| How the word frequency affects second language acquisition is worthy of study and discussion.The Frequency Hypothesis(Hatch&Wagner Gough,1975)hold the view that frequency is the determinant of language learning and plays an irreplaceable role in the language acquisition.The supporting evidence mainly comes from the research results related to cognitive science and psycholinguistics.In the field of second language acquisition,there are just a few empirical studies on the word frequency,and there is not enough evidence that frequency plays a decisive role in vocabulary acquisition.Firstly,the author refers to the thesis Research into the Factors Influencing the Efficacy on Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition of Zhao Longwu(2013)based on vocabulary learning strategies.On the basis of his questionnaire,the author revised and compiled the questionnaire.And find out the vocabulary in the textbook is the main input source of students’ vocabulary learning in the school.Secondly,according to VKS(also known as ‘vocabulary knowledge scale’)designed by Paribakht &Wesche(1993),and revised by a professor of Nanjing Normal University Ma Guanghui(2006),the author used this vocabulary test for reference compiled in his research on high frequency vocabulary level of middle school students,a vocabulary test volume is made.Finally,225 junior high school students from two classes in each grade in a county middle school in Taiyuan City,Shanxi Province,are selected as the subjects of the study.Through the vocabulary test,the study is conducted on the English vocabulary acquisition of junior high school students in this school,and the relationship between the frequency of vocabulary occurrence and the situation of vocabulary acquisition in junior high school English textbooks is deeply explored.The thesis focuses on the following three questions:(1)How about the word frequency in junior high school English textbooks? How about junior high school students’ vocabulary acquisition?(2)What is the relationship between word frequency and vocabulary acquisition in junior high school English textbooks?(3)Besides the word frequency,what other factors affect word acquisition?The results show that :(1)The proportion of words with high and medium frequencies inthe whole vocabulary of junior high school English textbooks is high,which is 45% and 38%respectively,and the proportion of low-frequency words is 18%.The average acquisition rate of high frequency words is higher,reaching 74%.The acquisition of medium frequency words is about one third,while the acquisition of low frequency words is even lower,about one fifth.Compared with other studies,the acquisition rate of subjects in this study is generally low;(2)The word frequency occurrence has a significant impact on second language acquisition.Vocabulary acquisition is affected by frequency.The students learn words with high frequency better,while learn the words with low frequency worse.Frequency is not the only factor that determines the rate of word acquisition.The acquisition rate of words with high frequency is not necessarily high,while the accuracy rate of words with low frequency may be high;(3)In addition to the word frequency,the limitations of the simple teaching methods,few channels for students to learn words,and the lack of English activities in township schools are also important factors affecting students’ word acquisition.According to the results of the study,the author puts forward some suggestions for junior high school teachers and their students English Vocabulary Learning:(1)Try to choose the words with high usage when compiling the textbook;Pay attention to the frequency and distribution of words;Use a variety of typesetting methods to increase vocabulary prominence;(2)Teachers can increase or improve vocabulary learning courses according to the situation;Teachers should pay attention to the lexical knowledge and meta-lexical knowledge;A lexical semantic network is established to assist the acquisition of lexical collocation knowledge. |
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