Word-Formation Tasks in the Context of Short Stories in an EFL Classroom

Novinec, Andrej (author), Blake, Jason Frederick (mentor)

This master’s thesis explores students’ success in word-formation tasks based on Donald Barthelme’s short story “The School” and examines whether word-formation teaching using short stories can positively impact students’ comprehension of word-formation processes. Researchers claim that literature in general is beneficial for students, especially due to its linguistic authenticity and the effects that it has on the language proficiency, vocabulary acquisition, motivation, cultural awareness and cognition. Word formation enables learners to more easily understand unfamiliar words on the basis of their previous lexical knowledge and create new lexical items. Among word-formation mechanisms, derivation, conversion and stress shift are the processes that are given the most attention to in schools since they are the most common ways of word formation in English. Due to its extensiveness, unpredictability and discrepancies, however, word formation is often difficult for teachers to fully and systematically present. For the same reasons, many students struggle to grasp and comprehend the theory behind word-formation processes. For the purposes of this thesis, quantitative research in the form of two examinations was carried out. The tasks included were of different types which offered a well-rounded approach to word- formation testing. The research partially confirmed that word-formation tasks in the context of short stories lead to better results than non-contextualised ones. In addition, although short stories can be beneficial for classroom use, they are not the perfect tool for all teaching situations. Lastly, the research confirmed that systematically focusing on one type of word formation accounts for better results than including various word-formation mechanisms in the same task.

• Language: English
• Keywords: word formation, short stories, story-based teaching, derivation, “The School”
• Work type: Master's thesis/paper
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Year: 2022
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-137306
• COBISS.SI-ID: 111197187
• Publication date in RUL: 10.06.2022

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Title: Besedotvorne naloge v kontekstu kratkih zgodb pri pouku angleščine

Abstract

V tem magistrskem delu smo raziskovali uspeh učencev pri besedotvornih nalogah, ki temeljijo na kratki zgodbi Donalda Barthelmeja, The School. Ob enem smo preučevali, ali ima lahko učenje besedotvorja prek uporabe kratkih zgodb pozitiven vpliv na razumevanje besedotvornih postopkov. Iz literature je razvidno, da je književnost praviloma koristna za učence, še posebej zaradi svoje jezikovne avtentičnosti in učinka, ki ga ima na učenčevo jezikovno usposobljenost, usvajanje besedišča, motivacijo, kulturno zavest in kognicijo. Poznavanje besedotvorja učencem omogoča lažje razumevanje neznanih besed glede na svoje predhodno jezikovno znanje in tvorbo novih besed. Med besedotvornimi postopki je pri pouku največ poudarka na izpeljavi, konverziji in spremembi mesta naglasa, saj so to najbolj pogosti načini tvorjenja besed v angleščini. Zaradi svoje obsežnosti, nepredvidljivosti in neskladij, ki se pojavljajo, je učiteljem znanje besedotvorja pri pouku pogosto težko sistematično in v celoti predati, učencem pa to znanje usvojiti. Za namene tega magistrskega dela smo izvedli kvantitativno raziskavo v obliki dveh testov. Naloge, ki smo jih vključili, so bile različnih tipov, da smo kar najširše zajeli preizkušanje znanja besedotvorja. Raziskava je delno potrdila, da besedotvorne naloge, ki temeljijo na uporabi kratkih zgodb, vodijo k boljšim rezultatom kot tiste, ki besedotvorje obravnavajo v izolaciji. Kljub temu, da so kratke zgodbe pri pouku lahko koristne, pa niso popoln pedagoški pripomoček za vsakršno učno situacijo. Nazadnje pa smo z raziskavo potrdili, da ločena obravnava vsakega besedotvornega postopka posebej vodi k boljšim rezultatom, kot hkratno vključevanje več različnih postopkov v isti nalogi.

• Keywords: besedotvorje, kratke zgodbe, učenje s pomočjo zgodb, izpeljevanje, The School