An application of the lexical approach to teaching english for vocational purposes an action research project at food industrial college

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL
STUDIES FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE
STUDIES





------------- *** -------------

NGUYỄN HOÀNG THU NGA

AN APPLICATION OF THE LEXICAL APPROACH TO TEACHING
ENGLISH FOR VOCATIONAL PURPOSES:

AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT FOOD INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE

Áp dụng đường hướng từ vựng để dạy tiếng Anh phục vụ mục đích nghề nghiệp:

Một nghiên cứu cải tiến dạy học tại Trường Cao đẳng Công nghiệp Thực phẩm

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field

: English Teaching Methodology

Code

: 8140231.01

Hanoi, June 2018


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL
STUDIES FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE
STUDIES





------------- *** -------------

NGUYỄN HOÀNG THU NGA

AN APPLICATION OF THE LEXICAL APPROACH TO TEACHING
ENGLISH FOR VOCATIONAL PURPOSES:

AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT FOOD INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE
Áp dụng đường hướng từ vựng để dạy tiếng Anh phục vụ mục đích nghề nghiệp:
Một nghiên cứu cải tiến dạy học tại Trường Cao đẳng Công nghiệp Thực phẩm

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field

: English Teaching Methodology

Code

: 8140231.01

Supervisor

: Assoc. Prof. Lê Văn Canh


Hanoi, June 2018


DECLARATION

An application of the Lexical approach to teaching English
for vocational purposes:
An action research project at Food Industrial College.
-----***----I certify that no part of the thesis has been copied or reproduced by me
from any other person‟s work without acknowledgement and that the thesis is
originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor.

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank my supervisor - Assoc. Prof. Le Van Canh for his
help, willingness, patience and valuable advice through the whole work on my
master thesis. I would also like to thank all the students who were willing to

patiently cooperate and participate in my research project.
Nguyen Hoang Thu
Nga

ii


ABSTRACT

This master thesis examines the application of the Lexical Approach and its
implications in teaching English at Food Industrial College (FIC). The aim of the
study is to explore the effect of the use of the Lexical Approach (as defined by M.
Lewis) on vocational students‟ English proficiency for their future use of English in
the workplace.
The theoretical part mentioned above is expected to bring a general view for
English learners to know more about the Lexical Approach in studying English. The
implications of the Lexical Approach in teaching English plays an important role in
linguistic studies in general and in English teaching method in particular. It enriches
the knowledge of Vietnamese learners in language as well as the experiences for
learning vocabulary.

Keywords: activities, Lexical Approach, vocabulary, vocational English.

iii


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS

EFL

English as a Foreign Language

ESP

English for specific purposes

EVP

English for vocational purposes

FIC

Food Industrial College

L1

First Language

L2

Second Language

VE

Vocational English

VOLL

Vocationally-oriented language learning

iv


TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION...................................................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT...........................................................................................................iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS................................................... iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS........................................................................................ v
1. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................... 1
1.1 Rationale............................................................................................................. 1
1.2 Aims of the study................................................................................................. 1
1.3 Methodology....................................................................................................... 2
1.4 Scope of the study............................................................................................... 2
1.5 Structure of the thesis.......................................................................................... 2
2. THE THEORETICAL PART............................................................................. 3
2.1 English for Vocational Purposes.......................................................................... 3
2.1.1 What is English for Vocational Purposes?...................................................... 3
2.2 The Lexical Approach......................................................................................... 3
2.2.1 What is the Lexical Approach?....................................................................... 3
2.2.2 Features of the Lexical Approach................................................................... 5
2.2.3 Research on the benefits of lexical approach to students’ proficiency..............7
2.2.4 Implications for Teaching............................................................................... 8
2.3 Implementing lexis in the class of FIC.............................................................. 10
2.4 Activities and Exercises..................................................................................... 14
2.5 Materials............................................................................................................ 16
3. THE PRACTICAL PART................................................................................. 17
3.1 The learners....................................................................................................... 17
3.1.1 Characterization of the learners..................................................................... 17

