Predicting the Meaning of English Words from Context

Abstract

One of the techniques of teaching English vocabulary to
Indonesian learners is by predicting the meaning of the English words
from context. But the effectiveness of this technique is very rarely studied.
This study aims at finding out the degree of effectiveness of prediction
from context. On the basis of a proposed theory that when learners have
not had a very large size of references in the long-term memory
prediction may fail, it is hypothesized that prediction from context has a
low degree of effectiveness.
The study makes use of the survey method. It involves 51 subjects.
They are the second semester students of the English Department, Faculty
of Teacher Training and Education, Widya Mandala Catholic University
Surabaya who are randomly sampled from the population that is the
second semester students of the English Department. Subjects predict the
meaning of 36 English words which are found in 15 reading passages. A
criterion of mean score is set to determine the degree of effectiveness of
the techniques.
The mean score obtained by the subjects is 12. The finding is that
the prediction technique has a low degree of effectiveness. The finding
supports the proposed theory that when learners, have not had a very
large size of references in the long-term memory, prediction may fail

Save to Mendeley