ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY AND RESEARH REPORT

FINAL ASSIGNMENT

English as Academic Purpose II

Submitted by

MARIA SYUHADA
Student of Faculty of Education and Teacher Training
Department of English Language Education
Reg. No: 150203221
Lecturer: Lilis Su’adah, S.PdI., MA.TESOL

FACULTY OF EDUCATION AND TEACHER TRAINING

AR-RANIRY STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY
BANDA ACEH
2019 M / 1440 H
 ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Maria Syuhada

Amiryousefi, M. and Ketabi, S. (2011). Mnemonic instruction: A way to boost vocabulary

learning and recall. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(1).

The journal provides a brief explanation about theories of mnemonic devices and how to
properly use them, especially to boost students' memory in memorizing vocabulary. It mainly
focuses on how to solve the problem students mostly faced in vocabulary learning and
acquisition that they easily forget the word they recently have learned. Amiryousefi and Ketabi
(2011) argue that many researchers have proved that mnemonic devices give significant impact
to enhance vocabulary's retention in memory. However, numerous teachers do not know its
effectiveness and how to apply this method. In addition, the mechanism of mnemonic devices
has not been studied in detail and depth. As a result, this journal aims at elaborating the
mechanism of mnemonic devices deeply, the matter I require most.

This journal is substantial for my research because it does not only show me how to use
mnemonic devices effectively but also several points I need to consider in implementing the
devices. This is due to some studies I have found that these devices' performance on vocabulary
retention can be varied and they do not always work effectively because of particular factors.
Teachers should choose a learning method based on students' proficiency and learning styles
(Coady and Huckin, 1997; Thompson, 1987; Holden, 1999; Mirhassani and Eghtesadei, 2007).
Admittedly, this journal impacts on my research to analyze the consideration given in it, thus, I
can minimize the particular factors which might influence the devices' performance.

Cresswell, J. W. (2008). Educational research: Planning, conducting and evaluating

quantitative and qualitative research (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice
Hall.

Since I am conducting experimental research at states school, I face many difficult cases to deal
with. This book provides numerous answers to that problem and theories to guide how I should
carry on my research, especially while designing the third chapter, which is the methodology.
Most importantly, this book provides many articles and cases in each research design, helping
me to analogy my research into this book.

Through this book, I have basic theories to overcome and manipulate the treatment condition of
my research. There are extraneous factors I found in my research when designing the
methodology (e.g., the selection of participants, the procedures, covariates, and pretest
instrument). This book showed me several types of experimental designs to answer my
extraneous factors. It also leads me to how to choose my research design by providing criteria I
need to reckon with a suitable on for my research.

Siriganjanavong, V. (2013). The mnemonic keyword method: effects on the vocabulary

acquisition and retention. English Language Teaching, 6(10), 1-10.

This journal studied the effectiveness of Mnemonic Keyword Method (MKW) on native Thai
EFL learners in term of short-term and long-term memory. The result showed that even a low
proficiency student is able to retain more words by using MKW than other methods. There are
some debating points about MKW I have analyzed from this article.

First, even most studies have proved the effectiveness of MKW, however, the important thing
surprising me is that the retention is reduced over time. Siriganjanavong (2013) stated that the
long-term vocabulary's retention can be decreased if the words are no longer used by the speaker
for a long period. As a result, in line with Atkinson and Shiffrin's Multi-store Model (1968), I
will use an additional method in my research completing MKW such as doing vocabularies
exercise (Yates, 2006) and creating contextual sentences.

Second, the superiority of MKW is to enable students to recall the vocabulary's meaning.
Nevertheless, Siriganjanavong (2013) showed that this method's weakness is regarding
vocabularies' spelling and pronunciation. Therefore, to overcome this shortcoming, I will apply
recorded audio to introduce vocabularies to my sample. Recorded audio is considered due to the
fact that I am not an English native speaker; consequently, I have no proper standard of
pronunciation as English native speakers have.
Takac, V. P. (2008). Vocabulary learning strategies and foreign language acquisition.
Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters.

This book is highly important for my research, especially for vocabulary learning and acquisition
because it provides what factors affect these processes. It provides theories in choosing which
techniques to be used in the classroom, teachers consider time availability and the content or
teaching material. Summarized from this book, there are some important points I found in this
book which influence my research.

