Student Factors Related to Variability in Learning Word Meanings from Context

Abstract

This study examined how vocabulary knowledge, the familiarity of concepts, and analytic reasoning affect sixth-grade students' ability to learn word meanings from the context of natural passages in a basal reading textbook. The results indicated that students with higher levels of general vocabulary knowledge learned relatively more, even though they had less room for improvement. Low students were at a disadvantage not only because they initially knew fewer words but also because they understood words less well. Also among low vocabulary students, words representing familiar concepts were more likely to be learned than those representing unfamiliar concepts. The study suggested that general and passage specific vocabulary knowledge are important variables influencing learning from context. General analytic reasoning was not a significant factor.Word count studies have consistently found that a large number of words occur in school materials and that the vast majority of these words

The Influence of Reading on Vocabulary Growth: A Case for a Matthew Effect

“…On the other hand, those same readers are less likely to encounter ceiling effects because any given text is more likely to include words that are novel to them. This argument made by Shefelbine (1990), however, concerns the effect of initial vocabulary skill on vocabulary growth. This is in contrast to the current study, which addresses the relationship of reading skill and vocabulary growth.…”

“…There was no hypothesis for the second question in this study because no previous research has addressed this specific question and there might be some reason to expect either a two-sided or a one-sided Mathew effect. As Shefelbine (1990) pointed out, readers with lower initial vocabulary knowledge will necessarily have an impoverished semantic context for inferring new word meaning, which might lead to lower rates of vocabulary growth. On the other hand, those same readers are less likely to encounter ceiling effects because any given text is more likely to include words that are novel to them.…”

The Role of Self-Teaching in Learning Orthographic and Semantic Aspects of New Words

“…Therefore, the ability to understand individual words plays an important role in semantic learning (cf. Cain et al, 2004;Ewers & Brownson, 1999;Sénéchal et al, 1995;Shefelbine, 1990).…”

“…Equally though, existing vocabulary knowledge is a significant predictor of semantic learning following reading (e.g., Cain et al, 2004;Ewers & Brownson, 1999;Sénéchal, Thomas, & Monker, 1995;Shefelbine, 1990). Cain et al (2004) found that the ability to infer word meanings from context was predicted by both oral vocabulary and reading comprehension but that reading comprehension emerged as the stronger predictor.…”

Learning vocabulary through meaning-focused input: Replication of Elley (1989) and Liu & Nation (1985)

“…The descriptive data also indicated that the participants with the lowest scores on the pre-test made the greatest gains. However, because participants with higher pretest scores could learn fewer words than those with lower pre-test scores, it is necessary to examine relative learning gains rather than actual learning gains in this analysis (Shefelbine 1990;Horst, Cobb, & Meara 1998). However, the absence of inferential analysis and effect sizes in all of the comparisons between the groups makes it difficult to clearly determine the validity of these conclusions.…”