2.1.2 Category of Teaching Strategy

Teaching strategy is more flexible which is different from teaching method. Teaching method is more specific and more operable than teaching strategy. In second-language teaching, for example, teaching methods include audio-lingual method, audio-visual method, communicative teaching, direct method, grammar-translation method and task-based learning (Vivian Cook, 2012:17), while teaching strategies are various. There can be three kinds of teaching strategies according to Stern. They are: intra-lingual strategy and cross-lingual strategy; analytic strategy and experiential strategy; explicit strategy and implicit strategy. (Stern, 1992) According to constructivism, teaching strategies include Scaffolding Instruction, Anchored Instruction and Random Access Instruction.

2.2 What is vocabulary teaching?

2.2.1 The Concept of Vocabulary

The everyday concept of vocabulary concerns with inpidual words and their particular meanings. It is a concept dominated by the dictionary and, in the case of second language learners, is often associated with the memorization of long lists of words. The concept of a word can be variously defined on a theoretical level but on a general level words can be broadly classified into two groups, content words and lexical words, depending on whether they contain lexical meaning or whether they perform a syntactic function in a sentence. Content words are the meaning carriers; the words that images can be attached to and which can be linked in the brain to networks of meanings. They are the words that can be discussed, explained and defined; the words that can be substituted for other content words. They belong to the following groups, nouns, lexical verbs, adjectives and adverbs. Content words, in single and multi word units, are the kinds of words that this study is concerned with. Function words, on the other hand, belong more to the grammar of the language than to vocabulary. They belong to grammatical categories such as articles, prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions, auxiliaries and hold little meaning in isolation. Their purpose is to provide syntactic structure and to make syntactic links between words. (P. J. Robinson, 2010)

2.2.2 Category of Vocabulary Teaching Strategy

Here, some vocabulary teaching strategies are found. Firstly, after the analysis of difficulties and the problems with vocabulary learning, collocation strategy, cohesion strategy and metaphor strategy were put forward (Zhang Haojie, 2012).

Secondly, Zhang Nan comes up with six vocabulary teaching strategies (Zhang Nan, 2006): 

·Discrimination Strategy: Connect the “to-learn” words with their semantically related words (e.g. synonyms, antonyms hyponyms, etc.) in the process of teaching target words.

·Description Strategy: Describe the features or characteristics of the target words to the students until the meanings are clear enough in their minds.

·Imaging Strategy: Show or imagining interesting visual materials such as pictures and personal experiences related to the target words.

·Grouping Strategy: Add the words of similar attributes to create an interrelated category.

·Formation Strategy: Present various word formations by which words are coined. Analyze the structures of new words and given new information of the frequently-used affixes and roots.

·Repetition Strategy: Maximize effectiveness of memorizing with well-organized reviewing.

Another eight kinds of student-centered vocabulary teaching strategies are (Wang Yaya, 2013): 

·The Direct-viewing Teaching Method: Use pictures, gestures, actions, objects, facial expressions.

·Game Method: Introduce various games into the class.

·Example Sentences Method: Adopt example sentences to help students comprehend and grasp teaching contents.

·Classification Method: Classify the things in a kind or of the same character to make them reasonable, centralized or systematic. 理论分析高中英语近义词教学策略(3):http://www.751com.cn/yingyu/lunwen_49905.html