Difficult Words Research Articles

Behavioural and neurophysiological responses to written naming treatment and high definition tDCS: a case study in advanced primary progressive aphasia

ABSTRACT Background Primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is associated with progressive loss of language functions in the context of irreversible neurodegeneration, for which there is no cure. Speech-language therapy can help preserve language abilities, and most promisingly, interventions like transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) have been shown to augment the effectiveness of therapy. However, the underlying mechanism for this enhancement is unknown. Objectives We evaluated the behavioural and physiological (using resting-state magnetoencephalography [rsMEG]) effects of contemporary naming treatment provided with tDCS in a patient with an advanced case of nonfluent variant PPA (P01; 67 year old male). P01 was mute but had preserved written abilities, which we aimed to enhance with written naming therapy and excitatory or anodal-tDCS. We hypothesized greater improvement in written performance, particularly immediate gains, maintenance, and generalization, after anodal- than sham-tDCS. Additionally, reductions in oscillatory abnormal activity, as indicated by rsMEG, were expected after repeated sessions of anodal-tDCS with the naming treatment. Methods A written picture naming therapy was paired with five sessions of anodal and five sessions of sham high-definition tDCS over two weeks. Anatomical and neurophysiological abnormalities were mapped with structural-MRI and rsMEG, respectively. TDCS was targeted towards an anatomically intact left supramarginal gyrus. The therapy-induced changes in written performance were evaluated on both trained and untrained pictures using Levenshtein Distances (LD). The neurophysiological changes were evaluated by comparing spectral relative power estimates in frequency bands ranging from delta to low-gamma (1–50 Hz), before and after therapy. All evaluations were completed immediately after therapy with sham- and anodal-tDCS, and at a 3-month follow-up. Results Compared to sham-tDCS, anodal-tDCS augmented the immediate therapy-induced gains on trained items, as indicated by reductions in LD scores, reflecting improvement in written performance, particularly for more difficult target words. Neural activity at the stimulation spot and in surrounding and remote regions exhibited reduced oscillatory slowing, both immediately after one session (short-term) and after completion of five sessions (long-term) of anodal-tDCS compared to sham-tDCS. This is manifested as decreased theta (1–4 Hz) and increased beta and low-gamma (15–50 Hz) power. No additional gains with anodal-tDCS were found on untrained items (generalization) or at 3-month follow-up (maintenance). Conclusions Our findings suggest that five sessions of anodal-tDCS can improve written performance by partially reversing abnormal neural activity and thus boosting the functional capacity of the structurally intact cortex. Longer duration of treatment may be needed for additional gains in maintenance and generalization with anodal-tDCS.

THE EFFICACY OF INSTAGRAM @GURUKUMRD AS THE MEDIA IN IMPROVING STUDENTS READING SKILLS

Instagram is an online mobile photo and video sharing that can attract students’ attention in the learning process. It is also used to interact and share stories to others directly. Because of this, Instagram is a social media which can be utilized to navigate students to read. This study aims to find out the use of Instagram @gurukumrd to improve students’ reading skills. The Instagram @gurukumrd is chosen as the object of this study because it provides students with reading activities through stories, comments, and opinions. To reach the aim of this study, researchers employed qualitative research with Ethnography method. The data are collected using instruments which are observation sheets and interview guidelines. There are 37 students involved in this study as respondence. Based on the research findings, the Instagram @gurukumrd facilitates students to acquire various vocabulary and grammatical knowledge. In addition, students acquire competencies on how to gain paragraph ideas, topic sentences, and reading comprehension. Through Instagram, students can remember and recognize difficult words. At the end of this, this media facilitates students to read simple paragraphs quickly. Based on the research findings, this study can conclude that the Instagram @gurukumrd can facilitate students to enhance students’ reading skills.

