Purpose – Learner empowerment or learner autonomy is regarded by some theorists as the self-propelled, sole effort of the learner. However, in creating self-directed learners who are empowered to learn, the role of significant others such as the instructor is imperative. This study shows how a committed lecturer can play an instrumental role in facilitating self-directed learning among learners. Methodology – Learner autonomy in vocabulary learning was successfully facilitated among a group of Malay tertiary learners pursuing a Business Studies course in Malaysia. This qualitative study explored the lecturer’s proactive efforts and initiatives in raising learners’ confidence in learning vocabulary. Data were collected through reflective in-depth interviews with the lecturer and learners at the end of every week for one month to obtain insights into their learning experiences. Findings – The lecturer’s pedagogical approaches of providing sufficient learning opportunities in class, teaching vocabulary in context, using vocabulary lists and direct methods, and building lessons spirally to reinforce learning made complex tasks become manageable and achievable. These efforts were well-commended by the learners in this study. The lecturer's conscious decisions, namely, encouraging collaborative learning tasks and not forcing reluctant speakers were guided by her awareness of the learners’ cultural background which impinged on their learning preferences, thus, creating a non-threatening learning environment. Significance – This study establishes the case that learner empowerment is not teacherless learning but is fostered when the instructor is able to pitch the lesson at an appropriate level and create a conducive and positive learning environment to synchronise with the learners’ cultural traits.
Lexical knowledge forms a firm foundation in the second language (L2) learners' efforts to cope with academic tasks and manage the four language skills. At pre university level, many Malaysian learners struggle with the complexity of content and language. Hence, this study, guided by the theoretical paradigm of cognitivism was undertaken to explore learners' metacognitive awareness of declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge and conditional knowledge in learning lexical items when preparing for the Malaysian University English Test (MUET). A case study involving participants of varying language ability was carried out to explore how metacognitive awareness is embraced by these learners. Research data was obtained through in-depth interviews and journal records. The results indicate that these Malaysian learners have commendable degree of awareness, particularly in the domain of declarative and procedural knowledge. However, conditional knowledge is seen to be somewhat lacking, particularly from their instructor's perspective. In order to harness metacognitive awareness and enable learners to become self-directed, instructors need to make conscious decisions to cut back at the right time and let learners be at the forefront in the learning process. It is also vital that instructors know the basic roots and then focus on the advanced concepts, subsequently, making informed decisions on the type of vocabulary and structural items to be imparted, so as to enhance metacognitive awareness of lexical items. Contribution/ Originality: This qualitative study contributes to the literature on Malaysian university students' metacognition in vocabulary learning. The study provides rich insights into the three types of metacognitive awareness, to enable instructors to make informed decisions on the type of vocabulary and viable methods to harness metacognitive awareness among learners. 1. INTRODUCTION Words are the "basic building blocks of language" (Brown, 2001) therefore, lexical knowledge forms a firm foundation of language competence for both native and non-native learners of English language. In view of this, vocabulary enrichment is seen as the moderating variable in the four language skills, namely, listening, speaking, reading and writing (Afzal, 2019; Harkio & Pietilä, 2016). This is so as sufficient lexis facilitates a learner's daily oral communication (Afzal, 2019) and assists various types of reading (Harkio & Pietilä, 2016; Li & Kirby, 2015; Masrai, 2019). In reading authentic texts, comprehension of a minimum of 3,000 written word families is required of a non-native user of English (Schmitt & Schmitt, 2014). This is also stressed by Masrai (2019) who affirms the
Argumentative writing has been regarded as an essential form of written discourse in Malaysia, specifically in Malaysian University English Test (MUET). However, limited research has been conducted on the MUET argumentative essay writing component for pre-university students. The purpose of this preliminary study is to investigate a compiled representative learner corpus to conduct an analysis of the linguistic features; lexical verbs used in Band 3 and Band 5 argumentative essays produced by students of a pre-university college in Malaysia. Subsequently, the lexical verbs utilized in the respective essays were compared. As a descriptive analysis and corpus-based study, the use of lexical verb forms was examined, reflecting the learners' knowledge of applying this linguistic constituent into their written essays. The method applied in the analysis is a computer-based learner corpus analysis. Results revealed that Band 5 essays contained more '-ing' participle (VVG) form, whereas Band 3 essays revealed the use of more past participle (VVN) form. Surprisingly, both groups avoided the base form of lexical verb (VVO). The pedagogical implications based on the results of the study were proposed and the ideas for future research were discussed.
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