Effects of the teacher-provided and student-generated keyword methods on the immediate and delayed recall and recognition of vocabulary items under classroom conditions at a Turkish university

Abstract

This experimental study aimed at investigating the effects of a teacher-provided keyword method and a studentgenerated keyword method on recall and recognition of vocabulary items in comparison to a rote rehearsal control group. The study was conducted at Middle East Technical University Department of Basic English. The participants were 47 intermediate-level students in three intact classes. Research questions focused on the differences, if any, among the three groups in terms of recall and recognition of vocabulary items, as well as the differences, if any, with respect to retention of the learned vocabulary after treatment. To answer the research questions, three intact classes were chosen from the Middle East Technical University. One class was instructed in the teacher-provided keyword method and a second in the student-generated keyword method. The third group, which served as the control group, was asked to learn the words by rote rehearsal. Each group was allowed 25 minutes to learn the same 20 target vocabulary items. Before the treatment, each group was given a pretest, and the same test was given as a posttest immediately after treatment to test immediate recall and recognition. To measure long-term retention, that is delayed recall and recognition, the same test was given to the three groups after two weeks. These tests included separate recall and recognition sections. Pretest and posttest scores of recall and recognition were compared to measure acquisition of vocabulary items. Later, the posttest and retention test scores were compared to measure long-term retention. For the analysis, means and standard deviations were calculated and one-way analyses of co-variance were applied for each comparison of both recall and recognition separately to see if any method was significantly different from the others. Results did not show any statistically significant difference among the groups for the three tests of immediate and delayed recall and recognition of vocabulary. Treatment worked equally very well for all groups and posttest scores for all groups were very high. However, those groups did not differ significantly from each other. Findings suggest that the keyword strategy, whether provided by the teacher or generated by the students, is not superior to rote rehearsal for either recall or recognition at immediate or delayed testing in university classroom conditions.