Exploring The Effects Of Lexical Approach On Efl Learners’ Vocabulary Knowledge And Writing Competence:An Empirical Study

Taking the chunk theory, cognitive theory and the Lexical Approach proposed by Lewis(1993) as the theoretical basis, this thesis reports an empirical study of the effectiveness of the lexical approach incorporated with learners’ cognitive factors on independent college non-English majors’ vocabulary knowledge and writing competence. This study aims to address the following research questions:1. Does the lexical approach incorporated with learners’ cognitive factors have any significant effects on independent college learners’ vocabulary knowledge?(1) What are the effects of the lexical approach on their breadth of knowledge of vocabulary?(2) What are the effects of the lexical approach on their depth of knowledge of vocabulary?2. Does the lexical approach incorporated with learners’ cognitive factors have any significant effects on independent college learners’ writing competence?(1) What are the effects of the lexical approach on their writing scores?(2) Does learners’ use of lexical chunks correlate with their writing scores?(3) What are the effects of the lexical approach on the appropriateness of lexical chunk use in their writings?3. What are learners’ attitudes towards the lexical approach incorporated with learners’ cognitive factors?The participants involved were two intact classes of non-English majors from an independent college in Jiangsu Province. One class was randomly selected as the experimental group(EG), the other as the control group(CG). Both groups were taught by the same teacher, however, learners in the EG received the lexical approach incorporated with learners’ cognitive factors(following the cycle of noticing-input-memorizing-output to teach lexical chunks) while learners in the CG were exposed to the traditional approach(focusing on the teaching of individual vocabulary and the explaining of grammatical rules). The experiment lasted for 15 weeks. All the learners took two tests for their vocabulary knowledge and writingcompetence respectively before and after the teaching experiment. Moreover, an interview was conducted among the EG after the posttest to get more feedbacks about the effectiveness of the lexical approach. Detailed analysis of the quantitative and qualitative data yielded the following findings:1. Differences in the posttest of the breadth of knowledge of vocabulary between the EG and the CG are not statistically significant. Although both groups have made improvement to some extent and the EG improved more than the CG, the differences of the improvement between the pretest and the posttest in the two groups are not statistically remarkable. The results indicate that the lexical approach can be of some help to broaden learners’ breadth of knowledge of vocabulary but the advantages are not so significant compared with the traditional method.2. Differences in the pretest and posttest of learners’ depth of knowledge of vocabulary in the EG and differences in the posttest between the EG and the CG have reached a significant level, which reveals that the lexical approach can greatly deepen learners’ depth of knowledge of vocabulary.3. Differences in learners’ scores in the writing pretest and posttest in the EG and differences in the writing posttest between the EG and the CG are remarkable, which demonstrates that the lexical approach adopted in this study is more effective in improving learners’ writing competence.4. Significant differences can be found in the number of lexical chunks used between the EG and the CG in the writing posttest. Also the increase in the number of lexical chunks used by learners in the EG has reached a significant level. Within the EG, learners who got higher writing scores used more lexical chunks than those who got lower scores and the difference between the two groups proves to be statistically significant. Correlation analysis shows that there exists a significant and positive correlation between learners’ writing scores and the number of lexical chunks used in their writings.5. Compared with the results of the writing pretest in terms of the appropriateness of lexical chunk use, learners in the EG used more appropriate lexical chunks in the posttest. In the pretest, only 36% of lexical chunks identified in theirwritings were judged appropriate, while this rate increased to 49.1% after the implementation of lexical approach. Learners who got higher scores in their writing pretest used more appropriate lexical chunks in their posttest than those who got lower scores. The results show that the lexical approach positively affects learners’ use of lexical chunks, especially for learners who got higher scores in their writing tests.6. Admitting that the lexical approach can lighten their burden of vocabulary acquisition, enrich the content and optimize the organization of their writings, learners in the EG hold a positive attitude towards the lexical approach adopted in this study.In addition, all the interviewees promise to learn English from the perspective of lexical chunks in the future.Incorporating cognitive factors into lexical approach, namely drawing learners’ attention to lexical chunks, inputting comprehensible lexical chunk materials,providing various memorizing methods and output activities, has been proved to be an effective way to improve learners’ vocabulary knowledge and writing competence in an independent college. Hence it should be applied to independent college EFL teaching. Meanwhile, for teachers who seek novel and effective approaches for vocabulary and writing classroom teaching, the refined lexical approach adopted in this study can be taken use of at their disposal.