| Computers are being increasingly utilized in second language acquisition (SLA); however, little is known about their most effective applications, and few guidelines have been established for instructional design in the context of evolving SLA theory. Of the various help options that computer applications can provide, online previewing activities as an input modification to increase students' comprehension of authentic video have received relatively little attention among researchers. This study deals with the impact of two such activities on listening comprehension and on the short-term retention of new vocabulary in a German video. One was a drag-and-drop activity (DD) in which students matched words to their meanings on the computer screen. The other was a glossary-based activity (GB) in which students looked up the meanings of unknown words in an online dictionary. In both activities, three options helped students find the meaning of unknown words: an English written translation, a short video clip presenting a German sentence in context, and the same German sentence in written form. Eighty two elementary German students enrolled in the second semester of German instruction participated in this study. With a combination of vocabulary pretests and posttests, stimulated recalls, and questionnaires, the researcher analyzed students' listening comprehension, their vocabulary knowledge, and their preferences in the use of both treatments. The results indicate that the two previewing activities helped students comprehend the German video and focus their attention on the new vocabulary. However, significant differences between DD and GB were found only for short-term vocabulary retention, with DD being a more effective tool than GB. No significant differences were found between DD and GB for listening comprehension. This finding is surprising considering that highly interactive tools such as DD are generally presumed to be more effective. In addition, participants' reported preferences for GB over DD points out that participants' perceptions may not be a reliable guide to treatment effectiveness. Finally, students who did not receive any treatment relied more on visual information from the video for comprehension, whereas students with a previewing treatment relied more on the auditory information in the video. |
