A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results

This study aims to apply basic concepts in cognitive linguistics to teaching English idioms to EFL students. English idioms expose their inherent difficulties to EFL learners because people of different languages usually have different conceptualizations. Words in idioms do not carry their literal...

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Main Author: Hung, Bui Phu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Penerbit Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia 2019
Online Access:http://journalarticle.ukm.my/13990/1/30592-104148-2-PB.pdf
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author Hung, Bui Phu
author_facet Hung, Bui Phu
author_sort Hung, Bui Phu
collection UKM
description This study aims to apply basic concepts in cognitive linguistics to teaching English idioms to EFL students. English idioms expose their inherent difficulties to EFL learners because people of different languages usually have different conceptualizations. Words in idioms do not carry their literal but conceptualized semantics. Cognitive linguistics, grounded in cognitive, social, and communicative theories, hypothesize idioms as examples of conceptual metaphors. Twelve idioms about finance were taught to 50 Vietnamese first-year EFL college students divided into two experimental groups for CL-based treatment and treatment for rote-learning, and one control group with no treatment. The experimental groups received 4-step treatments: warm-up, instruction, drill practice, and productive task. The results showed that the group receiving CL-based treatment outperformed the group applying rote-learning in both immediate posttest and delayed posttests for receptive and productive knowledge of the instructed idioms. The control group did not make any significant gain from the prettest to the posttests. The results suggest that students’ awareness of conceptual metaphors help them remember the target items long. Further studies can include measures of both explicit and implicit knowledge of the idioms as a result of CL-based treatment in other contexts.
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spelling ukm.eprints-139902020-01-23T23:53:20Z http://journalarticle.ukm.my/13990/ A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results Hung, Bui Phu This study aims to apply basic concepts in cognitive linguistics to teaching English idioms to EFL students. English idioms expose their inherent difficulties to EFL learners because people of different languages usually have different conceptualizations. Words in idioms do not carry their literal but conceptualized semantics. Cognitive linguistics, grounded in cognitive, social, and communicative theories, hypothesize idioms as examples of conceptual metaphors. Twelve idioms about finance were taught to 50 Vietnamese first-year EFL college students divided into two experimental groups for CL-based treatment and treatment for rote-learning, and one control group with no treatment. The experimental groups received 4-step treatments: warm-up, instruction, drill practice, and productive task. The results showed that the group receiving CL-based treatment outperformed the group applying rote-learning in both immediate posttest and delayed posttests for receptive and productive knowledge of the instructed idioms. The control group did not make any significant gain from the prettest to the posttests. The results suggest that students’ awareness of conceptual metaphors help them remember the target items long. Further studies can include measures of both explicit and implicit knowledge of the idioms as a result of CL-based treatment in other contexts. Penerbit Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia 2019 Article PeerReviewed application/pdf en http://journalarticle.ukm.my/13990/1/30592-104148-2-PB.pdf Hung, Bui Phu (2019) A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results. 3L; Language,Linguistics and Literature,The Southeast Asian Journal of English Language Studies., 25 (2). pp. 113-126. ISSN 0128-5157 http://ejournals.ukm.my/3l/issue/view/1196
spellingShingle Hung, Bui Phu
A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title_full A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title_fullStr A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title_full_unstemmed A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title_short A cognitive linguistic approach to teaching English idioms to EFL students: experimental results
title_sort cognitive linguistic approach to teaching english idioms to efl students experimental results
url http://journalarticle.ukm.my/13990/1/30592-104148-2-PB.pdf
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