ARTICLE ANALYSIS

Article Analysis

Article Analysis

Introduction

It seems almost impossible to overstate the power of words; they literally have changed and will continue to change the course of world history. Perhaps the greatest tools we can give students for succeeding, not only in their education but more generally in life, is a large, rich vocabulary and the skills for using those words. Our ability to function in today's complex social and economic worlds is mightily affected by our language skills and word knowledge. In addition to the vital importance of vocabulary for success in life, a large vocabulary is more specifically predictive and reflective of high levels of reading achievement. The Report of the National Reading Panel (2000), for example, concluded, “The importance of vocabulary knowledge has long been recognized in the development of reading skills. As early as 1924, researchers noted that growth in reading power relies on continuous growth in word knowledge (Trask, 1999).In this paper we analysed two articles Suhad Sonbul and Norbert Schmitt “Direct teaching of vocabulary after reading: is it worth the effort?” with Evagelia Papathanasiou “An investigation of two ways of presenting vocabulary”.

Analysis

In the Evagelia Papathanasiou article “An investigation of two ways of presenting vocabulary” author explain that in everyday conversation we speak of vocabulary in the singular; we speak of a person's vocabulary. This is actually an oversimplification. The American Heritage Dictionary defines vocabulary as “the sum of words used by, understood by, or at the command of a particular person or group.” In this paper we are concerned with extending the sum of words that are used by and understood by students (O'Grady, W., Dobrovolsky, M., and Katamba, F. 1996). However, it seems important to point out that in almost all cases there are some differences in the number of words that an individual understands and uses. Even the terms “uses” and “understands” need clarification. For example, the major way in which we “use” vocabulary is when we speak and write; the term expressive vocabulary is used to refer to both since these are the vocabularies we use to express ourselves. We “understand” vocabulary when we listen to speech and when we read; the term receptive vocabulary is used to refer to listening and reading vocabularies (Kuiper, K. and Allan, W. 2004).

While in Suhad Sonbul and Norbert Schmitt “Direct teaching of vocabulary after reading: is it worth the effort” they analysed that vocabulary refers to the combination of listening and speaking vocabularies, and literate vocabulary refers to the combination of our reading and writing vocabularies. Are our listening, speaking, reading and writing vocabularies all the same? Are they equally large? Is our meaning vocabulary larger or smaller than our literate vocabularies (Jeffries, 2006)?

For the first five years or so of their lives, children are involved in the process of acquiring a meaning/oral vocabulary—words that they understand when they hear them and that they can use in their speech. During this period, children have essentially no literate ...