EFL STUDENTS’ STRATEGIES TO IMPROVE THEIR VOCABULARIES IN CRITICAL READING CLASS

This research attempts to find out students’ strategies to improve vocabularies size in Critical Reading class of second semester students at English Education Program of STKIP SoE. A descriptive qualitative method was used in this research. There were 21 students involved as the research participants and willing to be interviewed. The result of this research showed that students applied strategies, such as listening to the songs, watching movie, reading, and listing difficult words to improve their vocabularies. By applying those four strategies, students were able to understand vocabularies in context without any assistantship, understand the words in foreign language, repeat the words several times, describe the conversation in mother tongue, pick some words when reading books, remember the words that they get, and write down some difficult words.

علم غریب الحدیث کی اہمیت اور ارتقائی ادوارکا تحقیقی جائزہ

Hazrat Muhammad (S.A.W) was sent as Messenger for the whole world; therefore, He was given command and understanding of the languages and behaviors of the Arabs. Muhammad (S.A.W) interacted with people of diverse origins and used different languages at different occasions to convey His message. These differences of dialects were unknown to other tribal communities. Due to periodical and regional differences, it was difficult to interpret Hadith. In order to solve this problem, a new field of study was originated with the name of, “Ilam ul Gharib”, which explained all the difficult and strange words. This field has too much significance as scholars of Hadith are annoyed by the ignorance of the study of this field. Dictionaries are insufficient to give proper interpretations of the words to study Hadith, because, sometime words give real meanings and sometime literal, sometimes there is proverbial or idiomatic use of language. “Gharib ul Hadith”, was originated in the second century A.H. when, a great scholar of Basra, Abu Ubaida Muhammar bin Masna’h wrote a book on “Ilam ul Gharib”. Many other books were also written in that period. There are four methods used to write books on “Gharib ul Hadith”. Books are different on the basis of their objectives, characteristics and significance. In this Research thesis, I have attempted to analyze the significance and evolution of the field, “Ilam ul Gharib”.
 

The Effects of Input Modality, Word Difficulty and Reading Experience on Word Recognition Accuracy

Language users encounter words in at least two different modalities. Arguably, the most frequent encounters are in spoken or written form. Previous research has shown that – compared to the spoken modality – written language features more difficult words. An important question is whether input modality has effects on word recognition accuracy. In the present study, we investigated whether input modality (spoken, written, or bimodal) affected word recognition accuracy and whether such a modality effect interacted with word difficulty. Moreover, we tested whether the participants’ reading experience interacted with word difficulty and whether this interaction was influenced by modality. We re-analyzed data from 48 Dutch university students that were collected in the context of a vocabulary test development to assess in which modality test words should be presented. Participants carried out a word recognition task, where non-words and words of varying difficulty were presented in auditory, visual and audio-visual modalities. In addition, they completed a receptive vocabulary and an author recognition test to measure their exposure to literary texts. Our re-analyses showed that word difficulty interacted with reading experience in that frequent readers (i.e., with more exposure to written texts) were more accurate in recognizing difficult words than individuals who read less frequently. However, there was no evidence for an effect of input modality on word recognition accuracy, nor for interactions with word difficulty or reading experience. Thus, in our study, input modality did not influence word recognition accuracy. We discuss the implications of this finding and describe possibilities for future research involving other groups of participants and/or different languages.

A Study on the Use of Mixed Language in Teaching English at Hospitality Management Class

Learning English as a foreign language required some strategies to achieve the goal of communication. In teaching and learning process, the teacher and students frequently use their first language to explain the difficult word in English. This study aimed to investigate the language used by the teacher as communication strategies in teaching English as a foreign language and students’ responses toward the use of each type of language instruction in teaching English at Hospitality class. To investigate the study there were 2 teachers and 2 classes of hospitality management class as the subject. The data were collected through observation of teaching and learning process and interview session. The study was designed as descriptive qualitative research and the data were analyzed descriptively. The finding showed that the teacher used the target language frequently, however the used of mixed language to explain some difficult words also found in teaching and learning process.

