Vocabulary Usage Research Articles

Design and evaluation of a context-adaptive AAC application for people with aphasia

Communication with an Alternative and Augmentative Communication (AAC) device tends to be extremely slow, mainly due to difficulties in navigating the extensive vocabulary needed for the generation of spontaneous utterances in a manner that allows the user to easily find and select appropriate words when communicating. This work aims to design, implement, and evaluate a context-adaptive AAC application that suggests the most appropriate words according to the user location and past vocabulary usage.

Exploring Input Parameters in an Expressive Vocabulary Treatment With Late Talkers.

Purpose The aims of this study were (a) to assess the efficacy of the Vocabulary Acquisition and Usage for Late Talkers (VAULT) treatment and (b) to compare treatment outcomes for expressive vocabulary acquisition in late talkers in 2 conditions: 3 target words/90 doses per word per session versus 6 target words/45 doses per word per session. Method We ran the treatment protocol for 16 sessions with 24 primarily monolingual English-speaking late talkers. We calculated a d score for each child, compared treatment to control effect sizes, and assessed the number of words per week children acquired outside treatment. We compared treatment effect sizes of children in the condition of 3 target words/90 doses per word to those in the condition of 6 target words/45 doses per word. We used Bayesian repeated-measures analysis of variance and Bayesian t tests to answer our condition-level questions. Results With an average treatment effect size of almost 1.0, VAULT was effective relative to the no-treatment condition. There were no differences between the different dose conditions. Discussion The VAULT protocol was an efficacious treatment that has the potential to increase the spoken vocabulary of late-talking toddlers and provides clinicians some flexibility in terms of number of words targeted and dose number, keeping in mind the interconnectedness of treatment parameters. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.11593323.

Using Q2 Write Strategy to Improve Primary School Pupils Essay Writing Quality

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of using Q2Write strategy to improve the writing skills among English as second language learners. The aim was to determine if the students who used Q2Write strategy produced better written texts holistically. The subjects of the study were 23, 11-year-old students from Sekolah Kebangsaan Batu Kikir, Negeri Sembilan. Students were selected using purposive sampling method. The pre-test and post-test scores were used as the main findings and supplemented by the findings from semi structured interview. Participants were required to write essays and participate in a semi structured interview. Five students from the participants were selected based on their essay scores and band for the interview at the end of the study. The study results indicated that Q2Write strategy is effective in improving the quality of essay writing as the participants were able to create better quality essays after implementing Q2Write strategy. The results also indicate that participants were able to improvise their essay in terms of organization, vocabulary usage, sentence construction and relevance of idea.

Variations in the Successive Quranic Readings, and Their Effects and Implications on Quranic Exegesis. Practical Examples from the Chapter of Al-Hajj

أهداف البحث: يهدف البحث إلى تناول المفردات القرآنية المتواترة في سورة الحج، والمختلَف في قراءتها، وإلقاء الضوء على بعض ما تميَّزت به من توجيه نحْوي أو لغوي أو بلاغي يؤكد سمة الإعجاز الذي نزل القرآن الكريم يتحدَّى به، ويثري النص دلالة وتفسيراً وتحليلاً، ويضفي إليه من البيان ما لا يخفى. منهج الدراسة: تم الاعتماد على المنهج الاستقرائي الوصفي والتحليلي، في تقصي جميع القراءات المتواترة في سورة (الحجّ)، وتوثيق إسنادها من مظانها المعتمدة، ثم تحليل هذه الاختلافات فيها، وتوجيه كل منها، واستقراء أهم الحِكَم والعِبَر والمقاصد من اختلاف هذه القراءات. النتائج: تحقيق معنى الرحمة بالأمة المتمثل باختلاف وتعدد معاني القراءات المتواترة، والمفضي إلى تعدد في الدلالات والآثار، فلا يحمل اختلاف القراءات المتواترة أي تناقض أو تعارض أو تضادٍّ في معانيها المختلفة، بقدر ما يتمثل في إثراء المعنى، ورفده بثروة فقهية، ودلالات لغوية، وأحكام تشريعية، وهو لون من ألوان التحدي في بيان الإعجاز القرآني، والتخفيف والتيسير والتسهيل على الأمة، ورفع الحرج عنها في اختيار القراءة المتلو بها، بالنظر لاختلاف الألسن، وتعدد اللهجات العربية، مع الالتزام بضوابط أسلوب القراءة المختار. أصالة البحث: تتجلى أصالة البحث في تطبيق آثار اختلاف القراءات المتواترة وتوجيهها على نماذج مختارة مِن سورة (الحجّ (

Justice: Virtue or Principles?

