学词汇有奇招
来源：岁月联盟
时间：2010-08-19
[Key Words] vocabulary; vocabulary-learning strategies; neat tricks
【摘 要】 词汇是语言的基本要求。没有词汇，语言将不存在，所以外语学习离不开词汇学习。通过观察，学者们发现词汇问题常常和交际联系在一起；而第二语言学习者普遍认为阻碍他们用目的语进行交际的是词汇，而不是语法，因为词汇载有他们需要理解和表达的基本信息。本文认为搞好词汇学习，在学习中起着举足轻重的作用；拥有一定的词汇量，就易于扫除英语学习中听说读写的最大障碍，进而提高英语水平。但是，词汇学习长期以来被教师和学生所忽视。这种做法导致英语学习进展缓慢现象。本文虽指出了英语词汇学习的重要性，但也强调了词汇学习绝不是简单地死记硬背。针对英语教学中中学生在词汇学习上的“费时低效”问题，本文提出了有关词汇学习的一些策略，鼓励学生积极采用多种生动有趣的词汇学习奇招，令学生产生“出格”的联想，激发其英语学习兴趣，从而扩大词汇量。
【关键词】 词汇量；词汇学习策略；奇招
Abstract
摘要
Contents
1. Introduction
2. Theoretical foundations
2.1 Current research findings of language learning strategies
2.1.1 Definitions of second language learning strategies
2.1.2 Why are learning strategies important
3. Neat tricks of vocabulary learning
3.1 Learning vocabulary by the way of verbal humor or jokes
3.1.1 Humor caused by the same or similar speech sounds
3.1.2 Humor caused by the polysemic words
3.1.3 Jokes
3.2 Learning vocabulary by the way of riddles
3.2.1 Riddles of words
3.2.2 Rebus
3.3 Learning vocabulary by the way of palindrome
3.4 Learning vocabulary by the way of tongue twisters
3.5 Learning vocabulary by the way of intelligent questions and answers
3.6 Learning vocabulary by the way of the pronunciation of letters
3.7 Learning vocabulary by the way of popular etymology
4. Conclusion
References
1. Introduction
In China, teaching English as a foreign language has a long history of a century or so. During the past few decades, the researching emphasis of the second language acquisition (SLA) began to shift from teaching to learning. It has become increasingly clear that a more direct understanding of the language learning process is needed to improve learning methods…Moreover, the research on certain factors or variables and their interactions has focused on gaining insight into the individual differences in second language acquisition, notably the second language learning strategy. It has been widely acknowledged that language-processing strategies exist and influence SLA. [1]
But “during the practice directed by different kinds of approaches or methods, it is found that none of them can be very successful in English teaching without students’ development vocabulary…. The root of the problems is that students have great weakness in vocabulary.”[2]
Why? Because the teaching and learning of vocabulary has never arouse the same degree of interest within language teaching as that of grammatical competence, contrastive analysis, reading, or writing, which have received considerable attention from scholars and teachers. [3] So from here, we can see though English is learnt or taught widely in China in recent years, generally speaking, learners or teachers cast highlights on translation and grammar during the years before 1990s. Recently, more attention has been paid to communication in English learning. It seems that vocabulary is never stressed enough in English learning and teaching. In reality, emphasis on vocabulary is reasonable and feasible.
Language is used as an instrument of communication in a society. And vocabulary is the most basic element involved in communication, because communication often breaks down when people do not use the right words.
Also, the importance of vocabulary has been pointed out so such as Wilkins, a famous linguist: “Were it not for grammar, a lot of things can’t be expressed; however, if there were no words, we couldn’t express anything.”[4] So an important aspect to improve the foreign language level for foreign language learners is to master the morphology of the language being studied.
Therefore, vocabulary plays such an important role in language and language acquisition that it is possible to learn English with high efficiency if vocabulary is centered from the very beginning to the end.
