Learning Words from Books: The Effects of Read
Aloud on Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition

Sharon H. Ulanoff
California State University, San Marcos

Sandra L. Pucci
University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee

Abstract

This study compares the gains made in second language vocabulary as a direct result of different literacy lessons implementing two bilingual methodologies: concurrent translation and preview-review. Students in the three randomly selected third-grade classes in the Los Angeles area were chosen to serve as the control (no treatment), concurrent translation, and preview-review groups. The children were given a pre test to assess their knowledge of selected vocabulary items. After the administration of the pre-test students in Group1 (control) listened to a story in English with no intervention or explanation of the story. Students in Group 2 listened to the same story in English with the reader using the concurrent method (translating the story from one language to the other). Group 3 heard the same story in English after having the teacher build background knowledge by previewing important points and difficult vocabulary in Spanish (preview). They also reviewed the story in Spanish after the reading in order to reinforce important points (review). All three groups were given a post test of the same vocabulary items after the treatment and one week later to examine gains in scores. Results indicate that not only did the students in the preview-review group score significantly higher than the control and concurrent translation groups, the concurrent translation group scored the lowest of all three groups and improved slightly one week after treatment. These findings demonstrate positive implications for the use of strategies which build background knowledge as a means of teaching second language vocabulary to English learners.

 

 

Sections of the Article

 

Introduction

Research has long supported the view that listening to stories facilitates literacy growth (Elley, 1989; Heath, 1983; Robbins & Ehri, 1994), including vocabulary development (Senechal, 1997) among other areas of literacy. In effect, reading exposure is often considered one of the primary vehicles whereby reading comprehension, writing style, and more complex vocabulary and grammar are developed (Krashen, 1985). Further, reading aloud to children is closely related to reading itself and serves to interest children in books, therefore encouraging them to read on their own (Routman, 1994). The notion that students learn vocabulary from listening to stories is especially critical when examining the literature related to second language learners, those students who come to school speaking a language other than English. If books can serve as the vehicle through which students come to know what words mean, then it becomes important to look at ways that these students can gain access to the text. One way to facilitate this access and thus the understanding of the stories, as well as the acquisition of vocabulary in the second language, is with primary language support. Primary language support involves the use of the native language to facilitate comprehension of the curriculum and instruction that takes place in the students' second language, in this case, English.

Such primary language support can serve as a scaffold to facilitate the link between background knowledge and the acquisition of a new language (Cummins, 1994). Second language learners can make use of what they know in their native language to better understand what they are learning in English. When used appropriately the primary language assists in promoting meaningful learning, which further builds the network of schemata available to the second language learner. The connections made between the students' first and second languages thus serve to facilitate new learning.

Reading Aloud and Literacy Development

The relationship between reading aloud and literacy development has also been substantiated by research findings. Hall (1987) reported correlations between reading test scores at age seven and children's preschool knowledge about books and literacy as evidenced by frequency of listening to stories. These findings are consistent with results of other studies on story reading and incidental acquisition of vocabulary (Elley, 1989; Lambert, 1991; Robbins & Ehri, 1994). Heath (1983), in her study of two communities and the effects of attitudes toward literacy on their children's development, supports this notion that reading aloud facilitates the growth of literate behaviors (Burns, Roe, & Ross, 1996; Christie, Enz, & Vukelich, 1997).

Elley (1980, 1989) and Elley and Mangubhai (1983) examined the second language vocabulary acquisition of children who listened to stories. They found rapid growth in English language development for children with greater amounts of free reading exposure. In Elley's study (1989), students exposed to a story three times without intervention showed a mean vocabulary gain of 19%, while students exposed once with minor explanations gained 20%, and the mean gain for students exposed three times with explanations was 33%. Elley concluded that stories read aloud with brief explanations offer a great resource for vocabulary acquisition in that students with limited vocabulary gain at least as much from the readings as the other students and that the learning is relatively permanent. Factors that influenced the acquisition of the vocabulary items included frequency of occurrence of a word in the story, amount of help that the context offered, and the frequency of the occurrence of the word in picture form within the text. Lambert (1991) replicated Elley's (1989) study and found that second language learners who listened to stories in English showed similar gains in second language vocabulary acquisition, specifically when the reading of the text was scaffolded for the child to facilitate understanding. She further discussed the view that such meaning-based mediation is often lacking from formal spelling and vocabulary instruction that has as a goal the teaching of new words.