The paper deals with the collision of two approaches to discovering and expressing the normative content of justice. The first one takes as a starting point the character of a just person or rather a person who has the virtue of justice. It is classically represented by Aristotle’s conception of particular justice. For Aristotle, a just person is a person who successfully overcomes the desire to have more (pleonexia). The second approach considers the virtue of justice a secondary phenomenon which is dependent on the principles of justice. The latter are formed due to a projection of the equal moral respect to every person onto relationships between cooperating and concurring individuals. To evaluate the relevance of the approaches, the author draws on the experience of the polemics on the meaning and theoretical value of the Aristotelian conception of particular justice. Its critics claim that: particular justice appears to be a highly contradictory virtue and doesn’t fit into the frameworks of the individual quest for the perfect and flourishing life; Aristotle distorts the structure of the value of justice because he prioritizes personal qualities of a distributor over methods and results of distribution. The advocates of the Aristotelian conception suppose that these criticisms don’t take into account the relation of the virtue of justice and communities with shared conceptions of the flourishing and perfect life (conceptions of good). The virtue of justice is a capacity to support a community and to identify the right order of the components in the shared conception of good. The author believes that the priority of virtue over principles in the sphere of justice marginalize the universal fairness and ignores the common usage of the moral vocabulary. So he concludes that the reverse order of priorities is more justified.

Using technological modality to learn vocabulary incidentally and intentionally for effective communication

Vocabulary is the flesh of a language, which is an indispensable constituent for a language. This research highlights the role of language learners' acquisition in incidental and intentional vocabulary by using technological modality. Effective usage of vocabulary in communication and comprehension is crucial and demanding as well. English being the diplomatic language, and which is witnessed as a parameter for graduates, particularly in job acquisition. There are numerous teaching methods were followed for effective learning. In order to benefit, English as a second language (ESL) learners and English as a foreign language (EFL) learners, task-based learning (TBL) approach is observed to be an effective learning method. This paper devices to use technology, entertainment, and design (TED) talk video with subtitles in the syllabus of TBL learning for effective learning of incidental and intentional vocabulary in language and succeeded by analysing the response from the students. The study reveals the significant development and interest in learning a new word by using the authentic instructional TED talk videos for vocabulary learning and vocabulary acquisition.

BORROWING AS A SOURCE OF LANGUAGE LEXICAL SYSTEM UPDATE (AS EXAMPLIFIED IN POETRY COLLECTION OF «THREE HUNDRED POEMS. SELECTED VERSES» BY LINA KOSTENKO)

Objective of the research is to find out structural-semantic and functionally stylistic features of the borrowed vocabulary in poetry by Lina Kostenko. Methods. Theoretical — analysis and synthesis of literature of the researched issue; practical — to obtain factual materials and based on them make conclusions regarding structural-semantic and functionally stylistic features of the borrowed vocabulary in oeuvre by Lina Kostenko. Results. Language (and therefore speech) is both stylistics, orthoepia, and compliance grammatical norms, etc., but above all it is vocabulary. And the vocabulary of the speaker is characterized first of all by its purity, synonymous and phraseological richness, normativity of pronunciation and, finally, correlation of native (Ukrainian) foreign words. Vocabulary of the modern Ukrainian language was formed in the process of its extended historical development and is a product of many epochs. Its shaping and development is closely connected with the history of Ukrainian people. Based on the factual material selected, we can conclude that Lina Kostenko most often uses words that are borrowed from Western European languages 48 % from 100 % (German, French, English, Italian); for the most part, it uses them without changing the value, but uses it as a comparison. Non-Slavic borrowings (from Latin, Ancient Greek, Turkic) make up 44 % of the studied words, the meaning of which the poet sometimes changes; uses for comparison. The borrowing from the Slavic languages (Old Slavic, Polonism, Russian) used by L. Kostenko is only 8 %. The author uses them without changing the values. The poet uses the borrowed elements of other languages with stylistic instruction with the purpose of creating the non-national diversity in the basis of Ukrainian language. Lina Kostenko also makes extensive use of terminology. After all, the potentialities of the corresponding lexical category create an artistic image, being part of a certain tropical figure, comparing and enriching the artistic color, expressive elevation of the artistic environment. Usage of vocabulary of foreign origin without its abuse and distortions, the way Lina Kostenko does, is one of the ways to enrich the vocabulary of language.

