Direct Approach

Dictionary Use and Vocabulary Learning

The debate of whether dictionaries should be used in the foreign language classroom, and what dictionaries, if at all, should be used has always been a lively one amongst language teachers and lexicographers. Empirical research on dictionaries has largely focused on comparing the usefulness of dictionaries with that of guessing (Knight, 1994). And only ahandful of these studies took vocabulary growth as their dependent variable (Knight, 1994; Luppescu & Day, 1993), most others investigated the usefulness of dictionaries in reading comprehension. Dictionary strategies, if at all encouraged, have normally been proposed in a prescriptive manner (Scholfield, 1982; Thompson, 1987).

How useful are dictionaries?

Like it or not, a dictionaryis amongst the first things a foreign language student purchases (Baxter, 1980; Luppescu & Day, 1993), and learners carry their dictionaries around, not grammar books (Krashen, 1989). Empirical research on whether dictionaries are helpful and how best dictionaries can be used, however, is only beginning to catch up. Amongst all the questions that can be asked of dictionaries, one has receivedthe most attention: Which is better, using a dictionary or simply guessing from context? Or to put it another way: Do dictionaries make a difference?

Dictionaries and vocabulary learning

Most studies on the effectiveness of dictionaries in vocabulary learning have been conducted in L1 settings, and most have compared dictionary definitions with contextual guessing. In general, results inthese studies favored the contextual guessing approach (Crist, 1981; Crist & Petrone, 1977; Gipe, 1978). These results were, however, confounded by the fact that the contextual guessing groups read texts that included definitions or examples, and were therefore exposed to dictionary-like situations as well as natural texts (Knight, 1994). Stahl and Fairbanks’ (1986) meta-analysis of L1-basedvocabulary studies did reveal that a combined approach is more effective than either dictionary only or contextual guessing only. [-6-]

Recent years have witnessed a surge of interest in dictionary research in L2 contexts (e.g., Hulstijn, 1993; Knight, 1994; Laufer & Hadar, 1997; Laufer & Hill, 2000; Laufer & Kimmel, 1997). Knight (1994), for example, discovered that whileincidental vocabulary learning through contextual guessing did take place, those who used a dictionary as well as guessed through context not only learned more words immediately after reading but also remembered more after two weeks. She also found that low verbal ability participants benefited more from the dictionary than high verbal ability participants who, in turn, benefited more from contextualguessing. Another interesting thing Knight found was that high verbal ability students would look up a word even if they had successfully guessed its meaning, a finding in line with Hulstijn (1993).

The advantage of a dictionary was corroborated in a study of 293 Japanese EFL university students by Luppescu and Day (1993). Participants were randomly assigned to a treatment (dictionary) group(N=145) and a control (no dictionary) group (N=148) and were asked to read a short story in class. The treatment group used a bilingual English-Japanese dictionary of their own choice, and the control group were not allowed to use any dictionaries. Neither group were told of the multiple-choice vocabulary test that was administered immediately after reading. Results suggested a clear advantage for thedictionary group in vocabulary learning through reading, but the dictionary group took almost twice as long to read the passage as did the control group.

Further evidence of the usefulness of a dictionary for ESL/EFL students can be found in Summers (1988) who reported the results of three experiments done on the effectiveness of the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English both in reading...