Crafting Lexical Fluency: An Exploration of Vocabulary Learning Methods among English Major Students

Abstract

Vocabulary plays a crucial role in the development of skills in a second language, with comprehending word meanings emerging as a key objective in the language acquisition process. An effective approach to enriching second language vocabulary knowledge involves providing learners with a variety of vocabulary learning methods. This research aimed to investigate the preferred vocabulary learning methods of students majoring in English. Questionnaires based on Schmitt's (1997) vocabulary learning strategy taxonomies were distributed to collect quantitative data. 120 English-majored students at a private university in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam participated in this study. The result showed that methods for vocabulary learning for discovery and consolidation were preferred by English-majored students including “using bilingual dictionary”, “guessing the meaning of new words through context, “Asking classmates for the meaning of a new word”, “learning vocabulary from social networking platforms (Facebook, TikTok, Instagram,...), “learning the spelling of a word, “making a mental picture of a situation in which the word might be used”, “taking notes newly learned words in class”, written repetition”, and practicing vocabulary by conversing with other people in English”.