Difficulties in Writing Business English Correspondence

The title of this research was the difficulties in writing business English correspondence at fourth Secretary Semester students in ASMI Citra Nusantara Banjarmasin Academic Year 2018-2019 which was aimed at knowing the difficulties of Writing Business English Correspondence. The population was 15 students or whole of the fourth Secretary Semester students and the researcher conducted the data using descriptive qualitative research that employs descriptive qualitative method. The data of this study were obtained by using questionnaire was divided into two parts; they are background of the respondent and surveyed the difficulty by using Likert-Scale. The scale ranged from: “Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree and Strongly Disagree”. Writing difficulties at Business English Correspondence at fourth semester students varied in the result which related to the Linguistic difficulty, like wide range of vocabulary usage. They have to enlarge the vocabulary meaning, using appropriate or formal vocabulary or sentences in Business English Correspondence. The respondents also gave their suggestion to change their difficulties like, changed their learning English method especially in writing business English correspondence.

한국어 학습자의 숙달도별 어휘 사용 양상

This study is a statistical analysis of Korean language learners’ vocabulary usage according to the learning proficiency. This study was analyzed using a large Korean learner corpus built by the National Institute of Korean Language. Korean language learners used 249 words and 97 types on average, and as Korean language proficiency increased, the number of words increased by 163 and word types by 54 on average. In addition, as a result of analyzing the use of educational vocabulary of Korean language learners, as the learner''s level improved, the percentage of beginner’s vocabulary decreased and the percentage of intermediate and advanced vocabulary increased. At all levels, the basic vocabulary was used a lot. As the learning level improved, the types of words used increased, but the use of high-level words did not increase significantly. The use of high frequency vocabulary by Korean language learners decreased more slowly than Koreans’ use of modern language. The ratio of use of educational vocabulary between advanced Korean learners and modern Korean is very similar. However, advanced Korean language learners used fewer advanced vocabularies than Koreans. Among the high frequency vocabulary, vocabulary with basic semantic function showed consistent usage regardless of Korean language proficiency. Also, the vocabulary usage pattern by theme was different according to the level of Korean language proficiency. (Cyber Hankuk University of Foreign Studies)

Developing Listening Materials for the Tenth Graders of Islamic Senior High School

This study is intended to develop listening materials. The research problem was “What is the appropriate listening material for the tenth graders of Islamic Senior High School of MA Ma’arif 7 Banjarwati. The study was designed in the form of Research and Development (R & D). The steps were need analysis, developing listening materials, expert and teachers’ validation, revision, try out, and final product. In collecting the data, several instruments were used. They are try-out, questionnaire, observation, and field notes. After the materials have been developed and validated by the expert and teacher, then it is tried out. Ten students were involved the try out. After the try out, the students stated their opinion. For the attractiveness, clarity of the recording, speed of delivery, vocabulary usage, and difficulty. Most the students stated that the materials were very good. For the result of the try out, the students made the most mistakes on ticking true or false activities. The steps of the research are need analysis, developing materials, expert and teachers’ validation, revision, try out and the final product. The product of this study is teacher’s book, student’s worksheet, and the listening materials. The materials are compiled in the form of CD. They are the language, length, content, style, and speed of delivery, the style of delivery and the quality of the recording. The materials are suitable with the students’ need, interest, and level of students’ ability in English. Listening activities can motivate students’ interest in learning English. Listening materials can give teachers a lot of input to be better in preparing listening activities