Lexical and semantic errors in the English language teaching in homogenious groups

The present research paper discusses the issues of identifying common lexical and semantic mistakes in Kazakh pre-intermediate EFL learners studying in homogeneous groups at university. Words are viewed as powerful tools and when used correctly, words may evoke different feelings and emotions and cause various actions. It’s important to learn how to spot difficult words, correct them timely, and master lexical competence teaching to use the words correctly. The data of the study were collected by learner’s EFL teacher from their final essays. Thirty-one essays were used as the instrument of the study to obtain real language from the participants. The authors of the study hope that the results of the conducted research would contribute to the understanding of the phenomenon of lexical and semantic errors in English language teaching which will help teachers to elaborate the differentiated tasks and ways of explaining new vocabulary preventing students’ misunderstanding. Furthermore, the results of the presented research can serve as guidance and be used in compiling EFL textbooks for Kazakhstani students. As a result, researchers managed to classify lexical and semantic errors in English language teaching, identified frequent errors, and described their causes. The findings of the research illustrate that the participants of the study make errors of word choice and incorrect collocations the most. Moreover, incorrect usage of the preposition and literal translation from L1 are included in the frequent mistakes

Urdu-27 Analytical study of arguments from Quranic verses in Ashiaat-ul-Lamaat

The interpretation of the Qur'an is the Qur'an itself and the second interpretation of the Qur'an in the history of Islam as a consensus is called Hadith and Sunnah of the Prophet.In the sub-continent, there were born a lot of Erudith and Scholars who preferred Islam as per their capacity. One of them is Sheikh Abdul Haq Mohadith Dehlvi, who lit the candle of the prophetic Hadith’s in the 11th century. He himself was un-paralleled expert in the field of Quran and prophetic Hadith. He declared the Quran and Hadith as the basis of religious sciences. That is way the central point of his all literary efforts in the Sharia and the Sunnah of the Holy Prophet (PBUH). Due to his book named “ Ashia Tul Lamaat” the sciences of prophetic Ahadith spread all over the India. Thus, the love for prophetic Ahadith was increased among the people of all India. In Ashia Tul Lamaat” he has explains the difficult words too. Difficult issues and important meanings has been explained away beneficially.

English Language Teachers’ Perspective of Using L1 in TEFL Class

The research discussed the using the first language in teaching a foreign language that had been a debate for language teaching practitioners for decades in language acquisition. The debate was about whether it was all right to use it in a foreign language class or not and how it affected the students’ learning process and result. Because of the pro and cons of using the first language in teaching a foreign language, the research was conducted to find out the use of the first language in teaching English as a foreign language. The research aimed to discover to what extent and in which instances L1 was used by the teachers in their English teaching class in terms of the teaching stages, including pre-teaching, whilst-teaching, and post-teaching in the classroom. The research also searched teachers’ perspectives and reasons for using L1 in their English class. Moreover, the research used a qualitative method to gathered information from the participants. The participants were four English teachers who taught English at senior high school in Bandung-West Java province, Majalengka-West Java province, Pangkal Pinang- Bangka Province, and Kuok-Riau Province. The collections of the data were questionnaires and interviews. The findings show that most teachers use Indonesian as L1 in the whilst-teaching stage when they deliver the materials. They use L1 to clarify the students’ understanding of the materials given and explain English language concepts, grammatical concepts, and difficult words. They argue that using L1 helps both teachers and students in teaching and learning English as a foreign language.

Об освоении книжных слов в истории романских языков: грамматика, прекрасная и волшебная

The article deals with the history and etymology of words with a learned meaning that were borrowed into the Romance languages from written Latin. While mastering words of this kind, speakers of the Romance languages in many cases exposed them to phonetic transformations, including irregular ones, since difficult words tend to be distorted in speech. In their expansion beyond a limited circle of intellectuals, such words acquired further new meanings related to their role in medieval culture. We focus on the descendants of the Lati nword grammatica , itself originally borrowed from Greek, which little by little obtained a variety of meanings: ‘Latin’, ‘language, idiom’, ‘magic, enchantment’.