First, this book provides some greatest interest among researchers leading to empirical reviews
of different vocabulary strategies research (e.g., mnemonics, what I conduct in my research). The
focus I took from the research is its pedagogical suggestion in teaching vocabulary. It shows me
some problematic issues (e.g., method and instrument) that happened while some strategies have
been applied. These arguments could support my research in designing the method and
instrument considering those issues.

Second, Tacac (2008) argues that teacher needs to check students' comprehension toward the
similarities and differences between first language and target language where these points are
likely to cause an error in vocabulary learning and acquisition. It leads me to consider the issue
that most EFL learners are concerned about. In the process of acquiring, recalling and using
previously lexical items, "the learner tends to assume that the system of FL is more or less the
same as in his L1 until he has discovered that it is not." (Ringbom, 1987, as cited in Takac, 2008,
p.9). Since I investigate the Keyword Method in my research, I am afraid that later there will be
a fallacy in the process of code-switching between L1 and TL. Influenced by this book, I decided
to use oral vocabulary for conducting my research to avoid misconception in understanding the
meaning of the vocabulary.

Yates, J. (2006). English vocabulary for beginning ESL learners. London, US: McGraw-Hill
Education.

This book provides numerous numbers of vocabularies, exercises for each vocabulary's type and
a number of grammatical explanations. However, I only use this book for one of the main
resources of vocabularies I use as my instrument in my research. There are few rationales why I
employ this book.

First, in my research, Keyword method requires me to teach vocabulary in contextual sentences.

This book provides various contextual sentences to show how those vocabularies are used,
especially in daily life. It clarifies the framework of the function word that applies to them. As a
result, students will know the proper situation to use those vocabularies.

Second, this book provides more than fifteen hundred words (Yates, 2006) which are frequently
used and appeared in students' daily life with family, friends and other people in the community
in general. It clearly divides the part of speech in each chapter that helps me in organizing the
vocabularies I will teach.
RESEARCH REPORT

ENHANCING LONG-TERM VOCABULARY RETENTION THROUGH KEYWORD

METHOD

A. Background
Vocabulary is one of the important language features to be mastered by EFL learners
since it is the essence of the language. Wilkins (1972; as cited in Kömür & Özdemir, 2015) states
that without vocabulary speakers are not able to convey meaning and communicate with each
other in a particular language. However, memorizing hundreds or even tens of vocabularies can
be challenging for EFL learners because it must be followed by memorizing its spelling,
pronunciation, and definition at the same time. Teachers teaching a foreign language must
provide varieties of effective methods for teaching vocabulary; as a result, the vocabularies retain
in students’ memory for a long-term.
As human brain is being the most crucial thing in memorizing vocabulary, the way it
memories is significant. Basically, the brain more easily remembers visual, kinesthetic, or audio
information (Raj, 2007). Based on this fact, in most cases, mnemonics helps the brain to
memorize vocabularies well. According to Atkinson and Raugh (1975), The Keyword Method
(KWM) is one of the most studied mnemonics used in the teaching of FL vocabulary. The
keyword method is using what a word sounds like to visualize something memorable that will
help them later recall the definition.
Several empirical studies have shown that Keyword Method (KWM) is effective to be
used as a teaching method in order to enhance English learners’ vocabulary retention (e.g.,
Brown & Perry, 1991; Shapiro & Waters, 2005; Sagarra & Alba, 2006; Amiryousefi & Ketabi,
2011). Khorasani et al. (2017) found that teaching new vocabularies to Iranian young FL learners
is more successful by using KWM than Total Physical Response (TPR). Nevertheless, most
studies reviewed using KWM were conducted in Thailand (Siriganjanavong, 2013), Iran
(Khorasgani & Khanehgir, 2013), or other languages like Chinese (Wei & Zheng, 2015), fewer
studies were conducted using Indonesian words as the keyword. The researcher will provide
visual and verbal mnemonics, which are images and phrases or sentences containing keywords in
Indonesian. This is expected to increase the enthusiasm and interest of the students to remember
the new vocabulary and to help them to easily recall the memory. As a result, this research aims
to introduce the Keyword Method to native speakers of Indonesian in remembering English
RESEARCH REPORT

vocabulary and to investigate the effectiveness of the Keyword Method in terms of long-term
retention.

B. Research Question
1. Is there students’ significant achievement after the treatment by using Keyword Method and
Traditional Method applied in memorizing vocabularies?
2. What do students perceive in experimental group towards Keyword Method?

