An Analysis of the Features of Words That Influence Vocabulary Difficulty

Autor/inn/en	Hiebert, Elfrieda H.; Scott, Judith A.; Castaneda, Ruben; Spichtig, Alexandra
Titel	An Analysis of the Features of Words That Influence Vocabulary Difficulty
Quelle	In: Education Sciences, 9 (2019), Artikel 8 (24 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (Hiebert, Elfrieda H.) ORCID (Scott, Judith A.)
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	2227-7102
Schlagwörter	Difficulty Level; English Language Learners; Elementary School Students; Secondary School Students; Instructional Program Divisions; Grade 4; Grade 5; Alphabets; Syllables; Form Classes (Languages); Predictor Variables; Word Frequency; Semantics; Morphemes; Prior Learning; Native Language; Word Recognition; Student Evaluation; Vocabulary Development; Familiarity; California + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Schwierigkeitsgrad; Sekundarschüler; School year 04; 4. Schuljahr; Schuljahr 04; School year 05; 5. Schuljahr; Schuljahr 05; Buchstabenschrift; Silbe; Analytischer Sprachbau; Prädiktor; Word analysis; Frequency; Wortanalyse; Häufigkeit; Semantik; Morphem; Vorkenntnisse; Worterkennung; Schulnote; Studentische Bewertung; Wortschatzarbeit; Kalifornien
Abstract	The two studies reported on in this paper examine the features of words that distinguish students' performances on vocabulary assessments as a means of understanding what contributes to the ease or difficulty of vocabulary knowledge. The two studies differ in the type of assessment, the types of words that were studied, and the grade levels and population considered. In the first study, an assessment of words that can be expected to appear with at least moderate frequency at particular levels of text was administered to students in grades 2 through 12. The second study considered the responses of fourth- and fifth-grade students, including English learners, to words that teachers had identified as challenging for those grade levels. The effects of the same set of word features on students' vocabulary knowledge were examined in both studies: predicted appearances of a word and its immediate morphological family members, number of letters and syllables, dispersion across content areas, polysemy, part of speech, age of acquisition, and concreteness. The data consisted of the proportion of students who answered an item correctly. In the first study, frequency of a word's appearance in written English and age of acquisition predicted students' performances. In the second study, age of acquisition was again critical but so too were word length, number of syllables, and concreteness. Word location (which was confounded by word frequency) also proved to be a predictor of performance. Findings are discussed in relation to how they can inform curriculum, instruction, and research. (As Provided).
Anmerkungen	MDPI AG. Klybeckstrasse 64, 4057 Basel, Switzerland. Tel: e-mail: indexing@mdpi.com; Web site: http://www.mdpi.com
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2020/1/01