However, English is rich in vocabulary; there are about 1,000,000 words. The practical number of English vocabulary is about 9,000…. To be communicatively competent, at least 5,000 words are required for a good foreign language learner because more than 2,000 words are essential for an average conversation, and it’s advised that neat tricks of vocabulary learning are necessary for English as a second language student to begin to make sense of what they are asked to read in school.
Then how can the students master such large number of vocabulary easily? It seems that it’s a great burden for them to memorize a large number of words. It has been long viewed that reciting from vocabulary list is the only choice. Sometimes it works, but it consumes much time and becomes poorly efficient.
“Vocabulary learning is a permanent, strategy-based task, and not just a rot-memorizing work. Mnemonic skills are very important and necessary in vocabulary learning.”[5] But if students are well aware of some neat tricks, that is, highly effective learning strategies, they can make appropriate use of those neat tricks that the thesis offers. More importantly, they can discover, even invent some new methods of their own with the new tool. “Anxiety will be lowered, and self-esteem will be established. Vocabulary learning will be both effective and efficient.”[6]
2. Theoretical foundations
2.1Current research findings of language learning strategies (LLS)
It’s viewed that second language learning strategies can play a rather pervasive role in second language learning, and research has progressed beyond simply counting the number of strategies.
2.1.1Definions of second language learning strategies
Research into the area of language strategies began in earnest in the 1970s. And second language learning-strategies have been defined in various ways.
“Stern tries to distinguish between strategies and techniques in second language learning. According to him, strategy refers to general tendencies or overall characteristics of the approach employed by the language learner while ‘learning technique’ refers to particular forms of observable learning behavior, more or less consciously employed by the learner.” [7]
“In the process of identifying and categorizing language strategies, many students dealt indirectly with strategies specifically applicable to vocabulary learning.”[8] In fact, a famous person once noted: “Training research on learning strategies with the second languages has been limited almost exclusively to cognitive applications with vocabulary tasks.”
Also, “Cohen points out that language learning and language use strategies can be defined as those processes which are consciously selected by learners and which may result in action taken to enhance the learning or use of a second or foreign language, through the storage, retention, recall, and application of information about the language.”[9]
Despite that there are so many language strategies, few neat tricks of individual vocabulary strategies have been researched, except for main strategies being guessed from content and certain mnemonics, such as associating mnemonic, repeating mnemonic and mechanical mnemonic. For example: “common way for students to deal with vocabulary is using the books to recite and spell the words again and again. They can remember the pronunciation, spelling and meaning quickly. But they can’t get the relative knowledge, such as background and usage of the words. The words can be remembered quickly at a short time, but it can also be forgotten easily.”[10] “Nevertheless, combining the results from general learning strategy research with those from more vocabulary-specific studies allows us to derive a number of tentative general conclusions about vocabulary learning strategies.”[11]
2.1.2Why are vocabulary-learning strategies important
The importance of vocabulary suggests that it is significant for learners to acquire vocabulary in large quantity and good quality. Present research into vocabulary study mostly focuses on memory work based on psychology and empirical experiments，like strategies of memorizing vocabulary. In fact，in addition to these，a great deal of research on vocabulary learning is worth.
Vocabulary learning strategies are effective tools for developing communicative competence, which are taken by the students to enhance and improve their English study. Appropriate vocabulary learning strategies result in improving proficiency and gaining great self-confidence in vocabulary learning. They are used because there is a lot of vocabulary for the students to master. But the size of vocabulary is so large that it is beyond the students’ memorizing ability. So what can they do? Highly efficient vocabulary-learning strategies come to their minds. Those strategies are used to help the learners learn vocabulary in a quite relaxing atmosphere, so that more profitable learning can take place.
