EFFECTS OF AWARENESS-RAISING INSTRUCTION OF CHUNKING ON COLLOCATION ACQUISITION AND READING COMPREHENSION OF SENIOR HIGH EFL STUDENTS

• Main Authors: Yun-peng Wang, 王雲鵬
• Other Authors: Ling-zu Yang
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/ubs286

碩士 === 國立高雄師範大學 === 英語學系 === 97 === ABSTRACT This study aims to probe into the effects of awareness-raising instruction of chunking (hereafter, ARIC) on collocation acquisition and reading comprehension of senior high EFL students. The ARIC was constructed of 11 instruction activities adopted from the lexical exercises provided by Michael Lewis (1997). The subjects were 40 first-year students in Yuan-li Senior High School. They were divided into two groups, 20 high achievers (hereafter, the HA) and 20 low achievers (hereafter, the LA), based on their English scores on the Senior High School Entrance Examination. Before instruction, all the subjects were demanded to fill out a pre-questionnaire and a pre-test. The questionnaire was to investigate the subjects’ awareness of the nature of the lexical chunks in English and their chunking patterns while they were doing silent reading. The pre-test was divided into two parts, reading comprehension test and collocation test. Before answering the five comprehension questions, the subjects were required to chunk the first two paragraphs of the reading text in the comprehension test. Right after a three-month awareness-raising instruction, the subjects were required to fill out the same questionnaire and the same test. Then statistical measures were employed to analyze the subjects’ responses to the pre- and the post-questionnaires and their performances on the pre- and the post-tests. Besides the quantitative analysis, the subjects’ chunked texts in the comprehension test before and after instruction were also examined qualitatively. The main findings are summarized as follows: 1. The ARIC successfully raised the subjects’ awareness of the lexical chunks in English, and changed their chunking patterns. That is, the ARIC acquainted the subjects, especially the low achievers, with the true nature of such lexical chunks as polywords, collocations, and fixed or semi-fixed expressions. With their awareness of the lexical chunks raised, the subjects also learned to chunk a text properly. 2. The ARIC was beneficial to both the HA and the LA in enhancing their chunking ability. In the present study, chunking ability referred to the capability to chunk a text properly. To be more precise, the ARIC enabled the subjects to identify the various chunks prevalent in a text. These chunks included such short chunks as single words (e.g., therefore, however), polywords (e.g., all the years), or collocations (e.g., a testing year, pass the exam), longer chunks as fixed (e.g., put the whole thing off until tomorrow, go to the extra mile) or semi-fixed expressions (e.g., I hope that, It’s important to understand that), and even clauses (e.g., when you take your final exam) or short sentences (e.g., Don’t decide to put the whole thing off until tomorrow). 3. The ARIC contributed to the enhancement of the subjects’ reading comprehension ability and collocation ability. According to the result of the study, the subjects’ performances on the comprehension test before and after instruction reached a significant level. In addition, there also existed a significant difference between the subjects’ performances on the collocation test before and after instruction. 4. The subjects’ awareness of the lexical chunks and their reading comprehension and collocation ability were highly correlated. The result of the present study manifests that as the subjects became more aware of the nature of lexical chunks, their reading comprehension and collocation ability also became better. To conclude, the ARIC was beneficial to the subjects in two aspects. First, it raised their awareness of the lexical chunks, which in turn promoted their chunking ability. With their lexical awareness raised and their chunking ability enhanced, the subjects’ reading comprehension and collocation ability also improved in the meantime. Therefore, it is highly advisable for EFL teachers to introduce such awareness-raising activities in their instruction.