| Vocabulary learning is an indispensable part for English learners.Since the concept of incidental vocabulary acquisition hypothesis was put forward by Nagy in1985,the related research on incidental vocabulary acquisition at home and abroad has been flourishing.Reading is one of the ways for learners to acquire vocabulary.But learners’ incidental vocabulary acquisition in English reading is influenced by many factors,such as the difficulty of material and learners’ English proficiency.Therefore,providing gloss can effectively help learners to acquire incidental vocabulary.However,the findings of previous studies in which gloss type is more conducive to incidental vocabulary acquisition are different.This study aims to probe into the effect of mother tongue gloss,target language gloss and self-gloss on senior high school students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition in English reading.It mainly focuses on the following two research questions:1.What is the effect of different gloss provider and different gloss language on students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition?2.Which type of gloss is more effective in promoting senior high school students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition?In this research,convenience sampling and qualitative interview are used.180 students from three parallel classes in grade one of a senior high middle school in Dazhou,Sichuan province participated in the study as research subjects.In order to ensure that all the subjects have the same English proficiency,vocabulary size test was adopted to test their vocabulary size.Through the analysis of the result of the vocabulary test and their recent English test scores,it is found that all the subjects have the same English proficiency and vocabulary size is 2,000 or more.The subjects were conveniently assigned to Chinese gloss group(gloss provided by teacher),English gloss group(gloss provided by teacher)and self-gloss group(gloss provided by students themselves),with 60 students in each group.All the subjects read the English material and completed the reading task within specified time,and had an immediate vocabulary test at once,and after one week,they had delayed vocabulary test.10 students were conveniently selected from the three groups for interview after the delayed vocabulary test.Through quantitative analysis of the test scores by using SPSS 22.0 and qualitative analysis of interview data,it is found that:1.There is no significant difference between teacher as Chinese gloss provider and student as gloss provider in students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition,but teacher as English gloss provider and student as gloss provider have significant influence.The performance of the English gloss group whose reading material is provided by teacher is significantly worse than that of the group using self-gloss material.That is to say,different gloss providers have little influence on students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition,but different gloss languages have significant influence on students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition.2.Chinese gloss is more effective in promoting senior high school students’ incidental vocabulary acquisition.The performance of Chinese gloss group in immediate vocabulary test and delayed vocabulary test is obviously better than that of the other groups,which means that Chinese gloss is not only beneficial to short-term memory,but also to long-term memory.The research has some implications for English vocabulary teaching and learning.When English reading materials are provided for senior high school students,Chinese gloss may be the best choice,for it can be more effective in promoting their memory of the new words.At the same time,from the perspective of proper vocabulary use,senior high school students should pay attention to the context in which the new words appear,for memory of discrete words by students makes less contribution to their proper use. |
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