Developing an English vocabulary curriculum for Hong Kong schools Arthur McNeill Hong Kong Baptist University.

Developing an English vocabulary curriculum for Hong Kong schools

Arthur McNeillHong Kong Baptist University

Outline of the presentation

1. How the project came about2. Aims of the project3. Design principles4. Procedures for compiling the

wordlists5. Some problems and issues

PART 1How the project came about

Evidence of low attainment in vocabulary size tests

02468

1012141618

3K AWL 5K max

Mean scores on Levels Test

HK F7

02468

1012141618

3K AWL 5K max

Mean scores on Levels Test

MainlandHK F7

Native/Non-native differences in vocabulary acquisition

Native English speaking students acquire about 3000 words per year at secondary school (ending up with about 20,000 word families in adulthood) .

Hong Kong secondary pupils acquire about 300 words per year.

Vocabulary and the CGs

Lexical relations: Synonyms (e.g. happy, glad) Antonyms (e.g. bright, dark) Homonyms (e.g. catch a bus, catch a

cold) Collocation (e.g. make a wish, watch TV) Lexical sets (e.g. furniture – table, chair,

desk, cupboard)

*please refer to CG (CDC, 2004): pp. 168-171

Vocabulary building skills recommended in CG

Word formation

Affixation (e.g. unhappy, careless) Compounding (e.g.

foot+ball=football) Conversion (e.g. cook a meal, a cook) Derivation (e.g. excite, exciting,

excited, excitement)

Quality, YES. Quantity, NO.

Curriculum guidelines stop short of identifying lexical targets.

Main concerns about inadequate vocabulary come from the tertiary sector.

PART 2Aims of the project

The Vocabulary Curriculum Project

EMB/CUHK collaborative project to develop an English vocabulary curriculum for 12 years of compulsory education.

To set vocabulary targets for each KS. To identify the English words to be

known by students by the end of each KS

Proposed Vocabulary Targets

Key Stage Stage Target CumulativeTarget

KS1

KS2

KS3

KS4

Proposed Vocabulary Targets

Key Stage Stage Target CumulativeTarget

KS1 1000 1000

KS2 1000 2000

KS3 1500 3500

KS4 1500 5000

Outcomes (Phase 1)

Four wordlists, each available in different formats:

1. Alphabetically arranged2. Thematically-arranged3. e-list (software which allows greater

manipulation of the content)

Research Questions

1. How many English words should HK students know at different stages of their education?

2. Which words should they know?

PART 3Design Principles

“Knowing a word”? Working definition

“Ability to recognize a word (in written or spoken text) and to know its meaning”

Type ofknowledge

Details

Form Written (orthographic); spoken (phonological); most frequent morphological variations

Meaning Only one meaning introduced at a time; additional meanings added as ‘new’ items

Sources of input?

Teachers familiar with the respective KS Frequency data about how vocabulary is

used in English: General English Academic English

Topics and themes listed in CGs Vocabulary content of the approved

textbooks

Frequency-based lists/corpora

GSL

BNC

AWL

“General” words

“Academic” words

GSL

BNC

AWL

Classic list of the most frequent 2000 words.Very widely used and respected.

100 million word collection of written and spoke English. A new ‘standard’.

570 words which occur frequently inacademic texts across disciplines

Textbook Corpus(currently stored as separate files)

KS1 Textbook A Textbook B Textbook C

KS2 Textbook A Textbook B Textbook C

KS3 Textbook A Textbook B Textbook C

KS4 Textbook A Textbook B Textbook C

Principles guiding final selections

Relevance to learners (now and later) Usefulness Combinability (collocations) Word class distribution Superordinates

PART 4Procedures for compiling the wordlists

Design of the vocabulary selection procedure

Frequency data from

GSL/BNC/AWL

Word samples by frequency

Teachers select words for own

KS

Initial (incomplete)

wordlist

Rejected items to be considered for next KS

Project team add remaining items

Textbook corpus

Topics from CGs

Completed wordlist

Teacher Input

Data gathering (from teachers)

70 schools at each KS Option of on-line task or submit hard

copy for KS1 and KS2 Secondary teachers invited to CU to

attend a seminar and “workshop”

Teacher Seminar, plus …

Vocabulary decision-making task

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Data analysis

1. Collation of the results of the teacher surveys.

2. Calculating a “score” for each word based on the number of times it was selected by teachers

3. Deciding on a cut-off point for each word score to determine whether it is representative of the teacher sample or not.

PART 5Issues and Problems

1. Basing a school curriculum on frequency data

Relating a corpus of naturally occurring L1 language to an L2 curriculum is less straightforward than it first appears.

Refer to handout for examples of BNC items which do not transfer readily to an English language curriculum for HK students.

What is the BNC?The British National Corpus (BNC) is a 100 million word collection of samples of written and spoken

language from a wide range of sources, designed to represent a wide cross-section of British English from

the latter part of the 20th century, both spoken and written.

Would a corpus of international English be more appropriate?

In applied linguistics, there is strong support for basing achievement standards on successful L2 users rather than on native speakers.

But, there is no corpus of “international English”. Should we encourage one?

2. Degree of consensus among HK teachers about target language

Analysis of the data revealed variation among teachers concerning the vocabulary items which should be included.

Should we look in more depth at the patterns of selection?

3. Should “Hong Kong words” be added?

Examples:

shroff – dim sum – dai pai dong - gweilo

Vocabulary Curriculum Project – Phase 2

Phase 2 – Pedagogy (materials development and teacher development)

Seed ProjectThe Magic of Words: Enhancing Effectiveness of Vocabulary Learning and Teaching at Primary Level

Aims of the project: To explore ways and pedagogies to

improve the quality of vocabulary L/T To promote the development of

vocabulary building skills To encourage the application of

vocabulary in speaking and writing To enhance pupils’ and teachers’

competence and confidence in handling vocabulary

Seed Project Target group: Two classes of P.4 pupils

Some ideas for making use of the wordlists in lesson planning: Building on pupils’ previous knowledge (i.e. words they have learnt) Selecting words to be taught in a particular module / unit (by making reference to the relevant categories in the wordlists)