Pronunciation Learning Strategy Use of EFL Learners: Focused on 5th and 6th Graders in Primary School

This study aims to investigate pronunciation learning strategies (PLS) use of 5th and 6th graders learning EFL in Korean elementary schools, including strategies they employ most and least frequently, and to discuss the relationship between PLS use and their grade, gender, and the level of interest in English. The questionnaire data about PLS use from 207 students were analyzed by descriptive statistics, t-tests, ANOVAs, and post-hoc tests. The responses to open-ended questions were qualitatively analyzed. Participants showed medium strategy use in six PLS categories. They also reported using memory and cognitive strategies most frequently, and metacognitive strategies least frequently. The most frequently used strategies involved repeating aloud and trying to remember the teachers’ pronunciation, whereas planning pronunciation learning and avoiding saying difficult words were used least frequently. Fifth graders and females used more strategies with higher mean scores than sixth graders and males. However, two strategies such as checking the sounds of words on a computer and learning pronunciation with peers varied significantly by grade, and a significant gender difference occurred in one strategy like practicing sounds in words and then in sentences. Noticeably, EFL learners’ levels of interest in English had the most significant effect on overall PLS use.

Students’ Phonological Awareness and Their Strategy in Pronuncing Words

The result of the study revealed that the students have difficulties in pronouncing words that wre categorized into three parts, those were consonant, vowel, and diphthong. In consonant, the students made errors /p/, /b/, /d?/, /z/, /f/, /v/, /d/, /s/, /r/, /k/, /?/, /t/, /ð/,/?/. In vowels, the students made errors /?/, /æ/, /e/, /?/, /?/, /?/, /i:/, /?/. In diphthong, the students made error /a?/, /??/, /??/, /??/, /a?/. Furthermore, the students’ strategy in their reading activity was categorized into three namely low, middle, and high categories. For low category, the strategy in reading activity was by checking the difficult word in a dictionary, asking the lecture how to pronoun the difficult word, and practicing to read the word continuously. For middle category, the strategy in reading activity was by doing repetition to every single word, listening the pronunciation of the words using u-dictionary, and always practicing to pronounce every single word. For high category, the strategy in reading activity was guessing based on their knowledge pronunciation and make a relation with the word that the same sounds.

An Evaluation of ‘Get Smart’ English Language Textbook from the Perspectives of English Teachers

<p>This study aimed to evaluate Get Smart year three ELT textbook. A mixed method<br />design of quantitative questionnaires and qualitative interviews was used. Thirtyeight ESL lecturers from primary schools in Malaysia have been studied for their perspectives on Get Smart textbook. The quantitative questionnaires were analyzed for descriptive statistics and interviews were analyzed thematically. The findings from both questionnaire and interviews showed that Get Smart is one of the most useful books for ELT in primary schools in Malaysia. However, there were some<br />parts which need to be improved such as the lack of creativity in illustrations,<br />challenging vocabulary, the social and cultural mismatch, use of difficult words in<br />grammar explanations, lack of sentence and paragraph structures in the writing part. These findings show that Get Smart textbook is suitable but still there are some parts that need improvement.</p>

Using PQRST Strategy and Powtoon Media To Improve Students’ Reading Engagement

The main objective of this research was to find out the improvement of students’ engagement in reading comprehension of descriptive text using PQRST Strategy and PowToon media to the seventh grade students of SMP Negeri 3 Sungai Raya in academic year 2019/2020. This classroom research was conducted in three cycles. The subject of this research was 32 students in class VII E. The researcher used observation checklist, field notes and reading tests as tools of data collection. The improvement of students’ engagement improvement could be seen was reflected byfrom their students’ performance in the teaching and learning process. The students became more enthusiastic in following participating in the lesson because they worked in group with their friends. The teacher gave a PQRST learning log to each groups as a guide during the stage of PQRST strategy shown in PowToon media. Preview, the students guess the topic by read the title and the pictures. Question, the students made questions based on they were interested in Preview stage. Read, the students read the whole text while looking for the answers of their own questions, they also wrote the difficult words found. State, the teacher and the students discussed about the contents of the text and the difficult words. The students have also take turn presented the results of their group’s work with their own words. Last in Test the teacher gave the students multiple choice to make sure they understood the text clearly. Those activities make students more active during the class, so their reading engagement was improved.