Efficient and effective vocabulary learning strategies are essential for a successful English learning and many students need to be told how to make use of them in their vocabulary learning. “Stress should be laid on the importance of adopting both individual and social strategies for enhancing linguistic proficiency. The former might include watching or listening to English regularly, jotting down new vocabulary or comprehension problems，and reading for pleasure. The latter is concerned with maximizing opportunities to use English. ” [12] For example, students had better join in the English corner and try to communicate with others as often as possible.
Also, the importance can be seen from a research on second language learners.
Based on an investigation of vocabulary learning among 100 students in the branch of Zhangzhou NO.1 Middle School, it is found that vocabulary-learning strategies of those good English learners could make considerable contribution to enhancing the development of English skills. Among the learning strategies, they, more often than not, focus on vocabulary strategies. It’s viewed that vocabulary is a permanent, strategy-based task, and not just a rot-memorizing work. But the others complain that though they have a conscious of the importance of the vocabulary, it’s still hard for them to memorize such large number of words.
In order to make the importance of vocabulary learning clear to readers, two graphs are made to invest the 100 students.
Graph 1（单位：人） Graph 2（单位：人）
The graphs suggest that:
First, the biggest obstacle of learning English as a foreign language lies in vocabulary. And reading is next to it. Actually, reading is made up of a lot of vocabulary. In other words, the difficulty of reading can be summed up as that of vocabulary. So, in order to improve their reading, how to help them learn vocabulary with high efficiency is worthy of the research.
Second, most students are working hard at English and try to employ various strategies in handling their English learning. Especially the “good” or “successful” learners know which strategy is fit for them. They have the ability to create and apply new vocabulary strategies of their own, but from Graph 2, we can see only a few students have the ability to learn vocabulary with high efficiency.
Third, more and more students show a tendency to attach great importance to the vocabulary learning. But most of them are considering that it is so difficult to do well in the vocabulary learning, and they are poor at creating or making use of new strategies.
Therefore, doing research on vocabulary learning strategies is necessary. It will help most students to lighten their burden of memorizing a large number of English words. For this purpose, the thesis offers some new idea of which vocabulary strategies can be efficiently used.
3. Neat tricks of vocabulary learning
Because of English’s richness in vocabulary, it seems quite difficult for middle school students to memorize so many words. It’s impossible for even native speakers of a certain language to learn all of the words, let alone for learners who intend to master it as a foreign language. They can easily remember them, but also forget them more easily.
In view of this problem of “time-consuming and poorly-efficient” vocabulary learning, the thesis offers some neat tricks. Though some may lack enough scientific theories, they are easy and fun for middle school students to learn the vocabulary. In order to elicit other’s valuable methods, the neat tricks offered are summed up as follows.
3.1Learnig vocabulary by the way of verbal humor or jokes
Language is a tool by which people can express their feelings and opinions, transmit information, exchange experience and take part in all kinds of social activities. In communication, in order to create some humorous effect or avoid some embarrassment, some English verbal humor always takes advantage of speech sound or semantic word (esp. pun or homonym) to create interesting ambiguity. With the help of English verbal humor or joke, students will keep in mind at ease those easily confused words and polysemic words.
3.1.1Humor caused by the same or similar speech sounds
Here, humor is created by the ambiguity, which is produced by homophone or homograph. There’re several examples helping us to learn vocabulary happily.
(1) Formula for Water
老师: 水的化学分子式是什么?
比尔: HIJKLMNO.
老师: 你在说什么?
比尔: 你昨天不是说 “H to O”吗?[13]
In this conversation, the ambiguity lies in the pronunciation of “to”. It sounds the same as the word “two”. Here what the teacher says must be “H Two O” according to the formula—H2O. But the student mistakes “two” for “to”. From the humorous conversation, middle school students will easily memorize the two words.
(2)“I had a round of golf with my wife this morning.”
“Which won?”
The husband didn’t answer.
“Which won?”asked the friend a second time.
