can empower them, increase
motivation. It is also important to note that the classroom should be inviting and the atmosphere should
make the children feel good to be there. Classroom with minimal windows will increase children’s
depression. So there should be a pleasant environment for them.

MEMORISING:
Memorising something depends upon every child’s IQ level, it differs from one another. In
general some children face problem in storing or consolidating information in long-term memory, or in
retrieving or accessing information from long-term memory. Some children may find it difficult in
following through on directions even they understood them. Also some may have problem even in solving a
lengthy problem with multiple steps, because in order to solve them they need to access their long-term
memory to remember their next step. Children with this trouble also face problems in higher thinking tasks
like problem solving and comparing and contrasting ideas. So this could be reduced by repeated practise.

HOMOGRAPHS AND HOMONYMS:

Homonyms are words that sound alike but have different meaning, for example, son & sun.
Whereas Homographs are words that are spelled the same but have different meaning, for example, Rose
(flower) & Rose (past tense of rise). So children generally get confused between these two. And there is
another division, named Homophones which is more or less same like homonyms. To reduce this confusion,
the children can be given abundance of examples and clear explanation by comparing the words.

CONTROL OF SPEED:
As children are in budding stage, they cannot cope up with faster dictation or a speed lecture.
They should be taken classes patiently with regular intervals between words by the teacher. It is better to
have well experienced staff for children so that they can understand their mentality well and can teach
according to it for better understanding. Every single word should be taught with proper pronunciation
which is not possible when it is rushed. Only then the children can follow it.

8
7
6
5
4 post-test
3 pre-test
2
1
0
1 2 3 4

Figure.2: this line graph shows the rise in performance of children after the method implementation.

6
VIII. CONCLUSION:
This pre-test and post-test shows increase in performance of children. They acquire more vocabulary when
given obvious explanations than simply reading out the story. This method gave opportunity for children to
frame their own sentence with the targeted words. This gives a greater degree of success for Second
Language learners who believes that English is tough to learn. It also increases the positive attitude towards
learning. This experiment became easier due to the incorporation of short story which provoked interest to
them. Its the hope, following this method of acquiring vocabulary through listening short story provides
sound knowledge for second language learners.

WORK CITED:
Linda C. Jones (2003). Supporting listening comprehension and vocabulary acquisition with Multimedia
Annotations: the student’s voice. CALICO journal,21 (1),p-p 41-65.
Julie F. Penno & Ian A. G. Wilkinson (2002). Vocabulary Acquisition from Teacher Explanation and
Repeated listening to stories: Do they overcome the Mathew Effect. Journal of Educational Psychology
2002, Vol. 94, No.1, 23-33.
Joshua Cohen (2008). Listening to Learn: Vocabulary with interactive activities. Kansai University, Osaka
Japan.
I.S.P Nation & Jonathan Newton. Teaching ESL / EFL Listening and speaking ESL and Applied linguistics
and professional series.
Ronan Brown, Rob Waring&SangraweeDonkaewbua (2008). Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition from
reading, reading-while-listening, and listening to stories. October 2008, Vol. 20, No.2 pp. 136-163.
David Nunan (2004). Task based- language teaching. University of Hongkong. Cambridge University Press
2004.
Warwick B. Elley. Vocabulary Acquisition from listening to stories. Reading Research Quarterly, Vol. 24,
No. 2 (spring, 1989), pp. 174-187. Published by International Reading Association.
Hilde van Zeeland & Norbert Schmitt. Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition through L2 listening: A
Dimensions Approach system 41 (2013) 609-624
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com
Mustafa Mubarak Pathan (2013). The use of Short-stories in EFL classrooms: Advatages and
implications.Labyrinth:Vol. 4, No.2, April 2013 pp. 21-26. Sebha University.
FatemehParvareshbar&BehroozGhoorchaei (2016). The effect of using short stories on vocabulary learning
of Iranian EFL learners. Theory and practise in language studies, Vol. 6, No.7, pp. 1476-1483, July 2016.
http://www.scholastic.com
John Flowerdew& Lindsay Miller (2005) Second Language Listening: Theory and Practise. Cambridge
University Press. December 2006, Vol.10, No.3, pp. xiv+223.
http://www.sciencedirect.com
Morrow, L.M., Sisco, L.J., & Smith, J.K. (1992). The effect of mediated story retelling on listening
comprehension, story structure and oral language development in children.
Mazzocco, M.M. (1997). Children’s interpretations of homonyms: A developmental study. Journal of child
language, 24,441-467.