A Study On Vocabulary Activity Design In NSE Based On National English Curriculum Standards

Vocabulary is to language what bricks are to buildings.Vocabulary learning is an important part of second language acquisition(SLA).According to National English Curriculum Standards(2017 Edition)(the Standards for short),vocabulary learning is a process of long-term comprehensive practice and efficient accumulation.This shows that accumulating vocabulary knowledge and practicing vocabulary use in contexts are not only the essence but also the approach to vocabulary learning.Revisions have been proposed on the requirements of vocabulary learning and teaching in the Standards where vocabulary knowledge is specified and receptive and productive vocabulary use is emphasized,which provides new guidelines for vocabulary teaching practice.Textbooks are important materials and means to achieve the goals of English curriculum.Since the quality of textbooks has a significant impact on students,teachers,teaching process and teaching outcomes,the present study attempts to investigate the vocabulary activity design of New Standard English,one of the most widely-used sets of textbooks for Chinese senior high students,based on the requirements concerning vocabulary learning and teaching in the Standards.The research questions include:1)What vocabulary knowledge(Form/ Meaning/ Use)is covered in vocabulary activities in NSE?2)What are the characteristics of receptive and productive vocabulary use involved in vocabulary activities in NSE?3)To what extent does the vocabulary activity design satisfy the vocabulary learning and teaching requirements in the latest National English Curriculum Standards?Drawing on Nation's(2001)vocabulary knowledge framework,this study makes a quantitative analysis of vocabulary knowledge and receptive and productive vocabulary use covered in the sample vocabulary activities in NSE.On this basis,the activities are qualitatively evaluated against the requirements on vocabulary learning and teaching in the Standards.The study shows that all of the nine aspects of vocabulary knowledge in Nation's(2001)framework are covered in NSE textbooks and the vocabulary activities most frequently place emphasis on the global category of Meaning,followed by Use and Form.However,the distribution of the activities involving different aspects is uneven.Specifically,the aspects of form and meaning,grammatical functions and word parts are the three most frequently addressed aspects,followed by the aspects of associations,concept and referents spoken form,constrains on use,collocations and written form.As regards receptive and productive vocabulary use,57.8% of all activities involve receptive vocabulary use and 42.5% of those activities are concerned with productive vocabulary use.Furthermore,there are more than 60% of sample activities concerning receptive vocabulary use in Books 1-4 and Book 8 while there are more than 50% of the sample activities addressing productive vocabulary use in Books 5-7.It can be concluded that this set of textbooks can meet the requirements concerning the coverage of vocabulary knowledge in the Standards in general,which can contribute to learners' and teachers' awareness of the multidimensional nature of vocabulary knowledge.Considering the specific kinds of vocabulary knowledge,the spoken form and written form aspects of vocabulary knowledge in Nation's(2001)framework receive less attention in the sample activities of NSE,which satisfies the requirements for vocabulary learning in the Standards where the pronunciation and spelling of vocabulary items are less emphasized.However,the form and meaning aspect of vocabulary knowledge receives far more attention than that required by the Standards.Besides,two kinds of vocabulary knowledge receive slightly more attention than others in the Standards.The first one is the connotation and denotation of key words and the intentions and attitudes conveyed by them in contexts.However,the proportion of the sample activities concerning this aspect is relatively low and nearly all of them fail to guide learners to explore the intentions and attitudes of speakers conveyed by the target vocabulary items.The second one is concerned with the grammatical functions of vocabulary items,the characteristics of which covered in the NSE activities meets the requirements of emphasizing the grammatical usage of vocabulary items in the Standards.Furthermore,the current research finds out the distribution of activities concerning receptive and productive vocabulary use is overall reasonable in NSE,with each type of vocabulary use represented by nearly half of the activities under examination.To a large extent,this satisfies what the Standards require for vocabulary use in general.However,only the textbooks for compulsory courses(Books 1-5)reflect the same emphasis on the “receptive vocabulary use-the combination of receptive and productive vocabulary use-productive vocabulary use”trend as the requirements in the Standards.This study is of both theoretical and practical significance:(1)The systematic analysis of vocabulary knowledge and use in textbooks based on the Standards can enrich the achievements in the field of materials evaluation;(2)The findings of this evaluation can also provide material writers with useful feedback for materials revision,and inform teachers of the advantages and shortcomings of the textbooks' vocabulary activities so that they can make some adaptations when applying them.