The effect of technology-assisted engagement on second language vocabulary strategy
Introduction
Vocabulary acquisition is important for second or foreign language (L2) learners (Laufer, 1986; Llach & Gómez, 2007; Nation, 1990; Tavìl & Ìşìsağ, 2009) since it affects their grammar competence, ability to communicate, and perceptions about the relative importance of vocabulary (Barcroft, 2004). Furthermore,
L2 learners’ vocabulary acquisition is related to their listening (Smidt & Hegelheimer, 2004) and reading comprehension (Cobb, 2007; Kern, 1989). Unfortunately, acquiring an adequate vocabulary is initially highly problematic for L2 learners (Meara, 1982). Given the important and challenge role of vocabulary acquisition in
L2 learners’ target language acquisition, the development of approaches to help students to acquire new words has been an important issue in language education (Aist, 2002; Gilman & Kim, 2008; Huyen & Nga, 2003; Kern, 1989; Kojing-Sabo & Lightbown, 1999; Smidt & Hegelheimer, 2004; Stockwell, 2010; Townsend, 2009). The relationship between vocabulary learning strategy (VLS) instruction and vocabulary acquisition is one of the main issues of concern (Gu & Johnson, 1996;
Lawson & Hogben, 1996). According to Dansereau (1985) and Rigney (1978), learning strategies are actions performed by learners to aid the acquisition, storage, subsequent retrieval, and use of information. Strategies are especially important for L2 learning because they are tools for active and self-directed involvement, which is in line with the argument of constructionist learning in which learners construct mental models to understand the L2 knowledge.
Oxford (1990) further indicated that appropriate language learning strategies (LLSs) result in improved proficiency and greater selfconfidence. Numerous studies have confirmed Oxford’s arguments, such as in learning Spanish (Morin, 2003) and English (e.g., Fan, 2003; Gu & Johnson, 1996; Kojig-Sabo & Lightbown, 1999).
ABSTRACT
Strategies play an important role in learning a second or foreign language (L2). The aim of the current study was to develop and evaluate a co-sharing-based strategy learning system for L2 vocabulary learning known as “Mywordtools.
” Mywordtools is designed specifically for lexical learning, enabling learners to use the currently available vocabulary learning strategies (VLSs) as well as e-tools provided within this system to learn L2 vocabulary for both indoor and outdoor settings during learners' free time. The effects of Mywordtools on L2 learners’ word learning were evaluated over a 5-week period.
Sixty-one sixth-grade learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) participated in this study. The results of this study demonstrate that students using Mywordtools to practice and share VLSs outperformed both those who did not use Mywordtools and those who used the platform but without sharing. It was also found that strategy sharing helped
1- L2 learners to construct more VLSs
, and they consequently performed significantly better than those who did not implement strategy sharing. The overall results indicate that the use of co-sharing with Mywordtools not only benefits the development of VLSs by EFL students but also helps them to gain more in L2 vocabulary learning
Educational Technology & Society An International Journal Aims and Scope Educational Technology & Society is a quarterly journal published in January, April, July and October. Educational Technology &
Society seeks academic articles on the issues affecting the developers of educational systems and educators who implement and manage such systems. The articles should discuss the perspectives of both communities and their relation to each other:
• Educators aim to use technology to enhance individual learning as well as to achieve widespread education and expect the technology to blend with their individual approach to instruction. However, most educators are not fully aware of the benefits that may be obtained by proactively harnessing the available technologies and how they might be able to influence further developments through systematic feedback and suggestions.
• Educational system developers
and artificial intelligence (AI) researchers are sometimes unaware of the needs and requirements of typical teachers, with a possible exception of those in the computer science domain. In transferring the notion of a 'user' from the human-computer interaction studies and assigning it to the 'student', the educator's role as the 'implementer/ manager/ user' of the technology has been forgotten.
2- The aim of the journal is to help them better
understand each other's role in the overall process of education and how they may support each other. The articles should be original, unpublished, and not in consideration for publication elsewhere at the time of submission to Educational Technology & Society and three months thereafter.