3.1.2 The students as English language learners.................................................... 18
3.2 Testing the progress........................................................................................... 18
3.3 Teaching plan.................................................................................................... 19
3.4 Evaluation of the sources.................................................................................. 33
v


3.4.1 Pedagogical journal....................................................................................... 33
3.4.2 Output of the learners..................................................................................... 35
3.4.3 Pre-test and post-test...................................................................................... 36
4. CONCLUSION.................................................................................................. 41
5. REFERENCES.................................................................................................. 43
6. APPENDICES................................................................................................... 45

vi


1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale
Our society is changing day by day. Exchange and learning each other
languages are important needs of human beings. In order to satisfy this demand we
have to study foreign language. There are thousands of different languages for us to
choose, but the most popular language nowadays is English. As it appears every
corner all over the world from urban to rural; from power countries to poor
countries…. English helps to bring together people from many different cultures.
Being aware of the importance of English, Food Industrial College (FIC)
focuses on teaching English for students. However, many students find it very
difficult to study and communicate in English due to insufficient vocabulary. As we
know, vocabulary is central to English language teaching because without sufficient

vocabulary students cannot understand others or express their own ideas. In second
language acquisition, over the past few years, the Lexical Approach has generated
great interest as an alternative to traditional grammar-based teaching methods to
teach vocabulary, but has never been used in the teaching of English for vocational
purposes. Since then, this study tries to explore how the Lexical Approach could be
implemented in the English lessons. The hypothesis is that students who are taught
English applying the Lexical Approach are able to acquire lexical items more easily
and remember them for a longer time.
Therefore, applying the Lexical Approach to teaching English, especially
English for vocational purposes is a useful way to help students to enlarge
vocabulary, improve their English proficiency for their future use of English at
work.
1.2 Aims of the study
This study aims at exploring the effect of the use of the Lexical Approach on
vocational students‟ English proficiency for their future use of English in the
workplace.
1


1.3 Methodology
In order to achieve the aim of the study, an action research approach was
adopted. This is because action research helps teachers to work on a specific issue
in their own classroom. In this study, the research question is:
How to improve vocational students’ English proficiency so that they can use
English for their future vocational purposes?
One hypothetical solution is that students‟ poor English proficiency is due to
their lexical deficiency. In order to address this issue, the use of lexical approach
may be a solution.
1.4 Scope of the study
The study focuses on the effectiveness of piloting the Lexical Approach to

improve the English proficiency of 25 second - year students in Food Industrial
College. The plan of this study can be used as an immediate solution to current
students' problem in learning their essential vocabularies. This study also gives
some strategies with the aim of facilitating long term retention of vocabularies for
students.
1.5 Structure of the thesis
So as to reach the above aims, the thesis is divided into the following parts:
1. Introduction
2. Theoretical part
3. Practical part
4. Conclusion
5. Reference
6. Appendices

2


2. THE THEORETICAL PART
2.1 English for Vocational Purposes
2.1.1 What is English for Vocational Purposes?
English for vocational purposes (EVP), under the umbrella of English for
specific purposes (ESP), has gained its prominence because more and more English
language programs are geared for those who would like to learn English, which is
relevant to their vocations. The overarching goal of ESP instruction is to help
specialist learners function well in workplaces or vocational higher education
settings where English serves as a medium of communication.
According to Basturkmen‟s (2010) ESP Branches, the one area of ESP,
which remains rarely explored in the ESP literature, is English for Vocational
Purposes (EVP) or Vocational English (VE), though some studies have reported
vocationally-oriented language learning (hereafter VOLL) or VE programs (see

Black & Yasukawa, 2012; Platt, 1996; Vogt &Kantelinen, 2013; Widodo, 2015). In
these studies, English language programs are contextualized within the process of
learning vocational competencies, and English language skills are viewed as social
practices and specific disciplines as dynamic because the actual use of the language
happens in authentic environments, in which students engage (Platt, 1996). In other
words, the emphasis is on using the language to learn or make sense of vocational
content. In addition, vocational socialization (inducting learners into the culture of
their chosen vocations or disciplines) and literacies (language as dynamic social
practice) are key components of VOLL.
2.2 The Lexical Approach
This chapter introduces the basis of the Lexical Approach and also how this
particular approach can be implemented in the English language lessons.
2.2.1 What is the Lexical Approach?
A lexical approach to teaching means the primary focus is on helping
students acquire vocabulary. This movement away from a grammar-based syllabus

