<p>Based on the survey of Chinese students in a Sweden university,the present study finds out that Chinese EFL learners at a low level can benefit from incidental English vocabulary acquisition through reading aided by glosses, that they prefer glosses in reading materials, and whether Chinese gloss and English gloss differ in effectiveness on incidental vocabulary learning.</p>

Based on the survey of Chinese students in a Sweden university,the present study finds out that Chinese EFL learners at a low level can benefit from incidental English vocabulary acquisition through reading aided by glosses, that they prefer glosses in reading materials, and whether Chinese gloss and English gloss differ in effectiveness on incidental vocabulary learning.

One can argue that songs offer a useful learning opportunity for learning English as a second language since it includes the combination of music and text. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine in what ways songs can affect the ESL classroom. The aim is further to compare and apply the findings to a Swedish upper secondary school context to examine how development can take place for ESL learners in Sweden. Moreover, the approach to this study consisted of a literaturereview of articles within the research area, which were used to answer the two research questions: To what extent can the use of songs in the ESL classroom stimulate incidental vocabulary learning?Additionally, what are other potential benefits from using songs in the ESL classroom? The results were unified regarding the main question of songs and vocabulary acquisition; all findings included positive effects of songs on incidental vocabulary learning and retention of new words. Moreover, implementing songs in the ESL classroom showed more positive attitudes towards school among students and teachers; in addition, the results indicated on a decrease regarding anxiety and stress among the learners. Furthermore, the Swedish National Curriculum emphasizes the importance of a positive classroom environment for the learners, and the syllabus for English requires a variety of texts, in which songs can offer useful learning conditions for vocabulary acquisition. Therefore, the song-based approach is presented as suitable for a Swedish upper secondary classroom.

The importance of vocabulary knowledge gained through incidental learning is well documented. The growth of incidental vocabulary knowledge is especially crucial for middle school students due to the complex words encountered in their studies. However, research on incidental vocabulary acquisition for middle school students is lacking. The purpose of this study was to compare the relative effectiveness of three instructional conditions (reading, writing, and reading and writing) on incidental vocabulary acquisition and retention with middle school students in an English as a first language (L1) environment. In this within subjects repeated measure study, 263 eighth-grade participants received treatment in three instructional conditions with three differing levels of involvement load. Data from 2,893 individual student measures were used to evaluate the influence of instructional conditions on incidental vocabulary acquisition and retention. Analysis of mixed-effects models showed that participant scores on the reading and writing condition were consistently higher than the writing only or the reading only condition. These results indicate that instructional tasks with higher involvement loads (e.g., reading and writing or writing) offer benefits to L1 middle school students for the incidental vocabulary acquisition necessary to be academically successful.

In order to learn a language, it is important to develop a vocabulary because it facilitates the language skills: reading, listening, writing and speaking. According to the Swedish curriculum, students must be able to develop these skills in English. However, the national tests show that students have poor results in reading and reading comprehension in English. Therefore, as future teachers of languages in Sweden, we chose to investigate how students can develop and strengthen their vocabulary through reading. Our research questions are: What cognitive processes and strategies are used when learning vocabulary? What does research say about incidental vocabulary learning through reading? What relationship does vocabulary have with reading comprehension? We have answered our questions by synthesizing and analyzing empirical studies which have been divided into two categories: cognitive processes and strategies, and vocabulary acquisition through reading. The findings show that, when encountering new vocabulary, learners use memory, determination, social and metacognitive strategies. Learning vocabulary happens both incidentally and intentionally and during this procedure words go through cognitive processes that determine where in our knowledge system they belong but this procedure can be affected by both internal and external factors. Results show that learners find reading and reading while listening to be a good method of learning vocabulary and these approaches also show good results in incidental vocabulary acquisition. Learners acquire new vocabulary incidentally through reading but the number of words they learn varies greatly. Learner’s prior vocabulary knowledge and the level of the target text is important for the outcome of new vocabulary acquisition. If the learner does not have an adequate prior vocabulary, associations and connections cannot be made and coherence not completed. In summary, the relationship between incidental vocabulary acquisition and reading comprehension is mutually beneficial. Reading provides context during a learner’s integration process and this leads to comprehension and vocabulary growth. There is a reciprocal relationship between comprehension and vocabulary growth, where both build on one another. However, since all the empirical studies did not take the same factors into consideration, the results have varied. In other words, external and internal factors can have a major impact on incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading. We suggest further research to investigate these factors in order to get a clearer picture of how we as teachers can improve strategies and instructions for vocabulary acquisition through reading.

Several studies have been made in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) regarding incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading. However, the majority have focused on the meaning of a word to measure complete acquisition. Nation (2001) argues that there are three main criteria for knowing a word, namely form, meaning and use, and it is not until all three criteria are met that one acquires new vocabulary. Therefore, we chose to create a study which focuses on incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading, but that focuses on three sub-criteria of Nation’s three main ones, namely recognition, association and collocation. In a previous study (Erlandsson and G. Wallgren 2017) we concluded that higher vocabulary knowledge contributes to better reading comprehension. Additionally, researchers (Horst et al. 1998; Day et al. 1991; Zahar et al. 2001; Waring and Takaki 2003; Pigada and Smith 2006, and Zhao et al. 2016) have also brought up several factors, such as learners’ prior proficiency level and word frequency, that can affect the outcome of incidental vocabulary acquisition. Therefore, we decided to investigate what impact these two factors have as well.  Our research questions are: How much vocabulary is learnt incidentally through reading, and how do proficiency and word frequency affect incidental vocabulary acquisition? These questions were answered through a study made in a classroom environment with students in the 8th grade. We were inspired by a study made by Waring and Takaki (2003) who focused on two main criteria for knowing a word, form and meaning. Our study was done through reading nine chapters from the novel Holes by Louis Sachar (2001) and to determine the degree to which rate word frequency played a part in incidental vocabulary acquisition, 24 words were chosen within four different ranges of word frequency (ranging between two occurrences to 39 occurrences in the text). These 24 words were then replaced with substitute words to ensure that each test word was new to the participants. First, the participants completed a reading comprehension test to establish the participants’ reading proficiency levels in English. They were later asked to read the chapters containing the substitute words. Directly after the reading exercise, the participants completed a vocabulary acquisition test. The vocabulary acquisition test consisted of three parts that focused on recognition (word recognition), association (multiple choice) and collocation (putting the target words in a context). Results show that words are acquired incidentally through reading. Our findings show a positive correlation between high reading proficiency levels and a higher amount of words acquired. The findings also indicate a positive correlation between words within a higher frequency range with a higher chance of being acquired. Furthermore, we also observed that substitute words with low frequency in some situations had a higher uptake than those words with a higher frequency. After this observation we tried to explain the anomaly by looking into the textual context of the surrounding words and found a potential explanation in the fact that the low frequency words had very descriptive surroundings.