“Which one?”thundered the husband: “How many wives do you think I have? Do you take me for a Turk?” [14]
The humor in this conversation is created on the basis of ambiguity between “won” and “one”. “Won” and “one” sounds completely the same, so it brings about the husband’s misunderstanding. It is no wonder that he asks a question in reply that if his friend takes him for a Turk who advocates polygamy.
Such similar humor may happen when somebody is telephoning. Please read the next conversation.
(3) “What Is Your Name?
A: Who is calling?
B: Watt.
A: What is your name, please?
B: Watt’s my name.
A: That’s what I told you. What’s your name?
B: That’s what I told you. Watt’s my name.
… ” [15]
After reading this conversation, we can’t help bursting into laughter. The man, called Watt, is out of luck. He has told his name—Watt, but in vain. The other person still mistakes “Watt’s my name” for “What’s my name” just because of the similar pronunciation. At last, both have to ring off the telephone angrily. Here, we learn the two words “What” and “Watt” without any difficulty.
3.1.2Humor caused by the polysemic words
This kind of ambiguity caused by polysemic word or pun is the most common in English conversation. Especially, the use of pun is so interesting that we can’t help laughing.
Below is a conversation between a teacher and a student.
(4)“A：Do you know what happens to liars when they die?
（你知道说谎的人死的时候会怎样吗）
B：Yes, sir. They lie still.
（我知道。他们依然撒谎。）”[16]
In this conversation, “lie” and “still” are two different homographs. So in order to master what the humor lies, we have to read between the lines. “Lie”has two meanings, that is, “躺” and “撒谎”. Similarly, “still”—another pun, means “静静地” and “仍然”. Therefore, superficially, “lie still” means “静静地躺着”; actually，it refers to the liars’ common feature—telling the untruth all the time, that is, “仍然撒谎”. Just as the saying goes, the leopard can never change its spots. Here, students will have a good command of those two puns easily.
Verbal humor sometimes also takes place between the professor and students.
(5)“Beer
The Professor rapped his desk and shouted: ‘Gentlemen, Order!’
The entire class yelled: ‘Beer!’” [17]
Here, “order” is a polysemic word. It not only refers to “keep silent”, but also refers to “request someone to bring (food, drink, etc.) in a hotel, restaurant, etc.” what on earth does it mean? It depends on the context. When lecturing, the professor shouted, “order” in order to ask the students to keep quiet, but the students purposely misinterpreted the professor’s words and yelled “Beer!” Then the professor found it both funny and annoying.
Another example will further explain pun’s humor.
(6) “--How are trees and dogs alike?
-- They both have a bark.” [18]
Here, without getting any idea of the pun “bark”, we will feel puzzled. As we all know, dogs always bark, but can trees bark? Of course, trees can’t bark. Here, “bark” is used as a noun. It has two Chinese meanings—“嗥叫” and “树皮”. If students have seen his humorous dialogue, it will not be easy for them to forget the word “bark”.
3.1.3Jokes
Joke is also another fun approach to learn vocabulary.
If students would like to distinguish and memorize firmly the three words—“class”, “lass”, and “ass”, they might as well have a try by the following joke.
(7)“Class, Lass and Ass
Professor Tom was going to meet his students on the next day, so he wrote some words on the blackboard which read as follows: ‘Professor Tom will meet the class tomorrow.’
A student, seeing his chance to display his sense of humor after reading the notice, walked up and erased the ‘c’ in the word ‘class’. The professor noticed the laughter, wheeled around, walked back, and looked at the student then at the notice with the ‘c’ erased. He calmly walked up and erased the ‘l’ in ‘lass’, looked at the flabbergasted student and proceeded on his way. ” [19]
Here, maybe junior students have learned the word “class” which means “班级”. But the other two words “lass” and “ass” may be easily forgotten. From this joke, students will know “lass” means “情人”, and “ass” means “蠢驴”. So isn’t it a good way to learn English vocabulary?
Let’s see another example. If students would like to learn and master the two words “share” and “polite”, which way is the best choice?