Language Variations of Teenagers: A Case Study in A Walk to Remember Film

Research on the relationship between language and gender or language and age is included in the realm of sociolinguistic studies. In this research, the researcher focused on language variation in teen speech. Researchers used qualitative research methods with non-interactive data collection methods. From the findings and analysis, the researcher concluded that the form of utterances used by the teenagers were different depending on their gender. The depth of this difference was seen in the frequency of slang vocabulary usage and the vernacular form of language that was more often used by young men. Gender differences turned out to affect the form of utterance of these adolescents where even though they were in the same group, adolescent girls still paid attention to the value of "prestige" in their language. In contrast to young men who show more their masculinity through slang and vernacular forms of language. In addition, the family and social environment, as well as their age where adolescence is a period of exploration, also influence their speech patterns.

An Evaluation of Sub-Skills (Vocabulary, Grammar and Pronunciation) in the Grade 9 English Textbook of Afghan Secondary Schools

English language is a part of the school's curriculum in all levels in Afghanistan as a foreign language. Despite it being including for decades, very little research has been done in regard to the quality and evaluation of the ELT English textbooks. The current study investigates and evaluates English Language Sub-skills of the secondary school textbook “Grade 9” to evaluate the effectiveness of the materials for the teaching and learning of the subskills. The Eclectic Checklist of Demir & Ertas (2014) has been selected for evaluating the selected English textbook. The findings indicate that the selected textbook lacks contextualized usage of vocabulary, systematic representation and sufficient explanations of grammatical structures, and appropriate usage of pronunciation activities. Furthermore, the findings indicate that the textbook needs improvements in developing and presenting the sub-skills of English language appropriately, particularly grammar and pronunciation. These findings will be helpful to policy makers and ELT textbooks developers of Afghanistan to represent the contextualized and appropriate usage of the English Language sub-skills in upcoming versions of ELT textbooks.

Electronic and Student-created Dictionaries for Enhancing EFL Pronunciation and Vocabulary Usage

The aim of this research is to investigate the effect of using electronic dictionaries combined with student-created dictionaries on English major students' pronunciation and vocabulary usage. Students' perceptions of this learning experience are also examined. The study combines both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies. Tests for pronunciation and vocabulary usage were designed and administered to73 English major students at Jouf University, KSA. Two questionnaires were designed to investigate students' perceptions. Results of the study revealed that the usage of electronic and student-created dictionaries improved students' pronunciation as well as their vocabulary usage abilities. Results also revealed that participants are willing to use both electronic and student-created dictionaries in vocabulary learning. The most frequent perceived benefits of electronic dictionaries are the speed of accessing the meaning of new vocabulary and getting clear correct pronunciation of them. The most frequent perceived benefits of student-created dictionaries are long retention and internalization of new vocabulary. Participants face some difficulties when using electronic dictionaries such as the inability to find accurate meaning of some vocabulary items and some technical problems. Participants face some difficulties with their student-created dictionaries such as difficulty in constructing illustrative sentences and time-consumption. The study recommends the incorporation of electronic and student-created dictionaries in vocabulary learning.

The Effect of Integrating Reading and Writing on EFL Learners’ Writing Ability and Vocabulary Usage

This study examined the effect of integrating reading and writing on EFL learners’ writing ability, vocabulary usage and learners’ perceptions. The participants were 63 Korean EFL college students randomly assigned to two groups. As homework, the learners in Group A (reading-writing integrated group) carried out summarizing and vocabulary tasks after reading English story books whereas those in Group B (writing-focused group) completed writing and vocabulary tasks in the textbook. The treatment lasted for eight weeks in total, four weeks before and after the midterm exam. Data were elicited from a pretest and a posttest for quantitative analysis, and a questionnaire survey and in-depth interviews for qualitative analysis. The results showed that both approaches had positive influence on developing learners’ writing ability and vocabulary usage. However, Group A showed greater improvement with regard to writing performance than Group B, and the difference was statistically significant. Group A also showed more improvement in vocabulary usage than Group B, although the difference was not statistically significant. Moreover, the survey and interview results indicated that learners perceived connecting reading and writing using English story books was helpful for improving their writing ability as well as vocabulary usage, and they showed a positive attitude toward the reading-writing integrated instruction.

