An Investigation Into Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition Of Senior High School Students Through Extensive Reading

Vocabulary acquisition is the main task of second language acquisition. Four language skills, including listening, speaking, reading and writing are all related to it. Hence, more and more researchers put their emphasis on it. They do researches from various aspects of vocabulary acquisition. Some researchers find a special angle and begin to study on incidental vocabulary acquisition. It brings fresh air to the study, enriches our understanding of vocabulary acquisition, and gives us lots of inspiration on vocabulary teaching.In the thesis, firstly, the researches about incidental vocabulary acquisition home and abroad are reviewed and summarized to explore the cognitive process of incidental vocabulary acquisition. In the process, extensive reading is considered as the basis of incidental vocabulary acquisition, and lexical processing strategies are the main measure to acquire the meanings of words. Therefore, further explanations of incidental vocabulary acquisition are given from the aspects of extensive reading and lexical processing strategies.In the second part of the thesis, the situation of incidental vocabulary acquisition for high school students are investigated and analyzed with a questionnaire. The focus of the investigation is the condition of their extensive reading and the usage of lexical processing strategies. There are still many problems in theirs choice of reading material, reading habit, and the usage of lexical strategies.In the third part of the thesis, the reasons of the problems are discussed in three aspects, including extensive reading, lexical strategies, and phenomenon of multiple meanings of one word. The suggestions are also given accordingly.At last, it comes to the conclusion. Now, the urgent task of teachers are helping students to develop their interests of extensive reading and give them instructions on the using of vocabulary learning strategies.Incidental vocabulary acquisition from reading enables learners do two tasks at the same time. The author believes that more and more students will get more pleasures from extensive reading.