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Volume 6 Number 1, Spring 2009, Pages 1-214   


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Incorporating Rich Vocabulary Instruction into a Language Classroom

    Zorana Vasiljevic


This study examined how rich vocabulary instruction can be incorporated into a language classroom in a time-efficient and pedagogically effective way. The instruction focused on developing lexical knowledge of higher-level learners, whose progress often comes to halt after they have reached the intermediate plateau. The assumption of the study was that explicit, regular, systematic teaching of word collocations will widen students' understanding of the meaning of the target words and, more importantly, their usage, and that this was expected to increase their communicative competence. Vocabulary treatment consisted of a set of homework and classroom activities whose sequence was based on their cognitive complexity and included both richness and fluency-building tasks. The adopted model of instruction proved to be highly effective in improving learners' receptive and productive vocabulary. It also raised learners' awareness about the nature of lexis and helped them to develop the skills they need in order to build their knowledge of collocations and word grammar independently of the teacher.

Keywords: vocabulary instruction, collocations, independent learner