The Application Of Production-oriented Approach In EAP Vocabulary Teaching

The Guidelines on College English Teaching states explicitly for the first time that college English learners should increase 400 and 600 words related to their major or future jobs for the basic and improving levels of objectives,among which words related to their major are part of EAP vocabulary.However,literature review shows that the current teaching efficiency of EAP vocabulary is unsatisfactory in that traditional teaching methods are text-centered and input-overemphasized.It is necessary to conduct further researches into processes,approaches and strategies for EAP vocabulary teaching and learning.The present study applied the Production-oriented Approach to the EAP vocabulary teaching in Financial and Economic English of CIMA major students with the same proficiency in English.The Production-oriented Approach was applied in the experimental class while the Grammar-Translation Method was adopted in the control class.It aimed to investigate the effectiveness of the application of Production-oriented Approach in EAP vocabulary teaching and explore whether there are differences of effects among types of productive tasks in learner's EAP vocabulary acquisition.There are two research questions in the present study.Firstly,is it effective to apply the Production-oriented Approach in EAP vocabulary teaching? Secondly,are there any differences among the various productive tasks(guided essay-writing,oral presentation,term interpretation and back translation)in their effects on the acquisition of learners' EAP vocabulary? Tests,questionnaires and interviews were conducted in order to contrast different teaching effects of the two approaches as well as effects on the learners' EAP vocabulary acquisition among the four types of productive tasks.It arrives at the following findings through data analysis.Firstly,results show that it is effective to apply the Production-oriented Approach in EAP vocabulary teaching.The Production-oriented Approach shifts from traditional teaching-valued design to learning-valued practice by following “output-input-output” teaching mode,which achieves learning-centered and learning-using integrated instruction.The teaching process that starts with productive activities and ends with productive activities can trigger learners' noticing and optimize their learning outcome.Secondly,different productive tasks impose different effects on the acquisition of learners' EAP vocabulary.In the processes of motivating,enabling and assessing,oral presentation and back translation may trigger the learners' noticing more sufficiently than guided essay-writing and term interpretation.The more focused a learner's noticing is,the more likely it is for the learner to achieve better long-term acquisition.The findings enrich the application of the Production-oriented Approach through extending from its previous practices in macro EGP courses to the micro EAP vocabulary teaching.Productive tasks can trigger learners' noticing in the acquisition process and promote their EAP vocabulary acquisition.The results of this study may be beneficial to both EAP teachers and learners in terms of EAP teaching designs and vocabulary learning strategies.Evaluation of the findings and limitations also identifies implications for both the teaching practice and further research.