Evaluating some ways of semantisation of the vocabulary in teaching English in high schools

Abstract

The study presents evaluation and analyses of some ways for semantisation in foreign vocabulary mastery in teaching English in high schools. The study aims to identify effective ways of semantisation in vocabulary teaching and word mastery. The relevance of the present study can be explained by the fact that identifying effective ways of semantisation in vocabulary teaching may aid higher English language proficiency of the 10th-grade students in meeting the curriculum requirements and standards. This also relates to the fact that teaching vocabulary remains to be one of the central issues in foreign language acquisition, as it is the basis for both productive and perceptive skills. It is hard to imagine a learner speaking a foreign language well without sufficient vocabulary. Thus, one of the main tasks in the EFL class is to expand the vocabulary of learners. The study provides general background on the peculiarities of teaching and learning foreign vocabulary, types of vocabulary, and reviews some ways of semantisation. The authors have reviewed and classified vocabulary semantisation into several groups: semantisation through translation, demonstration, description, numeration, synonyms, antonyms, semantic fields. A survey was applied to identify the effectiveness of the ways of semantisation in teaching vocabulary. Thirty-eight 10th-grade students answered survey questions and shared their perceptions and views on the ways of teaching vocabulary in EFL classrooms. According to survey results, semantisation of vocabulary based on lexical-semantic fields and description were evaluated as the most effective ways. It was found that each semantisation method may work effectively if it is applied with the appropriate word, phrase, or concept.