Dimensions of incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition and their effects on reading comprehension of ESL learners

College

Br. Andrew Gonzalez FSC College of Education

Department/Unit

Dept of English and Applied Linguistics

Document Type

Article

Source Title

RAP Journal

Volume

35

First Page

21

Last Page

33

Publication Date

12-2012

Abstract

This paper discusses a study which sought to determine incidental second language (L2) vocabulary acquisition (IVA) through reading among high school English as a Second Language (ESL) learners in Pampanga. In the study, the incidental research design was utilized to investigate the mental operations of the participants in their acquisition of incidental L2 vocabulary and to examine the effect of IVA on their success or failure in L2 reading comprehension. This study proposed a mediation model to describe the interaction of prior L2 reading proficiency, receptive knowledge, and productive knowledge with incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition, L2 reading comprehension, and retention of novel words. A vocabulary checklist was used to assess the memory traces of the participants concerning the novel words embedded in the reading text. In addition, L2 reading comprehension test, translation, and production tasks, and recognition test were used to determine their impacts on the participants' incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition and retention of novel words after three weeks. Analyses revealed a strong influence of prior L2 reading proficiency on receptive knowledge and productive knowledge. Furthermore, productive knowledge highly predicted L2 reading comprehension, and prior L2 reading proficiency highly predicted retention of IVA. This paper ends with recommendations for teachers, students, and school administrators.

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Disciplines

Language and Literacy Education

Keywords

Second language acquisition; Reading comprehension

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