The scope of the journal is broad. Following list of topics is considered to be within the scope of the journal: Architectures for Educational Technology Systems, Computer-Mediated Communication, Cooperative/ Collaborative Learning and Environments, Cultural Issues in Educational System development,
Didactic/ Pedagogical Issues and Teaching/Learning Strategies, Distance Education/Learning, Distance Learning Systems, Distributed Learning Environments, Educational Multimedia, Evaluation, Human-Computer Interface (HCI) Issues, Hypermedia Systems/ Applications, Intelligent Learning/ Tutoring Environments, Interactive Learning
3- Environments, Learning by Doing,
Methodologies for Development of Educational Technology Systems, Multimedia Systems/ Applications, Network-Based Learning Environments, Online Education, Simulations for Learning, Web Based Instruction/ Training Editors Kinshuk, Athabasca University, Canada; Demetrios G Sampson, University of Piraeus & ITI-CERTH, Greece; Nian-Shing Chen, National Sun Yat-sen University,
Taiwan. Editors’ Advisors Ashok Patel, CAL Research & Software Engineering Centre, UK; Reinhard Oppermann, Fraunhofer Institut Angewandte Informationstechnik, Germany Editorial Assistant Barbara Adamski, Athabasca University, Canada; Natalia Spyropoulou, University of Piraeus & Centre for Research and Technology Hellas, Greece Associate editors Vladimir A Fomichov, K. E. Tsiolkovsky Russian State Tech Univ, Russia; Olga S
4- Fomichova, Studio "Culture, Ecology,
and Foreign Languages", Russia; Piet Kommers, University of Twente, The Netherlands; Chul-Hwan Lee, Inchon National University of Education, Korea; Brent Muirhead, University of Phoenix Online, USA; Erkki Sutinen, University of Joensuu, Finland; Vladimir Uskov, Bradley University, USA.
Assistant Editors Yuan-Hsuan (Karen) Lee, National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan; Wei-Chieh Fang, National Sun Yat-sen University, Taiwan. Advisory board Ignacio Aedo, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Spain; Mohamed Ally, Athabasca University, Canada; Luis Anido-Rifon, University of Vigo, Spain; Gautam Biswas, Vanderbilt University, USA;
5-Rosa Maria Bottino, Consiglio Nazionale
delle Ricerche, Italy; Mark Bullen, University of British Columbia, Canada; Tak-Wai Chan, National Central University, Taiwan; Kuo-En Chang, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan; Ni Chang, Indiana University South Bend, USA; Yam San Chee, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore; Sherry Chen, Brunel University, UK; Bridget Cooper, University of Sunderland, UK; Darina Dicheva,
Winston-Salem State University, USA; Jon Dron, Athabasca University, Canada; Michael Eisenberg, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA; Robert Farrell, IBM Research, USA; Brian Garner, Deakin University, Australia; Tiong Goh, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand; Mark D. Gross, Carnegie Mellon University, USA; Roger Hartley, Leeds University, UK; J R Isaac, National Institute of Information Technology, India;
Mohamed Jemni, University of Tunis, Tunisia; Mike Joy, University of Warwick, United Kingdom; Athanasis Karoulis, Hellenic Open University, Greece; Paul Kirschner, Open University of the Netherlands, The Netherlands; William Klemm,
Texas A&M University, USA; Rob Koper, Open University of the Netherlands, The Netherlands; Jimmy Ho Man Lee, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong; Ruddy Lelouche, Universite Laval,
6- Canada; Tzu-Chien Liu, National
Central University, Taiwan; Rory McGreal, Athabasca University, Canada; David Merrill, Brigham Young University - Hawaii, USA; Marcelo Milrad, Växjö University, Sweden; Riichiro Mizoguchi, Osaka University, Japan; Permanand Mohan, The University of the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago; Kiyoshi Nakabayashi, National Institute of Multimedia Education, Japan; Hiroaki Ogata, Tokushima University, Japan;
Toshio Okamoto, The University of ElectroCommunications, Japan; Jose A. Pino, University of Chile, Chile; Thomas C. Reeves, The University of Georgia, USA; Norbert M. Seel, Albert-Ludwigs-University of Freiburg, Germany; Timothy K. Shih, Tamkang University, Taiwan; Yoshiaki Shindo, Nippon Institute of Technology, Japan;
Kevin Singley, IBM Research, USA; J. Michael Spector, Florida State University, USA; Slavi Stoyanov, Open University, The Netherlands; Timothy Teo, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore; Chin-Chung Tsai, National Taiwan
Conclusion
University of Science and Technology, Taiwan; Jie Chi Yang, National Central University, Taiwan; Stephen J.H. Yang, National Central University, Taiwan; Yu-Mei Wang, University of Alababa at Birmingham, USA. Executive peer-reviewers http://www.ifets.in
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