The Effect Of Vocabulary Presentation Modes On College Students English Vocabulary Memory Under Cognitive Load Theory

Vocabulary is regarded as an important building material of language.English vocabulary learning is influenced by both teaching methods and learners’ cognitive factors.In previous studies of vocabulary presentation and other vocabulary teaching strategies,many scholars have based their conclusions on the results of tests on vocabulary memory,but few have taken learners’ internal factors in the study of vocabulary presentation and vocabulary teaching methods.Therefore,based on summarizing and drawing on the research findings of scholars at home and abroad,this paper aims to investigate the correlation between students’ cognitive load and their vocabulary memory and to explore the amount of the cognitive load generated by students under different modes of vocabulary presentation in order to find the most effective way of presenting vocabulary under the theory of cognitive load.Due to the advent of multimedia teaching technology,multimedia presentation is also widely accepted by learners.This study uses plain text presentation mode in the classroom,as well as extensive use of multimedia static picture and multimedia dynamic video presentation modes,to investigate the following three questions concerning three different modes of presenting vocabulary:1)What is the correlation between students’ cognitive load and their vocabulary memory effect?2)In what way do vocabulary presentation modes affect the cognitive load of students?3)How is the memory workbench constructed to facilitate students’ English vocabulary memory effect under different modes of vocabulary presentation?This study selected 60 freshmen of non-English major from the Inner Mongolia University of Technology as the subjects,and used the students’ vocabulary test scores as the benchmark for evaluating the students’ vocabulary memory,as well as testing the students’ cognitive load,and the author analyzed the collected data statistically using SPSS23.0 and came up with the following results: 1)There was a negative correlation between students’ cognitive load and their vocabulary memory.That is to say,the lower the cognitive load of the students,the better the vocabulary memory effect of the students.Because the cognitive load which is too high is not conducive to better vocabulary memory.2)The students’ cognitive load was the highest in the presentation mode with plain text,second-highest for the multimedia static picture presentation mode.And in the presentation mode with multimedia dynamic videos,the students’ cognitive load was the lowest.3)In the intermediate vocabulary memory test,there was no significant difference in subjects’ test results among three modes of vocabulary presentation.In the vocabulary post test,the highest score was obtained in the presentation mode with multimedia dynamic videos,followed by multimedia static picture presentation mode,the score of subjects’ post test was the lowest in the presentation mode with plain text.Also,the effectiveness of students’ vocabulary memory retention was the best in the presentation mode with multimedia dynamic videos.The study concluded that the multimedia dynamic video presentation mode produced the lowest cognitive load of students,and had the best effectiveness on their vocabulary memory.This presentation mode helps students to build their vocabulary memory workbench,which has a positive effect on their vocabulary memory.The above findings have some implications for English teachers in teaching vocabulary and deserve the attention of second language teachers.