(8) Sharing the Apple
Tom was given two apples, a small one and a large one, by his mum.
“Share them with your sister,” she said.
But Tom gave the small one to his little sister and started sucking into the large one. Seeing that, his mother asked, “Why, Tom, you should be polite and take the smallest one.”
“Well, Mamma, should I lie just to be polite?” Tom answered. [20]
What a lovely boy! Through this joke, students will not only memorize “share” and “polite”, but also get some moral education.
From all the above-mentioned examples, we know that the conversation belongs to verbal humor, which, to a great extent, amuses us with the help of language ambiguity that is common in people’s daily life. Not until students find ambiguity and know its background, verbal humor does work. Skillfully making good use of the verbal humor will help students enlarge their vocabulary without difficulty, and finally improve their English knowledge.
3.2Learning vocabulary by the way of riddles
There are various riddles in China, so are there in foreign countries. Just as the Chinese riddles, English riddles play the word games, according to the word form, pronunciation and meaning. Whether you could work it out depends on a sudden inspiration.
Riddle – a kind of material that applies knowledge into games, is also an assistant to help students learn English. Especially in vocabulary study, if students do riddles alternatively with each other, surely they will benefit from this kind of game.
Such game for brains will stimulate students’ interest in English study and improve their ing and understanding. What’s more, riddles will help students to bear the vocabulary in mind more firmly while taking part in such games.
Below are several riddle games students may adopt to study vocabulary.
3.2.1Riddles of words
This kind of puzzle almost makes use of the word’s spelling. Some of them superficially seem very “strange”, but as soon as the key to the puzzle is revealed, it turns out to be reasonable.
For example, Students will learn the two words “united” and “untied” effectively and efficiently in such riddle of words.
(9) “--What word, if we change the position of one of its letters, becomes its opposite?
--United or untied. (联合的—松散的)”[21]
In “united” or “untied”, by changing the position of the letter “i”, we’ll get the answer.
(10) “Which is one of the longest words in the English language?”[22]
The answer is “smiles” which is formed by only six letters. Because there is one mile from the first letter “s” to the last letter “s”. Is there any other word longer than it? Of course not, it is the longest.
(11) “Which letter is the most useful to a deaf girl?”
The answer is the letter “A”, because only “A” could make her “hear”. From the spelling, we know adding “A” to “HER” becomes “HEAR”. It is so fun, isn’t it?
3.2.2 Rebus
Rebus is representation of a word or words by pictures etc. suggesting its part. It is a kind of more interesting riddle.
(12)
“ STAND
I ” [23]
What can be seen from the rebus is that the letter “I” is under the word “STAND”. Obviously, the answer is “I understand”.
(13)
“ KNEE
LIGHTS ” [24]
Similarly, the answer shares the same rule as the last example. We can see “KNEE” (is) on “LIGHTS”. “Knee” “on” sounds like “neon”. So, that is “neon lights”. What a neat trick to learn the vocabulary!
In a word, from the above-mentioned various riddles, we may know that they not only benefits students’ intelligence, but also promote their interest and confidence in English study. It is such trick full of wit that it is believed that riddle is worth a try, so that the enlarging quantity of vocabulary can be expected soon.
3.3 Learning vocabulary by the way of palindrome
There is something peculiar to English. There are many words or phrases in English that read the same backwards as forwards, called palindrome. Because English words or phrases are made of letters, some words’ spelling backwards is completely the same as that forwards. Such is another different approach of helping junior students to learn some special words easily, such as pop(砰的一声), “dad(爹), deed(行为), did(做), eve(前夕), level(水准), noon(中午), peep(偷看), sees(看), redder(较红的), civic(城市的) ”[25]
In addition to the words mentioned, there are also some sentences of great fun, reading and meaning the same backwards as forwards.
Let’s read some examples:
(14) Madam, I’m Adam.
(15) Sit on a potato pan, Otis.