C. Questions
1. What are the steps in conducting experimental research?
2. How to take the sample of if I conduct my research at school?
3. How long do I have to give the treatment of MKM?
4. What is the shortcoming of Mnemonic Keyword Method that I have to anticipate?
5. How to overcome the weakness of Mnemonic Keyword Method?
6. Is the code-switching problem possible to happen in Mnemonic Keyword Method?
7. How to deal with the wrong pronunciation that might happen since in MKM students
will face two words from L1 and target language that sound similar?
8. What is the strategy in MKM training to be successful?
9. What dictionary should I use as the sources of vocabularies in my research?
10. How to evaluate experimental research?

Answers’ Report
Conducting experimental research considered to have a number of threats and to have a
longer period than other research. Based on Creswell (2008), there are some steps a researcher
can use as a guide to minimize potential threats that might happen;
1. Decide if an experiment addresses your research problem
2. Form hypotheses to test cause-and-effect relationships
3. Select an experimental unit and identify study participants
4. Select an experimental treatment and introduce it
5. Choose a type of experimental design
6. Conduct the experiment
RESEARCH REPORT

7. Organize and analyze the data

8. Develop an experimental research report
Although the guide above gives a significant contribution on how to start my research, I
have found a question in the process of determining the sample of my population. Since I
conduct my research at school, the availability of the participants is limited. The setting prohibits
forming artificial groups. Thyer (2012) and Creswell (2008) states that many experimental
situations occur in which the researcher needs to use intact classes. As a result, quasi-
experimental designs are frequently used and so is my research. Moreover, I choose pre- and
posttest design of quasi-experimental design, the duration of the treatment consumes more than a
month and it also depends on students’ need which I would analyze further.
Moving to the Mnemonic Keyword Method (MKM), several studies have proved its
effectiveness on retaining students’ vocabulary in memory (e.g., Siriganjanavong, 2013;
Khorasgani & Khanehgir, 2013). However, there are some points I need to consider to
implement this method; 1) students need to find their mnemonic devices by themselves, if they
cannot I can offer one; 2) Sometimes it is difficult to find a keyword for certain words.
Moreover, students’ ability is varied, so it is suggested to combine MKM with another method,
strategy or device (e.g., imagery method, verbal devices, visual devices); 3) “when certain
strategies are agreed up on, the teacher should instruct the strategy and its importance and
effectiveness” (Hulstijn, 1997; Thompson, 1987; Holden, 1999; Mirhassani and Eghtesadei,
2007, as cited in Amiryousefi & Ketabi 2011).
Additionally, Tacac (2008) argues that MKM does not guarantee long-term vocabulary
retention. Therefore, it is required to revise words and their features (orthography, meaning,
grammar, and syntactic features, etc.). The teacher needs to check students' comprehension
toward the similarities and differences between first language and target language where these
points are likely to cause an error in vocabulary learning and acquisition. It leads me to consider
the issue that most EFL learners are concerned about. In the process of language acquisition,
according to Ringbom (1987), "the learner tends to assume that the system of FL is more or less
the same as in his L1 until he has discovered that it is not” (as cited in Tacac, 2008, pp.9).
Students’ readiness to transfer may also be influenced by their perceptions of linguistic and
cultural distance. It is worried later there will be a fallacy in the process of code-switching
between L1 and TL.
RESEARCH REPORT

Coping with this problem, I decided to use oral vocabulary for conducting my research to
avoid misconception in understanding the meaning of the vocabulary regarding the
pronunciation. Contextual meaning, grammar, and syntactic features are also provided to avoid
the issues. Furthermore, for the strategic training to be successful, students need to have great
opportunities to apply the MKM in real vocabulary learning situations and to share their
experience. It is also important to include the vocabulary learned by means of this strategy in
vocabulary tests because it provides the students with a chance to apply the method successfully.
Initially, the frequently asked issue I need to deal with is to find appropriate vocabularies
list to be taught in my research. Using a common dictionary, for example, Oxford Dictionary
makes me confused to select the proper vocabularies for participants because I need to
synchronize them to their syllabus in the curriculum. After asking some lecturers and my
supervisor, I am suggested to use English Vocabulary for Beginning ESL Learners by Yates
(2006) for one of the main resources of vocabularies I use as my instrument. Besides, there are
few rationales why I take this book as the source. First, this book provides various contextual
sentences to show how those vocabularies are used, especially in daily life. It clarifies the
framework of the function word that applies to them. As a result, students will know the proper
situation to use those vocabularies. Second, this book provides more than fifteen hundred words
(Yates, 2006) which are frequently used and appeared in students' daily life with family, friends
and other people in the community in general. It clearly divides the part of speech in each
chapter that helps me in organizing the vocabularies I will teach.
Finally, the way to evaluate my experimental research is an important matter to cope
with. There are some questions Creswell (2008) gave, adapted from Bausell (1994) as a basis for
evaluating my research; 1) Does the experiment have a powerful intervention?; 2) Does it
employ few treatment groups (e.g., only two)?; 3) Will participants gain from the intervention?;
4) Did the researcher derive the number of participants per group some systematic way?; 5)
Were an adequate number of participants used in the study?; 6) Wete valid, reliable, and
sensitive measures or observations used?; 7) Did the study control for extraneous factors?; and 8)
Didi the researcher control for threats to internal validity?. For a good experiment, I need to find
the reason to answer yes to each question.
RESEARCH REPORT

