The Effect of Reading for Discussion Model on Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition

Abstract

This study examined the effect of reading for discussion model (RfD model) on the incidental vocabulary acquisition (IVA) in comparison with a more the traditional teaching model. The 84 college students were then recruited as participants and were divided into two groups (42 vs. 42) which were designated as the experimental group and the control group. The experimental group was received with the RfD model teaching practices, while the control class underwent a more the traditional teaching model which was commonly practiced in the setting of college English teaching in China. After the experiment, all the students were tested two times (i.e., immediately after the class, and 15 days later) with vocabulary knowledge test (VKT). The data of VKTs analyzed by software SPSS16.0. The results indicated that, although the experimental and control groups achieved quite approximate outcomes in the immediate test of IVA, the experimental group performed much better than the control group. The advantage of the RfD model over the traditional model is that the RfD model gives more benefits on the long-term vocabulary retention. Therefore, as a novel English teaching model, the RfD model will make a great influence on English vocabulary teaching and learning. However, there were a few limitations for this study, so the further study should be conducted from other aspects to verify the effectiveness of RfD model.