Creativity and Unnaturalness in the Use of Phrasal Verbs in ESL Learner Language (original) (raw)
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Use of phrasal verbs in an ESL learner corpus and its corresponding pedagogic corpus
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Phrasal verbs are one of the most notoriously puzzling aspects of English language instruction. Despite their potential complexities, they are of high relevance for ESL/ EFL learners because knowledge of them is often equated with language proficiency and fluency. With the emergence of corpus linguistics, phrasal verbs have been extensively studied in General, Learner and Pedagogic corpora. Literature, however, is lacking in how learners' use of phrasal verbs reflects the corresponding pedagogic corpora to which they are exposed. To fill this research gap, this study adopted a corpus-based content analysis as its methodological approach to investigate the treatment of phrasal verbs in an ESL learner corpus and its corresponding pedagogic corpus. Findings are also compared against the presentation of these combinations in the British National Corpus (BNC). The study reveals that the selection of teaching materials is more intuitively than empirically based. It also suggests that teachers can use available corpora as supplementary teaching sources to work out the areas of L2 that tend to cause problems for the learners.
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This paper aims to give an overview of studies on phrasal verbs in three decades to present the theoretical and methodological issues, as well as the findings of research. Moreover, this review reveals the developments and paradigm shifts occurred in this area. Previous studies have shown that the research findings have not been incorporated into classroom activities and English Language Teaching (ELT) materials. The paper claims that the number of research on the use of phrasal verbs in ESL textbooks is limited and, therefore, further research is needed to examine how phrasal verbs are treated in textbooks in order to help ELT materials developers to present these items more effectively based on research findings.
Selection and Presentation of Phrasal Verbs in ESL Textbooks
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The emergence of the lexical syllabus and the recognition of the key function of phrasal verbs in language acquisition and fluency gave way to the inclusion of these notoriously challenging structures in the ESL/EFL curriculum. Of main pedagogic concern, therefore, is, with the sheer number of phrasal verbs in the English language and the limited volume of course books, whether the selection and presentation of these forms is informed by research findings. Findings from the current corpus-based study revealed that that selction of these forms in the Malaysian ESL textbooks were more intuitively than empirically-based.
A Corpus-based Study on the use of Phrasal Verbs in Malaysian Secondary School Textbooks
International Journal of Applied Linguistics and English Literature, 2019
Phrasal verbs (PVs) are one of the most notoriously puzzling aspects of English language instruction. Despite their difficulty and idiosyncrasies, they are of high relevance for ESL/EFL learners because mastery of PVs is often equated with language proficiency. Different from prior researches, this content analysis study seeks to identify the PVs used in the Malaysian upper secondary school textbooks and the frequency count of each PV in each textbook using a corpus linguistic approach. The most frequently PVs in each textbook were compared to the list provided by Biber et al (1999)'s Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English corpus. Findings from this study revealed that the selection and presentation of these combinations in the secondary school textbooks used in Malaysia depended more on authors' intuition rather than on empirical findings and pedagogical principles. There were no clear explanations of Phrasal Verbs in both textbooks that were analysed. Despite the large number of PVs in the corpus, their presentation in the textbooks was far from satisfactory with some being over-repeated at the expense of some others. This paper makes a few suggestions to further improve the present treatment of PVs in the textbooks used at upper secondary schools in Malaysia. It is suggested that accurate definitions and appropriate selection and presentation of PVs should be considered. Rather than relying on intuition, Malaysian textbook writers must consider integrating the use of corpus into their selection of PVs to be presented to students.
Phrasal Verbs in Learner English: A Corpus-based Study of Lithuanian and Polish Learners of English
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Phrasal verbs, though very common in the English language, are acknowledged as difficult to acquire by non-native learners of English. The present study examines this issue focusing on two learner groups from different mother tongue backgrounds, i.e. Lithuanian and Polish advanced students of English. The analysis is conducted based on Granger’s (1996) Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis methodology, investigating the Lithuanian and Polish components of the International Corpus of Learner English, as well as the Louvain Corpus of Native English Essays. The results obtained in the study prove that both learner groups underuse phrasal verbs compared with native English speakers. It is concluded that this could be due to the learners’ limited repertoire of phrasal verbs as they employ significantly fewer phrasalverb types than native speakers. Furthermore, it is noticed that learners face similar stylistic, semantic and syntactic difficulties in the use of this language feature. In part...
