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In this paper, as a main method, associative strategy would be introduced in detail. Then an experiment would be conducted among Non-English majors of college students in SIT. After analyzing the results, proper strategies in learning English vocabulary for Non-English majors will be summarized and put forward. Hope the process of this the experiment could strengthen students’ consciousness of applying some strategies rather than learning unconsciously and wasting much time; hope the strategies concluded at last would really achieve a pleasant result, benefiting the Non-English majors in SIT in learning vocabulary.
2 Literature Review
The research of vocabulary strategies has a long-dated history. With a great number of attempts from scholars made to explore, kinds of theoretical systems have been set up, both domestic and foreign. In this part, main and outstanding achievements about vocabulary strategies, especially associative strategies would be summed up.
2.1 Definition of the Related Terminologies
Vocabulary
Vocabulary is commonly defined as ‘all the words known and used by a particular person’(net1). It refers to a list or set of words for a particular language or a list or set of words that inpidual speakers of a language might use. Since vocabulary is a list, we might think that the only system involved is that of alphabetical order (Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary). For instance, the followings are some vocabulary: possible ['pɒsəbl] adj 可能的; previous['priːviəs] adj 以前的; proficient /prə'fɪʃnt/ adj. 熟练的.
Association
Concerning the definition of association, there are kinds of versions. It refers to an idea or a memory that is suggested by someone or something, or a mental link between ideas. The association in vocabulary learning means connecting words with the same or different sounds and images, and also something else sometimes, such as related words or collocations and the like.
Vocabulary Learning Strategy
Vocabulary learning strategy is a subcategory of language learning strategies, which can be defined as ‘ specific actions taken by the learner to make learning easier, faster, more enjoyable, more self-directed, more effective, and more transferable to new situations.’(Oxford,1990:8) It constitutes knowledge about what students do to find out the meaning of new words, retains them in long-memory, recalls them when needed in comprehension, and uses them in language production.
2.2 Classification of Vocabulary Learning Strategies
When talking about vocabulary strategies abroad, the classification among meta-cognitive strategies, cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies from O’Malley & Chamot (1990:21-34) comes out first. Meta-cognitive strategies are used by students to control and evaluate their own learning by having an overview of the learning process in general. It is a kind of strategies that facilitate learning by actively involving the learner in conscious efforts to remember new words. While, cognitive strategy, operate directly on incoming information, manipulating it in ways that enhance learning. Social/affective strategy, an acceptable way to discover a new word’s meaning, through asking someone who knows, including parents, teachers, native speakers, if possible, etc. Gu and Johnson (1996) established two main dimensions of vocabulary learning strategies for their study, meta-cognitive regulation and cognitive strategies, which covered six subcategories: guessing, using a dictionary, note-taking, rehearsal, encoding, and activating, all of which were further subcategorized. Nation(1990:132-137) proposed the idea that remembering the low-frequency words through learning the word’s roots, suffixes and prefixes, reciting the high-frequency words in contexts. Context strategy is a popular strategy of vocabulary learning strategies right now, a strategy that learners guess the new word through the information which is provided in the context language environment. Base on the above theories, Schmitt(1997:120-129) put forward a vocabulary strategy system composed of discovery strategy and reinforcement strategy. Later, according to combinations of possible values of the dimensions, Schmitt(2002) also pided vocabulary strategies into 6 main categories with 58 inpidual strategies in total.