A Study On The Influence Of Narrow Reading On Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition

It is no doubt that vocabulary is an essential part of a language.Therefore,how to acquire vocabulary effectively has aroused spread attention.While through traditional reciting way to learn words,the role that reading plays in vocabulary development may be ignored.However,when exposing students in reading,the key point is how to organize reading materials to promote students to obtain new words incidentally.Krashen proposed the concept of “narrow reading” in 1981,which means a series of reading texts are written by one author or address one subject matter.He believed that such “narrow” input is more effective for language learners to grow vocabulary.Although many researchers have championed narrow reading,there remains a dearth of empirical studies to provide proof.Few previous studies focused on one subject matter narrow reading,paid attention to undergraduates and designed a control group in experiment.Thus,this research aims to explore the effects that topic-focused narrow reading has on second language vocabulary acquisition for EFL sophomores.Based on Krashen’s Comprehensible Input Hypothesis,Frequency Effect in Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition and Schema Theory,this thesis attempts to discuss the following question: What are the effects of narrow reading on receptive vocabulary knowledge of EFL learners? What are the effects of narrow reading on productive vocabulary knowledge of EFL learners? What are the participants’ attitude,motivation and anxiety towards narrow reading? In the study,two classes of non-English sophomores from an university of Gan Su Province enrolled as participants.One class was treated as Narrow Reading Group and the other was Control Group.Among the given topics from New Horizon College English textbooks(the second edition),all participants were asked to choose one topic they are most interested in,then the top two topics were employed.Within each topic,there were four passages: one is main text,three are supplementary materials--three related-topic texts for Narrow Reading Group,while three unrelated-topic texts for Control Group.The experiment lasted about seven weeks.Ten words were selected as the target words.During the treatment,participants were told to focus on comprehending the content of the texts.A pretest was used to check if participants have prior knowledge of the target words,both immediate post-tests and delayed post-tests were made to measure whether narrow reading was helpful for participants’ receptive and productive vocabulary knowledge.Besides,a questionnaire was only delivered to Narrow Reading Group for the purpose of investigating their attitudes towards narrow reading.By analyzing the data,the results revealed that narrow reading does have effects on both receptive vocabulary knowledge and productive vocabulary knowledge of EFL learners.Besides,narrow reading could make more effects on receptive vocabulary knowledge than productive vocabulary knowledge.In addition,a majority of students had positive attitudes towards narrow reading.Hence,it can be concluded that narrow reading is an effective way to promote EFL learners’ vocabulary acquisition and motivate their learning interest.Despite some limitations due to a lot of practical factors,some implications were proposed to provide reference for further studies.