ERIC Number: EJ1247852
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2017
Pages: 20
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-2094-3938
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Helping Language Learners Get Started with Concordancing
Jeaco, Stephen
TESOL International Journal, v12 n1 p91-110 2017
While studies exploring the overall effectiveness of Data Driven Learning activities have been positive, learner participants often seem to report difficulties in deciding what to look up, and how to formulate appropriate queries for a search (Gabel, 2001; Sun, 2003; Yeh, Liou, & Li, 2007). "The Prime Machine" (Jeaco, 2015) was developed as a concordancing tool to be used specifically for looking up, comparing and exploring vocabulary and language patterns for English language teaching and self-tutoring. The design of this concordancer took a pedagogical perspective on the corpus techniques and methods to be used, focusing on English for Academic Purposes and including important software design principles from Computer Aided Language Learning. The software includes a range of search support and display features which try to make the comparison process for exploring specific words and collocations easier. This paper reports on student use of this concordancer, drawing on log data records from mouse clicks and software features as well as questionnaire responses from the participants. Twenty-three undergraduate students from a Sino-British university in China participated in the evaluation. Results from logs of search support features and general use of the software are compared with questionnaire responses from before and after the session. It is believed that "The Prime Machine" can be a very useful corpus tool which, while simple to operate, provides a wealth of information for language learning.
Descriptors: Learning Activities, Second Language Learning, Second Language Instruction, Computer Assisted Instruction, Computational Linguistics, English for Academic Purposes, Computer Software, Comparative Analysis, Language Patterns, Language Usage, Vocabulary, Recordkeeping, Student Attitudes, Foreign Countries, Teaching Methods, Independent Study, College Students, Phrase Structure
English Language Education Publishing. Site Skills Training - Clark, Centennial Road, Clark Freeport Zone, Clark, Pampanga 2023, Philippines. e-mail: asianefl@gmail.com; Web site: https://www.elejournals.com/tesol-international-journal/; Web site: https://www.tesol-international-journal.com/
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: China
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A