The argument that students acquire vocabulary from listening to stories supports the concept of incidental language learning as proposed by Krashen (1985), Nagy and Herman (1987), and Elley (1991). This concept assumes that when children repeatedly interact with stories they will learn a great deal of vocabulary and syntax (Elley, 1991; Senechal, 1997) in addition to demonstrating increased comprehension (Dennis & Walter, 1995). Learning is facilitated by the context presented by the story and subsequent mediation that may function as the scaffold necessary for such learning to take place.

Vocabulary, Comprehension, and Background Knowledge

Tierney and Cunningham (1984) discussed the benefits of building background knowledge as the key to success in reading comprehension. This is especially critical for second language learners learning in English. suchprior knowledge serves as a link between the story and the child's language, thus facilitating comprehension and learning. In fact, Tierney and Cunningham argued that there may be a causal relationship between background knowledge and reading comprehension. They suggested using prereading activities that focus on building background knowledge by previewing content and activating existing schemata, or knowledge already stored in the memory.

Mezynski (1983) discussed the relationship between reading comprehension and vocabulary knowledge, noting that it is difficult for readers to comprehend text that contains many unfamiliar words. She further acknowledged the need to examine the process of vocabulary acquisition and its relationship to learning from text. In terms of this learning from text, Sternberg (1987) suggested that the process of acquiring word knowledge involves inferring from context, which serves to facilitate the learning of a large number of words given the ever increasing amount of text presented to students both in and out of the classroom. It is important to note that this sharply contrasts with the view of Adams (1990), among others, who suggests that good readers do not use the context, but rather rely on the words themselves to read.

Given the amount of exposure to vocabulary words in school and at home, it is probable that the major mode of vocabulary growth, once students have learned to read, comes from incidental learning of words from context through reading (Nagy & Herman, 1987). This would argue for conditions in schools that serve to increase the amount of incidental word learning by students, including increased time for reading (Nagy & Herman, 1987, p. 26). This is equally important for the second language learner who is learning vocabulary in his or her second language.

Boyle and Peregoy (1990) use the term literacy scaffolds to describe "temporary frameworks that offer students immediate access to the meanings and pleasure of print" (p. 194). Within the framework of second language learning, support in building background knowledge can serve as such a scaffold or schema and can help students to deal with some of the challenges inherent in second language learning. One way to facilitate said building of prior knowledge is through the use of patterned and predictable books that allow beginning readers and writers immediate access to a literacy event (Boyle & Peregoy, 1990). Rather than having to wait until they have the content knowledge or reading competence necessary to participate as an expert, this scaffold allows the novice to become an active participant in the processes of learning to read and write (Boyle & Peregoy, 1990).

Listening to Stories in Bilingual Classrooms

In looking at, and listening to stories within the framework of bilingual education, there are several methodologies that can be used to facilitate second language learners' understanding of English text. Two of these methods are concurrent translation and the preview-review method. For the purpose of this study concurrent translation is defined as the use of two languages interchangeably or concurrently during lessons, with care taken to avoid the use of direct translation from one language to the other. Problems with this methodology stem from the fact that students screen out the non-dominant language, and that the teacher may tend to use English more than the child's primary language, thus giving the English language implicit status as the more important language (Ramírez, 1992).

While research indicates that the use of the primary language is advantageous in promoting cognitive development as well as second language acquisition (Cummins, 1994), it is important to note that in examining the current literature on bilingual methodologies and second language literacy development, there is little to support the use of concurrent translation. Although competence in the use of this methodology may serve to improve its delivery, it still does not eliminate the inherent problems. Krashen (1985) argued that this method can have negative implications in terms of second language acquisition in that concurrent translation discourages comprehensible input. Rather then concentrate on having the student understand the input, it is translated into the student's primary language, effectively eliminating an opportunity for second language acquisition.

Given that such translation tends to inhibit second language growth by causing the learner to tune out the target language, there are other means of employing the primary language to facilitate the language development. Using the child's primary language to assist in the building of background knowledge which, in turn, serves to activate already established schemata—can support such language acquisition. The preview-review method may do just that. This method, as employed in this study, uses the two languages separately. Preview-review involves the presentation of subject matter to whole classes or groups of students, and one of its distinct advantages is that the two languages are not used concurrently with equal time theoretically devoted to each language (Legaretta-Marcaída, 1981). In order to implement this technique, the class is separated into dominant language groupings where a synopsis of the content is previewed in order to build background knowledge in the primary language. The lesson is then taught in the target language. After the lesson a review is done in language dominant groupings, expanding and reinforcing that which was taught during the lesson. With the preview-review method the teacher needs to rely on other means besides the primary language of the student in order to ensure that the lessons are comprehensible. In this manner students can acquire the second language while they are also learning the material being taught.

