Factors in second language acquisition: opportunity, exposure, uptake and retention

1. Factors in second language acquisition: opportunity, exposure, uptake and retention Rob Waring

2. Essential questions • How much language do students need to meet? • What kinds of vocabulary do they need to learn? • How many times do they need to meet words to learn them? • What are the optimal conditions for learning vocabulary?

3. Types of vocabulary Individual words: book, table, life, chance, walk, airplane… Affixes:used, user, usefulness, user-friendly, disuse… Multi-part words: traffic jam, the day after tomorrow, lunch box… Lexical phrases: by the way, to and fro, a kind of,… Idioms: let the cat out of the bag, raining cats and dogs Sentence heads: Do you mind if I…, If I were you,.. Could you…? Collocations: High season, mild cheese, blonde hair… Colligations: agree to do x, agree on X, rely on someone, have an effect on x, x affects y... Others: SONY, Paul, twenty-seven, etc. , UNESCO…

4. How much to learn: vocabulary Learners need 8000-9000 words to know 98% of the vocabulary in native novels, magazines and most general reading Intermediate learners need at least a vocabulary of 2000 words receptively and 1000 productively to be able to build fluency rapidly Advanced learners will need 4000-6000 words An average high frequency word has about 8-15 common collocations There are 400-500 common phrasal verbs There are 1000-1500 common idioms There are hundreds of common sentences heads and formulaic phrases

5. How much to learn: collocations fast / quick meal train food shower yellow / blonde hair car flower regular / normal guy fries day exercise a round / circle of friends drinks golf wagons hate Types Adverb + Adjective: completely satisfied (NOT downright satisfied) Adjective + Noun: excruciating pain (NOT excruciating joy) Noun + Noun: a surge of anger (NOT a rush of anger) Noun + Verb: lions roar (NOT lions shout) Verb + Noun: commit suicide (NOT undertake suicide) Verb + Expression With Preposition: burst into tears (NOT blow up in tears) Verb + Adverb: wave frantically (NOT wave feverishly)

6. How much to learn: Grammar He walked to the station Did he see the man? Who did he go with? He ate with his mother He didn’t buy anything She wasn’t given anything Were they seen? Why did he mistrust them? You bought it, didn’t you? They were being shown the …. What were you doing when the phone rang? If I were you, I’d… If I won the lottery, I’d … Could I have that? Was he going to be there at 12?

7. How much to learn: grammar The grammar takes a long time The main tenses have many different forms I have been given. You have been given. He/she/it has been given. We have been given. They have been given. Have I been given? Have you been given? Has he/she/it been given? Have we been given? Have they been given? I haven’t been given. You haven’t been given. He/she/it hasn’t been given. We haven’t been given They haven’t been given. What have I been given? What have you been given? What has he/she/it been given? What have we been given? What have they been given? I have been giving. You have been giving. He/she/it has been giving. We have been giving. They have been giving. Have I been giving? Have you been giving? Has he/she/it been giving? Have we been giving? Have they been giving? I haven’t been giving. You haven’t been giving. He/she/it hasn’t been giving. We haven’t been giving They haven’t been giving. Yes, I have. No, I haven’t. Yes, you have. No, you haven’t. Yes, he/she/it has. No, he/she/it hasn’t. Yes, we have. No, we haven’t. Yes, they have. No, they haven’t ……, have I? ….., haven’t I? ……, have you? ……, haven’t you? ….., has he/he/it? ….., hasn’t he/she/it? ….., have we? ..…, haven’t we? ….., have they? ….., haven’t they? I have given. You have given. He/she/it has given. We have given. They have given. Have I given? Have you given? Has he/she/it given? Have we given? Have they given? I haven’t given. You haven’t given. He/she/it haven’t given. We haven’t given They haven’t given. What have I given? What have you given? What has he/she/it given? What have we given? What have they given?

8. Two levels of word knowledge

9. Intentional vs. Incidental learning

10. Terms • Opportunity: the chance that students have to meet words • Exposure: the texts/ language that students actually meet • Uptake: the rate at which things are learnt • Retention: the rate at which words are learnt or forgotten

11. Uptake and retention Intentional learning -fast – (Mukoyama 2005) -retention is good if the quality of learning is good -can’t learn the deeper aspects of vocabulary this way -each collocation is too infrequent -too many to learn -necessarily need to be learnt in context Incidental learning -20-50 meetings to learn a word’s meaning -knowledge is fragile as the meeting is often fleeting

12. The Forgetting Curve Number of words Knowledge

13. Occurrence rates

14. Opportunity In EFL environments: • Natural opportunity is low • Natural opportunity takes time, effort and commitment • Opportunities have to be sought • For many, creating language opportunities can only be done realistically through course requirements

15. Exposure How frequently do learners meet words? How much text do learners meet? What kinds of words do learners typically meet?

16. Exposure Data from a ‘typical’ 4 skills 5–level course book series for Mexican High Schools (Sequences by Heinle Cengage) -Includes all the units, instructions, exercises, workbook material, supplementary teacher’s material and listening texts -Teachers say students complete about 70% of the material -Only 20% of the class is taught in English -Little homework other than the course book materials are given -Data do not include out of class exposure -Data do not include student to student talk, student writings

17. Exposure Number of words in a typical 5 level course by frequency

18. Exposure Different words (types) in a typical 5 level course by frequency

19. Uptake What uptake can we expect from a typical course? How much text do learners meet? -Possibly 200-300,000 words over a typical 5 level course. How frequently do learners meet words? -Function words - very very frequently -De-lexical words - (have, be, do etc.) - very very frequently -800-900 words (25-27%) are met enough times for acquisition -400-600 (10-15%) words will be partially known -1300 words (over 65-70%) will probably not be learnt

20. Cautions ‘Acquisition’ assumes meeting the words enough times over 3 years is sufficient The data do not include multiple meanings, collocations, idioms, multiple-meaning senses, multi-part words, grammar, etc. The above data are for possible uptake rates from a typical course (individual results will vary) The data are calculated on input frequency (receptive vocabulary) Productive vocabulary size is typically 1/4 to 1/5th of the receptive. We can expect a productive vocabulary of 200-300 easy-to-access words and another 200-300 partial-access

21. What to do? Courses in general tend not to recycle vocabulary enough to allow for deep acquisition Most courses are linear in design – always teaching new things in each unit / lesson Learners need a good balance of intentional vs. incidental learning Start with lots of words, phrases, lexical chunks, sentence heads first. Focus on communicability. Grammar later Continue the coursework to provide the framework and initial knowledge of words, grammar etc. Massive text exposure to build incidental learning

22. Course book plus Extensive Reading Uptake if they add 1 graded reader per week

23. Course book plus Extensive Reading Significant improvement in vocabulary (800 --->1600 words) More of the words in their course book reach the ‘acquisition’ level (27% ---> 40%) They will have a better sense of how the vocabulary and grammar fit together They will have a better sense of collocation, and other deeper aspects of vocabulary acquisition.

24. Take home: We can learn lots of words at the form-meaning level quickly Initial word knowledge decays quickly unless learnt well Deeper aspects of word knowledge grow over time We can expect students exposed to normal levels of input from a course to acquire less than a thousand words receptively and a few hundred productively Adding a Extensive Reading almost doubles their vocabulary learning

25. Thanks for listening This presentation is available from www.robwaring.org/presentations/ Feel free to use and abuse as you see fit (attribution would be nice)