The Effect of Exercise Types on EFL Learners’ Vocabulary Retention

This study attempts to investigate the intermediate EFL learners’ vocabulary retention of the newly learned words which had different parts of speech by using recognition (fill-in-the-blank and matching) and production (paraphrasing and gap- filling) exercises in immediate and delayed tests. The sample of the study included 40 Iranian EFl learners at intermediate level. 40 new Words are taught through texts and dialogue. Then they did exercises. The meaning of other words in the exercises which were not taught, was provided in a mini dictionary and before the test they were collected. In doing each types of exercises the learners provided an English synonym, definition, translation, or matching of the word. After a two week interval, the participants' vocabulary learning was tested through the final vocabulary test containing all the words presented in four exercise types. The results of the study showed that learners recalled more words in fill-in-the-blank exercise than other exercise types both in immediate and delayed tests. The findings also indicated that recognition exercises were more effective than production exercises in EFL vocabulary retention. Learners’ operations in immediate tests were better than in delayed tests in four different exercise types.

Keywords:

production exercises , recognition exercises , immediate test , delayed test , vocabulary retention