An Empirical Study Of Vocabulary Input Mode On Productive Vocabulary Acquisition From Memetics Perspective In High School

In the process of human using language the important position about vocabulary has been widely recognized. Vocabulary is not only the central issue in language learning and acquisition but also closely related to it. (Coady & Huckin,1997). Second Language vocabulary teaching and learning has become one of the important parts in foreign language teaching and learning and linguistics. (Allen,1983; Harley,1995; Schmitt & McCarthy, 1997).Vocabulary plays an important part in language teaching and learning, and vocabulary acquisition is an essential part in language acquisition. Having a certain amount of vocabulary is the premise and foundation of learning and application of English. At present, China's high school students develop unbalancedly in their English vocabulary acquisition between receptive vocabulary and productive vocabulary, and there is a serious shortage of productive vocabulary.Memetics is a new theory based on Darwin's evolutionary theory to explain the law of cultural evolution. Memetics presentation has brought new perspective for many research fields. By studying the characteristics and the cycle of meme, re-examining English vocabulary acquisition, adopting the mode of linguistic memes to learn English vocabulary, with the help of reciting, imitation, references, transplant, grafting and other methods to increase language information input, and at the same time, increasing the capacity of language output enable learners to use words flexibly so as to enhance English learners'productive vocabulary ability. It is significant in some degree to analyze productive vocabulary from the point of memetics in high school.Two classes in Changzhi No.19 high school were chosen as participants, class 116 as experimental group (EG), and the other as control group (CG). The experiment lasted for a period of one term. The EG was trained with vocabulary input mode based on memetics, while the CG adopted the conventional method. Before the experiments, the writer separately conducted a pre-test for the overall vocabulary proficiency of two classes, and a questionnaire was delivered to the experimental class about learners'interest, confidence, initiative, sense of achievement and motivation. Then two hypotheses were put forward:(1) Does vocabulary input mode from memetics perspective help to improve senior middle school students'productive vocabulary acquisition?(2) Will this input mode improve senior middle school students'interest in English and strengthen their confidence, initiative, compared with conventional methods?After the experiment, the main conclusions are listed as follows:(1) Vocabulary input mode from memetics perspective helps to improve learners' productive vocabulary acquisition.(2) Compared with conventional methods, this input mode strengthens high school students'interest, confidence, and initiative in English.Therefore, it is necessary and feasible to apply memetics to English vocabulary teaching in senior middle school.