Promoting Vietnamese Learners’ Knowledge of English Phrasal Verbs: An Action Research Study

Abstract

This study aims to promote the learning of phrasal verbs (PVs) of Vietnamese low-intermediate adult English-as-a-foreign language (EFL) learners. Thirty-one students were involved in the study over an eleven-week span. In this study we adopted an action research design with a four-stage procedure, including planning, acting, observing and reflecting. The planning stage starts with exploring how PVs are introduced in the textbooks through document analysis and investigating the students’ current knowledge of PVs thorough diagnose text. The acting stage goes with implementing some measures to raise the students’ awareness of the syntactic and semantic features of this lexico-grammatical area and to increase their uptake of PVs through both incidental and intentional learning. The observing phase works on systematically and continually evaluating the effectiveness of the action taken through regular, progressive tests and in-class discussion. The effectiveness of the treatment was measured with pre-, immediate post-, and delayed post-tests in a form of gap filling multiple choice individual sentences. The final stage is reflecting - mirroring the gains and limitations of the teaching and testing techniques implemented. The results of this study reveal a constrained depiction of the PVs in certain aspects, echoing concerns highlighted in prior research. The findings propose that the integration of PV instruction into the comprehensive enhancement of language proficiency for A1-B1 proficiency levels, coupled with a targeted cognitive approach to PVs at the A2-B1 levels, can result in enhanced, enduring retention of PV knowledge. This study deliberates on pragmatic implications for the efficacious advancement of EFL learners' comprehension and utilization of PVs.

The Effectiveness of a Proposed Program Integrating Focus on Form and Gamified Learning in Fostering Egyptian English Majors' Phrasal Verbs Comprehension and Production

“…Examples of two-word phrasal verbs include 'look up ', 'get through', 'make out', 'give in', 'put off' and 'turn up'. Instances of three-word PVs include 'put up with', 'make up for', 'run out of', 'look forward to', 'catch up on' and 'look down on'. Thus, phrasal verbs are complex chunks where syntax and lexis overlap (Gardner & Davies, 2007;Jahedi & Mukundan, 2015;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023).…”

“…In terms of register, most PVs are frequently used in informal colloquial spoken contexts (Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Rodríguez-Puente & Obaya-Cueli, 2022). Hence, they are naturally employed in native speakers' daily conversations, movies, songs, newspapers headlines and talk shows (McCarthy & O'Dell, 2007;Badri-Ahmadi & Panahandeh, 2016;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Thyab, 2019;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). However, some PVs are used in formal contexts (McCarthy & O'Dell, 2007).…”

“…On average, EFL learners usually encounter one PV in every 150 English words they read or listen to (Gardner & Davies, 2007). Additionally, PVs are constantly coined by native English speakers (Badri-Ahmadi & Panahandeh, 2016;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). Therefore, acquiring PVs is important for EFL learners as it enhances their fluency, proficiency, naturalness and effective expression of ideas (Thyab, 2019).…”

“…Despite their importance, PVs represent a major source of difficulty for EFL learners ( Jahedi & Mukundan, 2015;Badri-Ahmadi & Panahandeh, 2016;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Teng, 2018;Okoh & Ghampson, 2019;Ravn, 2021;Alshayban, 2022;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). This difficulty can be attributed to PVs high frequency, complexity, arbitrariness, unfamiliarity and opaque polysemous meanings in many cases (White, 2012;Badri-Ahmadi & Panahandeh, 2016;Garnier, 2016;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Alshayban, 2022;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). Therefore, many EFL learners avoid using PVs in communication (Jahedi & Mukundan, 2015;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023).…”

“…This difficulty can be attributed to PVs high frequency, complexity, arbitrariness, unfamiliarity and opaque polysemous meanings in many cases (White, 2012;Badri-Ahmadi & Panahandeh, 2016;Garnier, 2016;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Alshayban, 2022;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). Therefore, many EFL learners avoid using PVs in communication (Jahedi & Mukundan, 2015;Ghorbanian & Jabbarpoor, 2017;Ton, Tran & Dang, 2023). For instance, Barekat and Baniasady (2014) found that Iranian English majors avoid using PVs in their writing, thus making the goal of achieving native-like proficiency unattainable.…”