2020-01-14
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To prepare the puzzle, I cut two equal-sized pieces of cardboard paper into rectangles. The selected idioms were written onto the rectangles in the puzzle-pieces board and their definitions on the game board. On the reverse side of the puzzle-pieces board, I glued colorful photographs of landscapes and then cut the puzzle-pieces board into individual pieces, each with an idiom on it. The important thing was the distribution of the idioms and their definitions on the boards. The definitions were placed in the same horizontal row opposite to the idioms so that when put together face to face each idiom faced its definition.
Puzzle Pieces Board
The idioms and their definitions were the following (all taken from The Penguin Dictionary of English Idioms p.77):
1. to be soft in the head: foolish, not very intelligent;
2. to have one's hair stand on end: to be terrified;
3. to be two-faced: to agree with a person to his face but disagree with him behind his back;
4. to make a face: to make a grimace which may express disgust, anger;
5. to be all eyes: to be very attentive;
6. to be an eye-opener: to be a revelation;
7. to be nosy: to be inquisitive, to ask too many questions;
8. to be led by the nose: to be completely dominated by, totally influenced by;
9. long ears: an inquisitive person who is always asking too many questions;
10. to be all ears: to listen very attentively;
11. to be wet behind the ears: to be naive, inexperienced;
12. a loose mouth: an indiscrete person;
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13. one's lips are sealed: to be obliged to keep a secret;
14. to have a sweet tooth: to have a liking for sweet food, sugar, honey, ice cream, etc.;
15. to grind one's teeth: to express one's fury;
16. to hold one's tongue: to say nothing, to be discrete;
The task for students. Work out the puzzle by matching the idioms and their definitions. First, put puzzle-pieces on the desk with the word facing up. Take one and match the idiom to the definition. Having done that, place the puzzle-piece, word-side-up, in the chosen rectangle. When you have used up all the pieces, turn them over. If they form a picture of a landscape, the choices are correct. If not, rearrange the picture and check the idiom-definition correspondences.
The game objectives. To work out the puzzle, students had to match idioms with their definitions. The objective of the game was for each pair to cooperate in completing the activity successfully in order to expand their vocabulary with, in this case, colloquial expressions.
All students were active and enjoyed the activity. Some of their comments were as follows: "Very interesting and motivating" "Learning can be a lot of fun" etc.
Students also had to find the appropriate matches in the shortest time possible to beat other participating groups. The element of competition among the groups made them concentrate and think intensively.
Translation activity. The other group of students had to work out the meanings of the idioms by means of translation. Unlike the previously described group, they did not know the definitions. The expressions were listed on the board, and students tried to guess their proper meanings giving different options. My role was to direct them to those that were appropriate. Students translated the idioms into Polish and endeavored to find similar or corresponding expressions in their mother tongue. Unlike the game used for the purpose of idiom introduction, this activity did not require the preparation of any aids. Fewer learners participated actively or enthusiastically in this lesson and most did not show great interest in the activity.
Administering the test. In order to find out which group acquired new vocabulary better, I designed a short test, for both groups containing a translation into English and a game. This allowed learners to activate their memory with the type of activity they had been exposed to in the presentation.
The test checking the acquisition of newly-introduced reading vocabulary
I. Match the definitions of the idioms with the pictures and write which idiom is depicted and described:
1. to be inexperienced
2. to listen very attentively
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3. to be terrified
4. to be dominated by someone
5. to be attentive
6. to be insincere, dishonest
The proper answers are the following:
1. d., to be wet behind the ears
2. a., to be all ears
3. e., to have one's hair stand on end
4. f., to be led by the nose
5. b., to be all eyes
6. c., to be two-faced.
II. Translate into English (the translated sentences should be the following):
1. He is soft in the head.
2. She is two-faced, always criticizes me behind my back.
3. Mark has a sweet tooth, so he is not too slim.
4. Will you hold your tongue if I tell you something?
5. Why are you such a loose mouth?
6. Don't be nosy! This is none of your business.
Analysis of the results. Group I received an average mark of 3.9 as compared to 3.4 obtained by group II. In other words, the group which had learned vocabulary through games performed significantly better. However, it is especially interesting and surprising that group II also received high scores for the game. Even though learners in group I had the material presented by means of translation, most students got better marks for the game.
Summing up. Even though the results of one activity can hardly lead to informative conclusions, I believe that the results suggest that the use of games for presentation of new vocabulary is very effective and enjoyable for students. Despite the fact that the preparation of a game may be time-consuming and suitable material may be hard to find, teachers should try to use them to add diversion to presentational techniques.