Phrasal verbs in a longitudinal learner corpus: Quantitative findings
This study analyses Chinese learners' use of phrasal verbs from a longitudinal perspective. Through a comparison of the learners' output of phrasal verbs with that of two groups of native English speakers (American university students and British secondary school leavers), Chinese learners were found to be capable of producing an adequate number of phrasal verbs. Yet, they did not demonstrate appropriate choice of phrasal verbs. The longitudinal data reveal that the learners' acquisition of phrasal verbs during their three years of study was not always linear. A considerable decrease in the number of phrasal verbs used in the students' writing in their second year was noticed. No considerable increase in the use of phrasal verbs was observed at the end of their third year. Another important finding of this study is that the American students tend to use far more phrasal verbs than their British and Chinese counterparts.
1983
This study is the result of an interest in the fields of linguistics and ESL begun ten years ago and nurtured through academic studies and a professional career. I acknowledge and thank Dr. Mary Jane Coole for having introduced me to this very interesting and fascinating field. I thanle her also for encouraging any potential she saw in me that would result in my becoming an 'ES~ specialist'. Finally, I thank her for helping me to continue work leading to a doctoral degree, particularly through the difficulties time and place have offered. This dissertation could not have been completed without her help and professional guidance. I also thanie Dr. William Christie and Dr. Anoop Chandola, who were so kind as to sacrifice vacation time in order to serve on my committee. A large debt of gratitude goes to my mother, Germaine B. Sproul, who took over many of my duties as homemaker and mother to allow me t!1e time and energy to complete this study. Finally, I aclmowledge the love and encouragement of my husband, Reginald A. DaIle, whose emotional support provided the help I needed to continue and finish this worle. I will be forever indebted to him.
A Comparative Corpus-based Study on the Use of Phrasal Verbs by Turkish EFL Learners and L1 English Speakers, 2021
This quantitative study aims to reveal the most frequently used phrasal verbs (PVs) by L1 speakers of English and Turkish EFL learners in written and spoken registers. With the purpose of spotting any overuse and/or underuse by Turkish EFL learners, it compares their usage to L1 English speakers' through four corpora-two learner corpora and two native corpora. Additionally, the study investigates the most frequent adverbial verb particles (AVPs) and lexical verbs (LVs) in phrasal constructions comparing learners and native speakers. The results show that although LV types differ to a large extent, Turkish EFL learners display a similar profile to L1 English speakers in terms of types of PVs and AVPs. However, these verbs and particles are significantly underused, especially in spoken register-a result that contradicts previous research. Specifically, within the scope of this study, regardless of the register Turkish learners tend to favour few AVPs out of the mostly used ten while leaving out the others. The findings might be of use to EFL teachers regarding raising their students' awareness on the contextual use of PVs in different registers with a combination of both implicit and explicit teaching in mind. In addition, learners can benefit from the ready-made PV lists to enhance their prospective usage in meaningful contexts.
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College Of Graduate Studies College of Languages (MA, in linguistic) Investigating the Difficulties of Understanding and Using English Phrasal Verbs (A Case study of Second year English Language Student) (at AL-Neelain University College of Arts ) مهف يصقت مادختساو تابوعص هبكرملا لاعفلاا يف ةيزيلجنلاا هغللا دلأا ةيلكب ةيزيلجنإ ةغل ةيناثلا ةنسلا بلاط ةلاح ةسارد( ا ب – ج ا ةعم ) نيلينلا A Thesis Submitted in Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of M.A in Linguistics
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Modern English language has a particularly large number of combinations of postpositions with verbs. Their number is growing steadily. This is evidenced by books, dictionaries, dedicated to phrasal verbs and their use. Along with the increasing number, the frequency of their use is also growing. This means that they perform a desired function due to their greater brevity and expressiveness. The study of phrasal verbs is one of the most difficult tasks for a person who wants to improve his or her level of the English language. Phrasal verbs that are more infrequently used in conversation have already moved to the language of the media, business and economy. Phrasal verbs have strengthened their position in the verbal lexicon of contemporary English. Having become a phenomenon of conversational level, they are essential for the communicative act, and offer unlimited opportunities to express virtually all concepts. The article investigates research into the use of the lexical set strategy for teaching phrasal verbs in Kazakhstani universities. Even though the incidence of phrasal verbs is significant in English-speaking countries, little has been written about other causes of the non-use of the forms of PVs except for avoidance. Accordingly, this study explored 302 PVs used in 60 talks by the University students. The author comes to the conclusion that a well-defined strategy for teaching and learning PVs promotes the development of students' foreign language communicative competence.