Influence Of Chinese Language Transfer On English Vocabulary Learning In Senior High School

Vocabulary is central to language and of critical importance to the typical language learners; here the author refers to senior high school students. In learning a foreign language, it is very important to learn one's vocabulary.The use of the term 'transfer' can be traced back to over a century ago when Whitney first used the term to refer to cross-linguistic influence (Odlin, 1989). As Kellerman(1987) puts it, the L1 can provide 'a leg-up along the developmental ladder.' As for any foreign language learner, knowing a certain number of words is the first step to master a language. However, if a person says he 'knows' the meaning of a particular lexical item, it does not mean that their lexical knowledge may be identical. According to the language transfer theory, it is assumed that where there are differences between the native language and foreign language, the learners* native language knowledge will interfere with the foreign language, and where the native language and foreign language are similar, the native language will actively aid foreign language learning, that is, in the case of similarities between the native language and foreign language, the transfer functions positively, while in the case of differences, it functions negatively. And native language transfer can not be avoided in the foreign language learning (Kellerman, 1987).At present in China, a large number of high school students are learning English in a kind of environment full of Chinese factors. They have neither chances nor surroundings to communicate in English with each other except in their class. In the process of learning, Chinese has negative influences in the learning of English lexical meanings, partly because there are many differences both in language form and culture between China and English-speaking countries, and partly because before the Chinese students began to learn English, they had mastered a plenty of Chinese words and systematic Chinese knowledge, which the students tend to rely on. Thus, this will inevitably influence Chinese students in the learning of English sound, vocabulary and grammar, etc.Therefore, the thesis tried to have a research on the influence of Chinese language transfer on the learning of English vocabulary, especially the negative aspects on the process of learning. Therefore, the following three questions will be answered in this study:Q1: Why can not learners in senior high school get rid of the thought pattern of Chinese in their process of learning English?Q2: What influence does Chinese transfer have on the learning of English vocabulary meanings and how?Q3: What ways will be used to prevent against negative transfer and make full use of positive transfer so as to improve the senior high school students' ability to use vocabulary?In this thesis, based on the theoretical frame work of language transfer, the author starts with the introduction of this research, that is, research background, significance and research objective. Then the author continues with a literature review of language transfer, including the cause of language transfer, some theoretical basis and its relationship with English teaching. After that, by using scientific research methods of questionnaires and inquiry, the author tries to find out how much the English teaching and learning relies on the Chinese meanings aid. In terms of conceptual meaning, connotative meaning, collocative meaning and idiomatic meaning, the thesis draws an elaborate contrastive study between English word meanings and their Chinese explanations. After the discussions about the influence of Chinese transfer, here, mainly referring to negative transfer on English vocabulary learning, some suggestions and implications are put forward. Finally, the thesis points out that the teachers can teach English vocabulary through creating language environment and making full use of positive transfer.