(16) Step on no pets. [26]
Palindrome means the same no matter backwards or forwards. By the way, there exist some strange words completely different from it. Such kind of word becomes two different words of sense when it reads forwards and backwards, such as “are (是)—era(时代), deer(鹿)—reed(芦苇), door(门)—rood(十字架), evil(邪恶的)—live(生活), meet(遇见)—teem(充满), not(不)—ton(吨), on(在……上)—no(不), pan(平锅)—nap(打盹), part(部分)--trap(陷阱), step(步)—pets(宠物), ten(十)—net(网), tops(顶)--spot(地点)”[27]
3.4 Learning vocabulary by the way of tongue twisters
What is a tongue twister? It’s defined as “word or phrase that is difficult to pronounce correctly or quickly, e.g. She sells sea shells on the sea-shore.”[28] “Tongue twisters are often used in pronunciation practice because they are fun and motivating. Also the relaxing atmosphere helps students to overcome inhibition. Students should be given time to practice on their own for a few minutes before they are asked to perform.” [29] Because a tongue twister often contains many words of the same or similar pronunciation that students always feel puzzled at. Using tongue twisters makes contribution to vocabulary learning. It will help students to learn and memorize a lot of words of similar pronunciation. Below are some examples.
(17) “Good, better, best,
Never let it rest;
Till good is better,
And better best.”[30]
This tongue twister not only helps students to learn the two words of similar sound—“best” and “rest”, but also helps them to distinguish the three words of different degrees—“good”, “better” and “best”.
(18) “A flea and a fly were in a flue.
The flea said to the fly, ‘Let’s flee,’
but the fly said to the flea, ‘Let’s fly.’
So the flea fled and the fly flew.” [31]
After reading the tongue twister, students will have a clearer idea of a pair of
homophones—“flea” and “flee”, a homograph—“fly” and another pair of homophones—“flue” and “flew”. Besides, it also can help students to memorize the past tense of the irregular verbs—“fly” and “flew”. Students will benefit a lot from this competitive game.
In a word, tongue twisters can be used not only in pronunciation practice, but also in vocabulary learning. Using tongue twister competition will help students to practice its pronunciation and learn for enjoyment.
3.5 Learning vocabulary by the way of intelligent questions and answers
This way of vocabulary learning is something like that of humor that has been mentioned early in the thesis. Intelligent questions refer to questions full of wits with the feature that they are always so peculiar that most people can’t make head or tail of them. But when the intelligent answers are revealed, they will be suddenly aware.
Such game for brains always plays tricks on words or homophones. And it’ll help students to keep these words firmly in mind.
(19) “--What are the strongest days of the week?
--Saturday and Sunday—all the other days are weak (week) days.” [32]
The answer is so fun, contrary to most people’s expectation, because “weak” pronounces the same as “week”. Here, the intelligent answer works based on the pair of homophone. In the USA, their weekdays are only five days, that is, from Monday to Friday. In other words, these five days are “weak days”(虚弱的日子). So, here, in the question and answer, students will distinguish “weak” from “week” with little effort, and also learn the expression of a week.
Just as it’s mentioned above, an intelligent question and answer about the week is suggested. Then, what about any about the month, such as March and April? Read the following example:
(20) “--When do we feel most tired in the year?
--On the 1st of April.
--What! Why?
--Because we have just had a March, lasting 31 days. ” [33]
Obviously, this intelligent question and answer plays tricks on the homophones—“March” and “march”. Because April comes after March—the 3rd month of the year, and the word “march” also means “行军”, no wonder that the 1st of April comes after the 31 days’ march, so we feel most tired.
(21) “—Which word has the most letters in it?
---Mailbox.”[34]
Is the answer wrong? Definitely not, it’s right. Aren’t there a lot of letters in a mailbox? So the answer deliberately misinterprets “letter”(字母)in the question as “信”. What a smart answer!