Culture-Focused Teaching of Language and Translation

This article considers certain aspects of achieving cross-cultural communicative competence by university students through culture-oriented studies of English. It describes the principles of culture-focused tuition and their implementation in the development of teaching materials using the example of a series of practical English textbooks for future linguists and, specifically, translators developed at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Various forms of class work and self-supervised student work are discussed which ensure students take an active role in the tuition process via team work and individual work, as well as the development of responsibility for their own tuition, and the build-up of skills for self-supervised work. Rigorous selection and use of authentic, up-to-date, high-quality verbal and audio-visual material is described as an essential component of creating teaching resources. Language resources should be not only authentic: they must reflect the contemporary state of the English language, focusing on typical usage and differences between variations of the English language. The article describes such assessment from the points of view of the style of texts in terms of grammatical correctness, modern or obsolete vocabulary, typical or untypical usage, stylistic colouring, the number and quality of stylistic devices and other such criteria. The article also reviews the progress of cognitive studies in linguistics and their relevance for, and impact on, the methodology of language teaching. It discusses recent achievements in cross-cultural and intercultural pragmatics as the basis for culture-focused tuition strategies, aimed at the development of cross-cultural communicative competence, which must be understood as a conscious and pro-active mastering by students of certain communicative strategies and tactics of verbal behaviour in a foreign language environment.

Integrative approach to teaching academic writing to the first-year students of the foreign language faculties

With the dominance of English as the international language communicating through writing in English is vital for any member of the society who wants to be successful, therefore developing students’ writing skills has been of a current interest in teaching foreign languages at Universities. This article aims to discuss a teaching approach which can provide University students with enough support before they start writing something for academic purposes. The paper begins with analyzing two approaches to teaching writing that have dominated over the recent years: writing process and writing product, with their advantages and disadvantages. The product approach is a traditional approach focusing on the final product of writing which is the result of students’ mimicking a model text, that is usually analyzed at the initial stage. Emphasis is put on accuracy of produced texts, namely correct and diverse grammar, spelling and vocabulary usage. This approach is popular with teachers due to its easy application. The process approach tends to focus more on the process of creating a text through the various stages of generating ideas, drafting, revising and editing. Vocabulary and grammar used are not the key factors in assessing the written text. Students are given considerable freedom within the task, so the outcome of writing is not preconceived. Though most of methodologists consider the process approach to be a more effective method of teaching writing teachers often avoid it because of its being time consuming. Each approach still has some disadvantages that can only be compensated by the advantages of the other. So instead of using either of the approaches in isolation while teaching academic writing, paragraph writing in particular, the article suggests integrating them especially for working with students with a low competence in English. Such integration can facilitate students to generate ideas in a comprehensive manner and provide the students with appropriate support of grammar and vocabulary

The importance of language vocabulary and language usage for sociocultural adjustment among Indonesian adolescents from three bilingual ethnic groups

ABSTRACT We investigated how the knowledge and usage of two languages relate to sociocultural adjustment in bilingual adolescent samples from three ethnic groups in Indonesia (214 Javanese, 108 Toraja, and 195 Chinese adolescents; 272 females; M age = 14.33 years). We tested a model specifying that the vocabulary knowledge of each language mediates the relation between language usage and sociocultural adjustment (here combining strongly correlated measures of adjustment to the ethnic and national culture). The results revealed the same partial mediation model in all groups; bilingualism is important for sociocultural adjustment in all ethnic groups. There were substantial group differences in ethnic language vocabulary scores, but the correlations between ethnic language usage with sociocultural adjustment were the same across groups. Results also showed that ethnic language usage matters more than ethnic language knowledge, and national language knowledge matters more than ethnic language knowledge for sociocultural adjustment. Moreover, our findings confirm that there is a language shift going on in Indonesia because Bahasa Indonesia as national language, which was the second language in the past, has become the dominant language across ethnic groups in Indonesia.