The support for this approach is based on the assumption that both languages are used in fairly equal amounts and are kept separate. Fillmore and Valadez (1986) suggested that maintaining parity in the use of the two languages is critical to achieving the goals of two-way bilingual programs. This would include enough primary language instruction to allow second language learners to continue to succeed academically while acquiring English, and enough English instruction to facilitate English acquisition. One continuing question is that of the necessary amount of each language to be used for program effectiveness. While research has shown equal amounts of both languages are important for program success, it has been found that teachers consistently use more English in the classroom (Ramírez, 1992).

It is also important to contextualize language within such a schematic framework, such as in the form of an interesting and predictable story. Second language vocabulary acquisition would be no exception. It is even more important for second language learners to activate schemata in order to make connections between new vocabulary and background knowledge. Further, this new vocabulary is easier to acquire within a contextualized framework (Andersson & Barnitz, 1984).

In order to explore the impact of using the primary language as a scaffold to facilitate vocabulary development for second language learners, this paper examines the effects of reading stories to second language learners with and without the use of such scaffolding. To look more closely at the relationships between read aloud and primary and second language support, two different bilingual methodologies (concurrent translation and preview-review) with varied amounts and types of scaffolding were employed as means of promoting access to text. This paper describes the differential impact of both methodologies.

 

Methodology

Setting and Sample

Maple Street School is a year-round bilingual school in the greater Los Angeles area. The school has approximately 1,200 students; 88% of the students have Spanish as their primary language. Approximately 75% of the students who have Spanish as their primary language are identified as English learners (ELs).¹ The students come from fairly stable homes; most families own the single-family homes where they live, and most children attend the school for several years. Approximately 85% of attending students participate in the government subsidized lunch and breakfast program. The school has a transitional bilingual program in which children are separated according to language for initial reading instruction and later "transitioned" or changed over to English language arts instruction when they reach a certain proficiency level in both Spanish reading and English. Each class had a mixture of English and Spanish readers at various levels.

Students from three-third grade classes at Maple Street School were chosen for data collection. Classes were randomly assigned to one of three groups: control (no treatment), n = 16; concurrent translation, n = 21; and preview-review, n = 23. It is important to note that the number of subjects was constrained by the number of ELs in each class. All children in each class participated in the study, but only those students who had Spanish as their primary language were included in the sample that was analyzed for this paper.

Data Collection Procedures

All students in three groups were given a pre test (see appendix) to assess their knowledge of selected vocabulary words from the book The Napping House by Don and Audrey Wood (1989). The book was chosen for its repetitious and pictorial representation of the target words, as well as predictability to facilitate the use of contextual clues. The test consisted of 20 vocabulary items taken directly from the text. Each vocabulary item was followed by four choices from which the student selected the most appropriate definition. Students were instructed to respond only to the words they knew, circling the correct response and crossing out the items they didn't know. Students were not penalized for incorrect answers in the scoring process; rather, they were given one point for every correct answer. In order to examine reliability of the test, two versions were administered, prior to data collection, to a similar population (32 fifth-grade students from the same school). There was a high correlation between the two versions (r = .981; p = .0001) of the instrument.

The same teacher administered all the treatments. After the administration of the pre test, students in Group 1 (control) listened to The Napping House in English with no intervention or explanation of the story. Students in Group 2 listened to the same story in English with the reader using the concurrent translation method (translating the story from one language to the other). Group 3 heard the same story in English after having the teacher build background knowledge by previewing important points and difficult vocabulary in Spanish (preview). They also reviewed the story in Spanish after the reading in order to reinforce important points (review). Pictures and role-playing, as well as the students' primary language, were used during the preview and review in order to introduce, elaborate, and build background knowledge. All three groups were given a post test (see appendix) of the same vocabulary items after the treatment to examine gains in scores. A delayed post test was administered one week later without rereading the story in order to examine retention rates.