3.6 Learning vocabulary by the way of the pronunciation of letters
There exist some special words in English whose pronunciation is the same or similar as that of some letters. Just because of their similarity of speech sound, we’ll remember its pronunciation firmly. Let’s see some examples.
Words--------Capital Letters:
“eh(啊)------------------ ---A pea(豌豆)-------------------------------P
bee(蜂)---------------------B queue(长队；辫子)---------------- ---Q
sea(海) / see(看)----------C are(是)/ ah(啊) ----------------------- --R
dee(D字形马具)---------D ess(S形的东西)----- -------------- --- S
eye(眼睛)------------------I tea(茶)/tee([高尔夫球]发球处)------T
jay(鲣鸟)------------------ J you (你)/ ewe(母羊)------------------U
ell(旧时的量布长度)----L vee(V形的东西；五元的钞票)----V
oh(哦)/owe(欠)-----------O why(为什么)----------------------Y ”[35]
If junior students master these words of similar sounds of letters, they will know why does “IOU” mean “借条”. Why? Because “IOU” sounds the same as “I owe you”. What’s more, if it is combined with the last trick—intelligent question and answer, the humor effect will be more unforgettable. Let’s see an example.
(22) --Which 4 letters is a thief most afraid of?
-- OICU.
Because “OICU” sounds the same as “Oh, I see you！” If a thief is seen thieving something he will be caught red-handed, and, of course, he will be punished.
3.7 Learning vocabulary by the way of popular etymology
Etymology means the account of the origin and history of a particular word. But here, it doesn’t refer to that etymology studied by the etymologists. According to one’s requirement or understanding, an explanation for some words’ etymologies--popular etymologies is provided. Different from that in the dictionary, such popular etymology is always lacking in etymological grounds, but it is easier for students to understand and memorize some vocabulary, so this neat trick may easily spread widely among the students.
(23) Take “History” for an example.
“History” is equal to “His story”, which exists in the religions. But, in accordance with their explanation, “His” must be capitalized, referring to “God”, because in their opinion, God arranges history.
Those religious persons give worship to God by using the word form. Similarly, this way can also be used to be strongly against religion. Let’s see how those anti-religious persons belittle God.
(24) The popular etymology of “God” goes as follows:
What makes “God”? A “DOG” turning a somersault becomes “God”. What a vivid description!
(25) Another example of “NEWS” will help the students to learn and master these five words below effectively.
Do you know why the word “news” is spelt with “NEWS”? Because “NEWS” comes in all directions: North, East, West, and South. Then the students will easily know the relationship among them, and bear them in mind.
Due to the limited space of this article, there are many neat tricks that can’t be listed one by one. In the near future, based on students’ interest, the researchers will surely invent other neat tricks to lighten students’ burden of study.
4. Conclusion
Through theoretical analysis and research results, it is concluded that vocabulary learning makes great contribution to the development of students’ English. In the thesis, the importance of vocabulary in English learning and teaching is talked about. Vocabulary is an essential preparation for acquiring English knowledge, communication competence and learning skills. The development of vocabulary predicates the future progress in English study.
Just because of the great importance of vocabulary learning, the aim of this paper is to produce efficient English education and enable students master a large number of vocabulary. So it suggests some neat tricks of vocabulary learning to help middle school students solve the problem of “time-consuming and poorly-efficient” vocabulary learning.
With the help of these tricks, students’ vocabulary-learning burden will be lightened. But the tricks are for students’ reference only. After all, students learn for themselves, so they had better create some of their own.
However, English learning strategies are so many that, for the moment, students are not believed to easily find any fit for them, especially strategies of vocabulary learning. But if they are continuously summing up the experience and absorbing new ideas, some day they are sure to find or create new tricks of their own. At that time, the problem of low-efficiency vocabulary learning will become a paper tiger, no longer blocking the way of efficient and effective English learning.
References
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[7] 同[1] P136
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[32] 同[26] P125
[33] 同[16] P239-240
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