The obstacles faced by the junior lecturers of Syiah Kuala University in achieving the required TOEFL scores

The Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) is an examination used to evaluate a non-native English speaker’s proficiency in the English language. This study was conducted to investigate the obstacles faced by the junior lecturers of Syiah Kuala University in achieving the required TOEFL scores. This research applied a focused description as a method of collecting the data and was located within qualitative research. The population of this research was 23 junior lecturers of Syiah Kuala University who were participating in a training class at the Language Centre of Syiah Kuala University and are in preparation for further study in either home country or overseas universities. The instrument of data collection is a questionnaire guide with google form that was sent to 23 junior lecturers. The questionnaire was used to find out the obstacles faced by the junior lectures in achieving the required TOEFL scores. The collected were analysed by using compiling the percentage, adopting the formula proposed by Sudjono. The finding shows that junior lecturers faced obstacles in answering listening to long conversations with a percentage of 93.3% and avoiding similar sounds with a percentage of 80%. The specific obstacles in the structure written expression section were the skill in answering coordinate connectors, agreement after certain words, and parallel structure with coordinate conjunctions questions with the percentage 60%. The other obstacles were skills in answering agreement after prepositional phrases and skill in agreement after prepositional phrases questions with the percentage 67.7%. Then, the obstacles faced by them in reading comprehension were in recognizing main ideas and determining meanings of difficult words questions with the percentage of 67.7%. It is suggested that the junior lecturers should improve their English proficiency before they take the TOEFL test.

Enhancing EFL Freshman Students' Reading Skills with Inspirational Quotes

Introduction: Many ESL college students have reading comprehension problems in English, such as difficulty understanding ideas explicitly or implicitly stated in a text, making inferences, and inferring meanings of difficult words from context.
 Aims: The article proposes the integration of inspirational quotes in the teaching of English to EFL college students as a supplement to in-class instruction and the textbook, and shows the advantages of integrating inspirational quotes in reading instruction.
 Materials, Tasks, and Instructional Phases: The article shows the sources of inspirational quotes; criteria for selecting inspirational quotes; reading skills that can be developed with inspirational quotes (literal, inferential, critical comprehension and appreciation; decoding, using phonic, morphological, semantic, and syntactic clues; deriving word meaning from context; understanding certain grammatical structures such as idioms, ellipsis and participial phrases; locating anaphoric relationships and making inferences). The instructor can use a Facebook page, an online course, or an online discussion forum to post the inspirational quotes and tasks. Reading instruction with inspirational quotes goes through three phases: (i) Before reading an inspirational quote, the instructor introduces the inspirational quote, gives a vocabulary overview and pre-questions, and sets goals for the tasks. (ii) While reading an inspirational quote, the students read for the general topic, pay attention to specific vocabulary, imagery and figures of speech, and use contextual clues to infer the meaning of difficult words. (iii) After reading an inspirational quote, the students discuss answers, summarize or retell the topic orally, comment on it, give their impression and the moral or lesson learnt. The instructor serves as a facilitator. She guides the students, encourages them, and gives feedback on weaknesses and areas of improvement.
 Reflections and Recommendation: Students’ responses to a questionnaire-survey revealed positive attitudes towards practicing reading with inspirational quotes. They found them beneficial in promoting their reading skills. Recommendations for creating an inspirational quote repository are given.

ارھاصات ومبشرات کےضمن میں منتخب سیرت نگاروں کے طرز بیاں کا تقابلی جائزہ

The Irhaasaat & Mubashirat signs of prophecy are those extraordinary and surprising events that have appeared before the birth of the Holy Prophet (صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم) until the time of prophethood. The main purpose of those signs was to indicate the birth of Holy Prophet(صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم).Those "Irhaasaat" are the predictions of the priests or monks of 'Ahl e kitaab,the events happened in Arab like the incident of As’haab e feel those happened with Prophet Muhammad(صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم),and the dreams of Holy Prophet(صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم).These events are described circumstantially in the books of 'Seerat' and history. Every biographer discusses and explains merits of those events in his own style and reference to the context. For example, out of the three books under study, Al-Rawd Ul-Unf gives a brief description of the text, different narrations, interpretation of difficult words and explanation of ambiguity.Ibn Hisham discusses the previous topic in detail to explain the new event to make it semantically understandable.Imam Zahabi cares most about the authenticity of the "rivayah",briefly discusses the incidents and only gives importance to the events related directly to Holy Prophet صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم).Since Allama Suyuti adopted the style of describing miracles and signs of Prophethood in Al-Khasais Ul-Kubra,so we can easily find the Irhaasaat of life of Prophet (صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم) and events before his birth related to the context of our subject