Data Analysis

In order to control for the effects of the pre test that can be viewed as a measure of student aptitude, the regression approach was used. The pre test was regressed on the post test, after which the treatment was entered. Next, a repeated measures MANOVA (multiple analysis of variance) was used to explore differences between groups. Finally, since both methods indicated significant differences for the treatment, one-way ANOVAs (analyses of variance) followed by post hoc Scheffés were used to determine where the significant differences lie.

 

Findings

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of the treatments (concurrent translation and preview-review) on vocabulary acquisition. All groups demonstrated growth on the post test. Table one reports the means, standard deviations and gains for the three groups.

Table 1
Means (Standard Deviation) and Gains for Control and Experimental Groups

 

Of interest are the post test means for the concurrent and control groups. Note that the control group showed larger gains (see Table 1) than the concurrent group and that the concurrent group actually scored higher on the delayed post test one week later. This is consistent with the literature that suggests that students do not listen in the target language when an immediate translation follows. In addition, the literature on story telling reports student gains of approximately 20% after listening to stories without further instruction (Lambert, 1991). Gains in the control group mirrored these results; there was an overall gain of slightly over 19% for students in that group. Students in the concurrent translation group, on the other hand, showed gains of only 12% on the vocabulary test, while those in the preview-review group improved scores by an impressive 57%.

The effects of the treatments (concurrent translation and preview-review were initially examined with multiple regression. Due to the univariate nature of multiple regression, the post test, which had a high correlation (r = .9192; p = .01) with the delayed post test, was chosen as the dependent variable. Initial results (see Table 2) indicate that the pre test is the most significant predictor of success on the post test (R² = .67581; p = .0000). When the treatment is entered into the equation it can be seen that it too is significant (R² change = .05887; p = .0008), indicating that there is a significant effect due to the treatment.

Table 2

Regression Results

 

The results of the repeated measures MANOVA omnibus tests mirror the findings of the regression, indicating significant differences between groups. Since repeated measures MANOVA was used due to the pre-test/post-test design, all tests were entered into the procedure. Given that the effects of the treatments and their interactions were significant (multivariate effects of the tests, Pillais = 0.4139, F = 19.77315, p = .0000; interaction effects of the treatments and the tests, Pillais = 0.32778, F = 5.58639, p = .0000), the univariate tests for both effects were examined. The averaged tests of significance that again report significant differences for the interaction are reported in Table 3. These can be compared to the univariate F tests in a regular MANOVA, which generate the same results as one-way ANOVAs.

Table 3

Averaged Tests of Significance

 

Finally, to examine group differences a series of one-way ANOVAs followed by post hoc Scheffés were used (see Table 4).

Table 4

One-way ANOVAs on Pre, Post, and Delayed Post Tests

 

Examination of the results of the ANOVAs indicates that while there is no significant difference between groups on the pre test (F = 1.9155; p = 0.1566), both the post test (F = 9.1323; p = 0.0004) and the delayed post test (F = 6.2086; p = 0.0036) reflect significant differences for the treatment. The post hoc Scheffé tests report that the significant differences on the post test and the delayed post test lie between the concurrent translation group and the preview-review group.

 

Discussion

The present study examines the impact of reading aloud on second language acquisition, using two bilingual methodologies: concurrent translation and preview-review. Findings indicate that there is a significant difference between preview-review and concurrent translation in terms of English vocabulary acquisition as measured by a vocabulary test. It is clear that children learn and retain more vocabulary from listening to stories when a methodology that builds background knowledge by employing the primary language in a scaffolding type activity is used.

What is even more important to note is that the use of the primary language in the form of concurrent translation does not significantly facilitate this vocabulary acquisition. Students in the concurrent group made mean gains of 12%, as compared to 19% for the control group and 57% for the preview-review group (see Table 1), indicating that the concurrent group made less gains than even the group with no treatment. These findings seem to be consistent with the previously mentioned point that students tune out the non-dominant language when they know that a translation into the dominant language will immediately follow. In the case of vocabulary acquisition in the second language, this would lead to less acquisition than for those students who listened to the story only in English. This supports the view of keeping both languages separate in terms of instruction.

An interesting finding is the fact that the concurrent translation group is the only one that performed better on the delayed post test than on the post test administered immediately after hearing the story. This would seem to indicate that the learning due to repeating the test may have been more effective than the treatment (Pedhazur, 1982). However, a t-test run on the means (post, 7.333 and delayed post, 7.714) shows that this difference is not significant (t = -.381; p = .375).