Revising vocabulary
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Many sources referred to in this article emphasise the importance of vocabulary revision. This process aims at helping students acquire active, productive vocabularies. Students need to practise regularly what they have learnt; otherwise, the material will fade away. Teachers can resort to many techniques for vocabulary consolidation and revision. To begin with, a choice of graphs and grids can be used. Students may give a definition of a given item to be found by other students. Multiple choice and gap filling exercises will activate the vocabulary while students select the appropriate response. Teachers can use lists of synonyms or antonyms to be matched, sentences to be paraphrased, or just some words or expressions in context to be substituted by synonymous expressions. Doing cloze tests will show students' understanding of a passage, its organisation, and determine the choice of lexical items. Visual aids can be of great help with revision. Pictures, photographs, or drawings can facilitate the consolidation of both individual words as well as idioms, phrases and structures. There is also a large variety of word games that are "useful for practising and revising vocabulary after it has been introduced" (Haycraft). Numerous puzzles, word squares, crosswords, etc., are useful especially for pair or group work.
I shall now present the games I have used for vocabulary revision.
Description of the group. I gave teachers a questionnaire to determine their view of using games for vocabulary teaching. In response to the questionnaire, many teachers said they often used games for vocabulary revision. Some claimed they were successful and usually more effective than other methods. To see if this is really true, I decided to use a crossword puzzle with a group of first year students.
The crossword puzzle. After completing a unit about Van Gogh, students wanted to expand their vocabulary with words connected with art. The students compiled lists of words, which they had learnt. In order to revise the vocabulary, one of the groups had to work out the crossword puzzle.
Students worked in pairs. One person in each pair was provided with part A of the crossword puzzle and the other with part B. The students' task was to fill in their part of the puzzle with the missing words known to their partner. To complete the activity, learners had to ask each other for the explanations, definitions, or examples to arrive at the appropriate answers. Only after getting the answer right could they put it down in the suitable place of their part of the crossword. Having completed the puzzle, students were supposed to find out what word was formed from the letters found in the shaded squares.
Students enjoyed the activity very much and did not resort to translation at any point. They used various strategies to successfully convey the meanings of the words in question-e.g., definitions, association techniques, and examples. When everyone was ready, the answers were checked and students were asked to give examples of definitions, explanations, etc., they had used to get the missing words.
The other group performed a similar task. Students were to define as follows:
I. Define the following words: shade, icon, marker, fresco, perspective, hue, daub, sculptor, still life, watercolor, palette, background.
II. Find the words these definitions describe:
1. a public show of objects
2. a variety of a colour
3. a wooden frame to hold a picture while it is being painted
4. a pale or a delicate shade of a colour
5. a picture of a wide view of country scenery
6. an instrument for painting made of sticks, stiff hair, nylon
7. a painting, drawing, or a photograph of a real person
8. a piece of work, especially art which is the best of its type or the best a person has made
9. painting, music, sculpture, and others chiefly concerned with producing beautiful rather than useful things
10. a line showing the shape (of something)
11. a person who is painted, drawn, photographed by an artist
12. a picture made with a pen, pencil, etc.
Analysis of results. The results show that the crossword puzzle, though seemingly more difficult since it required the knowledge of words and their definitions and not mere recognition and matching, was easier for 27.4% of the learners and granted them more points for this part of the test. For the majority of the students (nearly 60%) both activities proved equally easy and out of the group of thirteen, eleven students had the highest possible score.
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Summing up
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These numbers suggest that games are effective activities as a technique for vocabulary revision. Students also prefer games and puzzles to other activities. Games motivate and entertain students but also help them learn in a way which aids the retention and retrieval of the material (This is what the learners stated themselves).
However, the numbers also show that not everyone feels comfortable with games and puzzles and not everyone obtains better results.
Although one cannot overgeneralise from one game, student feedback indicates that many students may benefit from games in revision of vocabulary.
Conclusions
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Recently, using games has become a popular technique exercised by many educators in the classrooms and recommended by methodologists. Many sources, including the ones quoted in this work, list the advantages of the use of games in foreign language classrooms. Yet, nowhere have I found any empirical evidence for their usefulness in vocabulary presentation and consolidation.
Though the main objectives of the games were to acquaint students with new words or phrases and help them consolidate lexical items, they also helped develop the students' communicative competence.
From the observations, I noticed that those groups of students who practised vocabulary activity with games felt more motivated and interested in what they were doing. However, the time they spent working on the words was usually slightly longer than when other techniques were used with different groups. This may suggest that more time devoted to activities leads to better results. The marks students received suggested that the fun and relaxed atmosphere accompanying the activities facilitated students' learning. But this is not the only possible explanation of such an outcome. The use of games during the lessons might have motivated students to work more on the vocabulary items on their own, so the game might have only been a good stimulus for extra work.
Although, it cannot be said that games are always better and easier to cope with for everyone, an overwhelming majority of pupils find games relaxing and motivating. Games should be an integral part of a lesson, providing the possibility of intensive practise while at the same time immensely enjoyable for both students and teachers. My research has produced some evidence which shows that games are useful and more successful than other methods of vocabulary presentation and revision. Having such evidence at hand, I wish to recommend the wide use of games with vocabulary work as a successful way of acquiring language competence.
Note-taking
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A Useful Device