REFERENCES

Amiryousefi, M., & Ketabi, S. (2011). Mnemonic instruction: A way to boost vocabulary
learning and recall. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(1)

Atkinson, R. C., & Raugh, M. R. (1975). An application of the mnemonic keyword method to
the acquisition of a Russian vocabulary. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human
Learning and Memory, 1(2), 126-133.

Brown, S. T., & Perry, F. L. (1991). A comparison of three learning strategies for ESL
vocabulary acquisition. Tesol Quarterly, 25(4), 655-670

Cresswell, J. W. (2008). Educational research: Planning, conducting and evaluating

quantitative and qualitative research (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice
Hall

Kömür, Ş., & Özdemir, P. (2015). The effects of keeping vocabulary notebooks on productive
academic vocabulary growth. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences. 199, 666–674.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.07.59

Khorasgani, A.T., & Khanehgir, M. (2017). Teaching new vocabulary to young learners: using
two methods total physical response and keyword method. International Journal of
Evaluation and Research in Education, 6(2), 150-156

Raj, B. S., Dharmangadan, B., & Subramony, S. (2007). Recall of visual and auditory stimuli as
a function of Hemispheric dominance and preferred modality in learning. Journal of the
Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, 33(2), 275-284

Sagara, N., & Alba, M. (2006). The key is in the keyword: L2 vocabulary learning methods with
beginning learners of Spanish. Modern Language Journal, 90(2), 228-243

Saphiro, M. A., & Waters, L. D. (2005). An investigation of the cognitive processes underlying
the keyword method of foreign vocabulary learning. Language Teaching Research, 9(2),
129-146

Siriganjanavong, V. (2013). The mnemonic keyword method: Effects on the vocabulary

acquisition and retention. English Language Teaching, 6(10), 1-10
RESEARCH REPORT

Takac, V. P. (2008). Vocabulary learning strategies and foreign language acquisition. Clevedon,
UK: Multilingual Matters

Thyer, B. A. (2012). Quasi-experimental research designs. New York :Oxford University Press

Yates, J. (2006). English vocabulary for beginning ESL learners. London, US: McGraw-Hill
Education
 RESEARCH REPORT

Annotated Bibliography Rubric

Name :
Title of the research :

Criteria Excellent Very Good Satisfactory Poor

good
Annotation
- it states the resources
- evaluates resource
- states why the resource (s) is
useful for research

Sources
- states at least 5 resources
- resources are listed
alphabetically
- using proper APA format

Punctuation
- punctuation is used
appropriately

Grammar
- grammar is used appropriately

Presentation
- neat and easy to read

Length

Other comments

RESEARCH REPORT RUBRIC

RESEARCH REPORT

Name :
Title of the research :

Criteria Very Good Satisfactory Poor

Excellent good
Understanding
- the report shows
understanding of
the topic
- the information
is relevant to the
topic
- demonstrates
lesson learnt

Argument
- the argument is
clearly stated
- the argument is
supported with
appropriate to
evidence

Integration
- the report shows
integration with
annotated
bibliography,
interview and
topic

Clarity
- the report follow
the format
- the arguments
are clearly stated

Presentation
- neat and easy to
follow
RESEARCH REPORT

- fulfills the
assigned length

Referencing
- all materials are
referenced
- the citation is in
correct format
- relevant sources
listed
- sufficient
number of
references

Spelling and vocabulary

- all words
including author
names are spelt
correctly

- language used
appropriate to
the academic
context

Punctuation
- Punctuation is
appropriately
used

Grammar
- Grammar is
appropriately
used

Other comments :