Furthermore, the dramatic gains of the preview-review group (57%) surpass even Elley's (1989) findings of a growth of 33% with three repetitions of a story and brief explanations. While this story was only read once, the preview-review technique provided enough context to activate the schemata and assist the children to acquire the target vocabulary. Stahl (1986) also found that multiple exposures to vocabulary words facilitated their acquisition. While the preview-review group did not hear the story more than once, the type of mediation offered served the function of providing repeated exposure to target words. Elley (1989) found that the gains were permanent. In this study, gains were maintained for one week on the delayed post test without further instruction.

An interesting observation is that students in the preview-review group did spend more time listening to the story since the methodology called for both the preview and review of the vocabulary. Equally interesting, the concurrent translation group also spent more time listening to the story than the control group, but this did not seem to facilitate vocabulary development.

It is important to note, though, that the Scheffé test indicated that there is no statistically significant difference between the control group and the preview-review group on either of the post tests. Examining the means and standard deviations (see Table 1) shows the differences in gains to be rather diverse: 19% for the control group; 57% for the preview-review group. Possible reasons for the lack of statistical significance include the large variance in scores as evidenced by the large standard deviations, specifically for the control group, which has a standard deviation of 6.938 (mean = 10.438) on the post test as compared to 5.446 (mean = 14.87) for the preview-review group and a standard deviation of 7.157 (mean = 9.812) as compared to 5.538 (mean = 14.13) on the delayed post test. In addition, while a total sample of 60 seems adequate, the fact that this study focused on three groups makes sample size a limitation. Replication with a larger sample would serve to eliminate this problem.

 

Conclusions

Primary language support assists the student in acquiring second language vocabulary, specifically when there is no direct translation into the primary language. When methodologies that use the students' primary language as a scaffold to support learners are properly engaged, substantial vocabulary acquisition can result. Although on the surface the notion of translating the language into the students' primary language would seem reasonable, Krashen's (1985) input hypothesis explains why this is not so. When students know that the input will be translated into their primary language, they have no incentive to pay attention to input in English. Likewise, teachers using concurrent translation have no motivation to make the input comprehensible to the students; rather, they translate the content of the lesson into the students' primary language (Crawford, 1995).

The key to vocabulary acquisition, as well as language acquisition, can be seen as mediation of meaning. It is the role of teachers to mediate such acquisition using methodologies and techniques that focus their attention, that of the learners on understanding the text at hand. The results of this study show the positive effects of adhering to such a methodological and theoretical framework.

These findings support previous research indicating that listening to stories facilitates vocabulary acquisition (Elley, 1989; Lambert, 1991). While this study dealt specifically with the impact of reading aloud on English learners' second language vocabulary acquisition, it has implications for all learners in that it demonstrates the importance of meaning and understanding as literacy scaffolds. If use of the primary language as a scaffold in reading aloud facilitates vocabulary acquisition, as is evidenced by the present study, it should be more widely employed to facilitate such acquisition and guide English learners on the path toward second language literacy.

 

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Endnotes

¹ It is important to note that the term LEP (limited English proficient) is currently employed in the state of California to label students who are not proficient in English. To avoid the pejorative connotation of this term we will use the terms English learners or second language learners instead of LEP students throughout this paper.

 

Appendix: Pre/Post Test

The napping house Name:________________________ Teacher:___________________ Reading Book:____________________________________________ Instructions: Put a circle around the word that means the same as the underlined word.
napping walking home sewing sleeping	cozy rosy comfortable fun to do	everyone a lot of cats all the people silly song not
child a small cat hard to find a boy or girl	dozing knocking down walls painting crying	breaks grabs smashes into pieces walks in the door
snoring sneezing loudly a sleeping noise eating lunch	dreaming thinking in your sleep ice cream playing with toys	bumps knocks into runs falls into
bites hurts with teeth hides goes shopping	wakeful sad careful can't sleep	scares wipes clean tells a story finishes
flea small pencil small insect tall building	snoozing dancing looking at your watch swimming	mouse house small furry animal large animal with ears
claws jaws scratches with nails plays with birds	granny a type of fruit a long day hard work	no one lots of eggs all in the world no people
slumbering sleeping quietly waking heavily carrying too much playing nicely	thumps walks eats hits jumps