STUDENTS’ PERCEPTION ABOUT ENGLISH TEXTBOOK “WHEN ENGLISH RINGS A BELL” CLASS VII USED IN CURRICULUM 2013 AT SMP 12 PADANG

The purpose of this research is to know students’ perception about exercises which is stated on English Textbook “When English Rings A Bell” class VII. Approach on this research is survey used cross sectional Survey with 56 participants from SMP 12 Padang. Researchers used random sampling. In collecting the data they used questioners and interview. Result of this research explain about students’ perception about exercises on English textbook “When English Rings A Bell” from component of the book. Furthermore, indicators of this research based on Garinger (2002) it states that the exercises contribute to learners language acquisition, balance with the format, should be progressive for the students, varying and challenging . So, students’ perception about exercises on the textbook are exercises on the textbook is interesting, because the book is colorful and has example of questions from exercises. there has simple instruction and vocabulary on the textbook is familiar to the students. Exercises in gape filling is simple so they are able to fill it. However, exercises on essay form is difficult, because the instruction consist of many difficult word. so, they are not able to do the exercise.

How classroom talk contributes to reading comprehension

This article is an inquiry into how classroom talk among learners and a teacher in a reading class contributes to comprehension. It draws on sociocultural perspectives on school learning (Melander, 2012; Pellegrino, 2020; Stahl, 2002), conversation analysis research of human interaction in the humanities (Edwards 1997, 2001; Tanner 2017) and teachers’ open invitations in whole-class discussion within classrooms (Koole & Elbers, 2014; Seedhouse, 2004). Video recordings of learner interactions have been transcribed by means of the Jefferson (1984) conventions and analysed by means of the conversation analysis framework of Clayman and Gill (2004). This framework draws on conversation analysis principles developed in various disciplines, and allows for a detailed analysis of what the comprehension interactions were about and how they were conducted for the purpose of comprehension. Analyses were considered based on sequence organisation, response preferences, lexical choices and gestures. Findings indicate that grade 4 learners use talk in creative, spontaneous and dedicated ways in their attempts to understand a text during a classroom lesson. Learners take turns at talking in ways that reflect their personal understandings of words and sentences, and interact in ways which clarify their own understanding of meanings. Non-verbal behaviour such as pointing, excitement, interruptions, tone of voice, faster and slower speech, sighs and observations are all patterns observed which, in the context of conversation sequences, contributed to interpretations of difficult words and also offered answers to comprehension questions. Findings are discussed in terms of the social actions associated with classroom talk, the value of independent attempts of meaning making and talking about the text for shared comprehension.

Translating Comic Strips as a Strategy to Enrich Students’ Vocabulary Mastery

This study aims to figure out the effectiveness in enriching students’ vocabulary mastery by implementing comic translation teaching technique. The method of the research is mixed method design with the type of true-experimental pre-test post-test control group design for the quantitative data and close-ended questionnaire for the qualitative data. The population of this study were the students of eight grade in one of the junior high schools in Tasikmalaya. the sample 30 students as the experimental group and 30 students as the control group. The two research instruments used were test and questionnaire. The vocabulary test in the form of finding the difficult word and making it a sentence was used to get the data of students’ level of vocabulary mastery, while questionnaire was used to know students’ perception toward the technique. Based on the data analysis, it is found that comic translation could improve students’ vocabulary mastery. This technique met the criteria of success since average of students’ score got 80 and students showed positive perception toward this technique.The preliminary study indicated that students’ problem in learning vocabulary was the limited vocabulary knowledge, thus, they performed low in language tasks. Comics were used as media in teaching vocabulary since it is an authentic material that contains rich vocabulary exposure for the students. It is suggested for the teacher to implement comic translation as an extensive vocabulary exposure activity during lesson.