| The General Senior High School English Curriculum Standards(2017 version)has been promulgated in 2017 and has been implemented since the fall of 2018.The National Matriculation English Test(NMET)becomes the first National College Entrance Examination since the issue of the English curriculum standards.In the NMET,vocabulary has always been an important component and a crucial determinant in determining the difficulties of the test paper.However,research on the vocabulary of the NMET is still rare in China.Therefore,a comparative study of the vocabulary required in the latest edition of the GSHSECS and the words used in the examination sheets for the recent three years from2019 to 2021 can benefit the assessment and improvement of the test under the guidance of the new curriculum standards.It is also very instructive and informative for the NMET to be better aligned with the GSHSECS criteria,and conforms to the existing state of English teaching and learning in China.In the context of the curriculum standards,the present study explores the distribution of the vocabulary in the eight examination sheets of the national unified papers in recent three years respectively,as well as the alignment situation with the vocabulary of three mastery levels in the word list of the GSHSECS.The study is centered on the following three questions:1.What are the vocabulary complexities of the GSHSECS-required vocabulary in the NMET from 2019 to 2021?2.What are the distribution characteristics of the GSHSECS-required vocabulary in the NMET from 2019 to 2021?3.To what degree of vocabulary alignments are between the GSHSECS-required and the NMET from 2019 to 2021?In response to the above research questions,the authors built two corpora,namely the corpus of the NMET(2019-2021)and a corpus of the word list on GSHSECS.This study does quantitative,qualitative,and comparative analysis by using Ant Conc corpus analysis software and corpus linguistic research methods.The following is a summary of the significant findings:1.In terms of vocabulary complexity,the value of vocabulary complexity fluctuates a little.The LD,and LV tend to be balanced,the LS increases a few years by year.The examiner also deliberately follows the principle of complexity progression.There is a general consistency in the total word types and word tokens among the NMET constructed by the GSHSECS and the national Ministry of Education.2.From the perspective of lexical distribution,about half of the word types in the NMET from 2019 to 2021 aligned to the words listed in the GSHSECS.Level 1,Level 2 and Level 3 words are tested at decreasing proportion,and the rates of the three-level words tend to decrease successively as the levels of the words increase.3.There are almost all alignments between the NMET and the GSHSECS,while a few misalignments.Then the words(appear no less than twice)-misaligned proper names,compound words,and derived words are picked out for further exploration.Based on the paper’s conclusions,the author makes some practical recommendations for test designers who want to choose and assess words scientifically,for teachers to expand students’ vocabulary and for students to improve their vocabulary ability.Firstly,the test designers should consider carefully and decide on the proper lexical items to test and reasonably adjust the order of all these materials in the NMET conforming to the principle of gradual difficulty.They should also attach great importance to the proper proportion of the three-level words and enrich several proper misaligned words in the NMET to improve students’ core competency.Then,using an activity-based approach,teachers should pay attention to the requirements and restrictions of curriculum standard vocabulary,gain a thorough understanding of the connotation and requirements of the new English curriculum standards,excavate instructional resources,and increase lexical chunks.Lastly,students should create a strong foundation,develop the habit of autonomous and critical thinking,and expand their vocabulary. |