Design and implementation of the korean muallaf center application as a guide to praying and iqro procedures for korean muallaf

The number of Moslem populations increased rapidly by 70%. It includes the converts in South Korea. The development of Moslems in South Korea is marked by the development of mosques in Seoul, Busan, and Jeju. The number of converts in Korea is very high meanwhile the main constraint factor for Korean converts is the absence of prayer guide in Hangeul feature. Constraint experienced by the converts, the most important is prayer. This research developed the Android Application, named The Korean MuallafCenter, which is an application that helps the converts to include ablution, prayers, and easy-to-understand religious worship. The purpose of this research is to help the converts to understand the guidelines of Islam with Hangeul, so that they can practice it. The methodology of this research is by literature study, application design, implementation, and evaluation of the application usage. The results of this study are the Korean MuallafCenter Applications that have been used by Muallaf Korea, especially Ustadz, Imam, and Muallaf Public Figure, Olabora Song. They gave suggestions that the application requires the addition of a better Hangeul vocabulary usage and an approach to the Korean Society in accordance with its culture.

Media Promotion Role of Economic Vocabulary: Specific Features and Functions in Presentation and Advertisement

The article is devoted to studying the media promotion role of economic vocabulary in the media discourse. The aim of the study is realized in the content analysis of the economic vocabulary in promotion and advertisement. We identify the features and functions of economic vocabulary in promo and advertising discourse. The paper deals with the interpretative analysis of economic lexicon in different types of media texts. The complex methods of semantic and pragmatic, functional and interpretative analysis of the realization of the economic vocabulary in the media discourse are used. The article reveals functional specificity of presentation texts and advertising texts. We carry out an analysis of economic vocabulary and phraseology which are used in presentation and advertizing as one of their components. On the basis of the received results we reveal specific features and functional specificities of economic vocabulary usage in presentation and advertising texts. The ways of analysis are useful for development of cognitive linguistics, socio- and psycholinguistics, semantics, pragmatics, lexicology, stylistics, discourse linguistics, media linguistics, cultural linguistics, and communication theory. In the article, we establish that presentation and advertising texts have almost the same purposes, their structural components have their specific features. Both economic presentation and economic advertisement have structure which is convenient for the auditorium to apprehend information. The main structural parts of presentation and advertisement are similar. Economic terms in media presentations make the economic vocabulary cultural determined. Terms in economic advertisements are used quite rare but there can be realities, symbols and concepts. The expressive stylistic means are also used in such advertisements: neologisms, attributive phrases, slangy words, jargons, metaphors and others.

Unmuting the Subaltern through Linguistic Hybridisation: Gaelicisations and their Functionality in Trauma-Related Novels by Fionn Mac Colla and Neil M. Gunn

One of the essential objectives of the modernist Scottish Renaissance movement was to re-develop a strong national Scottish identity by emphasising the Celtic-Gaelic heritage. Authors such as Neil M. Gunn or Fionn Mac Colla pursued this aim by functionalising Gaelicised English in their texts, which relate to trauma events of the nineteenth century. Gaelicised English is defined as the usage of Gaelic vocabulary and Gaelic grammatical patterns within the framework of English as a superstrate text tissue. In this article, many examples of Gaelicised English taken from Mac Colla's novel And the Cock Crew (1945) and from Gunn's Butcher's Broom (1934) will be presented and contextualised. These Gaelicisations can be considered as key components of a linguistic hybridity which challenges the master metanarrative of the nineteenth-century Highland Clearances and the discourse of the Improvements. The question to be answered in the last part of this text will be if these novels and their linguistic hybridity can help to process the trauma of the Clearances by giving a voice to a muted Highland subalternity.