EFL and ESL Learners in one context: Who is at a disadvantage?

The main aim behind the present study was to explore the effect of textgeneration on incidental vocabulary learning in EFL and ESL contexts. The totalnumber of one hundred and thirty two male and female students participated in the study. They belonged in three subgroups as follows:- 50 Indian learners from the Karnataka State in India (28 male and 22 femalestudents); - 47 Iranian learners from Markazi Province in Iran (23 male and 24 femalestudents), and, -35 Iranian learners in ESL context who were studying at Maharaja and Mahajana Colleges in Mysore, India (16 female and 19 male students).Homogeneity of the subjects was ascertained by a TOEFL test. A multiplechoice vocabulary test, developed based on the target vocabulary items in the twelveselected passages, was used as a pre-test and post-test. It may be worth mentioning that, the test had gone through certain steps for modification and adjustments at theconstruction stage before it was presented to the respondents. In the treatment period,students were presented with scrambled texts. Clearly, the target vocabulary items were underlined. The subjects were told to rearrange the sentences into the sequencethat made the maximum sense to them (text-generation).While performing the task, students were supposed to guess the meanings of those vocabulary items. All thethree groups had more or less equal exposure to the texts. Data analysis manifestedthat those students who are in ESL context scored significantly higher than their peers in EFL context. Further, it has been revealed that text-generation had significantly impact either on EFL or EFL learners in incidental vocabulary learning

Keywords:

text-generation , incidental vocabulary learning , EFL , ESL