3


largely began in 1993 with the publication of “The Lexical Approach” by Michael
Lewis. It was called an approach to differentiate it from a method. In English
language teaching, methods are systems for structuring lessons while approaches
are less concerned with how the lesson is structured and more concerned with the
general focus of instruction. Teachers should be aware of this as there is some
reluctance to adopt a more lexical approach because of the fear that it may mean
revamping the way one teaches. In reality, teachers can use any methodology with a
lexical approach from grammar translation to task-based learning. What changes is
just the linguistic focus of the lesson. While one might think the paradigm shift was
away from teaching grammar structures towards teaching individual words, the
linguistic focus of the lexical approach is really in between grammar and what we

traditionally think of as vocabulary. What it focuses on are structures made up of
words, meaning that the actual paradigm shift was away from individual words to
clusters of words, or lexical chunks as they are commonly referred to. This new idea
about the structural nature of the language does not exclude grammatical structures
but instead recognizes that the language has far more structures than those that
occur in the grammatical syllabus. Consider the statement below:
The Lexical Approach is based on the idea that language is made up of other
structural elements besides what we traditionally think of as grammar.
In that statement, there are two distinct structures:
“X is based on the idea/belief/premise that + clause” “X
is made up of Y”.
Both of these structures occur fairly frequently in the language with different
variables. Yet neither one would be found in a grammar book. In his book, Michael
Lewis suggested that teachers need to help students become aware of the lexical
structures that commonly occur in the language. The idea is that if students become
aware of some of the many lexical structures, they will have a lot more information
about how to combine individual words to build coherent structures like phrases,
expressions and whole sentences, which should ultimately emulate those used by
4


native speakers. Many teachers have noticed that it is no use of grammar which
separates higher level students from native speakers – often the student‟s grammar
will be better than a native speaker‟s – but the way words are combined into lexical
chunks.
2.2.2 Features of the Lexical Approach

The Lexical
Approach

Noun/
Noun phrase + is based on the + abstract noun + that + clause
Using the Lexical Approach requires the investigation of spoken and written
language in order to notice structures which are often ignored because they do not
fall into the categories determined by the traditional understanding of grammar.
Outlining the form of these structures (see example above), helps students acquire
and use the structures and trains them to recognize other ones. The idea is not so
much that students remember the structure of various lexical chunks, for there are
far too many to remember, but that they become aware of the structural nature of the
language beyond the traditional grammar structures. Once they have some
awareness of how language is chunked together, they are more likely to notice the
how a particular lexical chunk is structured and that dissection process is a step not
only towards retaining that structure but also other structures like it.
As mentioned earlier, the Lexical Approach focuses not on individual words
but on clusters or chunks of words. Part of the reason for this is that individual
words, particularly many of those, which are high in frequency, can change meaning
depending on the other words they are chunked together with. The five sentences
below indicate how the word “go” can change depending on the words it is
associated with.
5


Can we go any faster?
Can you help me get my car going?
There's only a week to go until I get my exam results.
I think I heard the doorbell go just now.
I'll put it all away if you tell me where everything goes.
The Lexical Approach consists of three main types of chunks:
Collocations: Words of the four main parts of speech which go
together, usually, but not always, two words.

Fixed expressions: Expressions which cannot be changed or can
Types of Chunks

only be changed minimally. Most fixed expressions are idiomatic
or are those used in polite speech (e.g., How‟s it going?).
Semi-fixed expressions: Expressions which have at least one slot
into which a number of different words or phrases can be inserted.

Below those are examples of how two semi-fixed expressions can be broken down
and expanded:
Collocations: Go on, come first, do homework….
Fixed expressions: All of a sudden, on the other hand, out of the blue…
Semi-fixed expressions: You know I…, Have you taken into account…

You know I

Have you taken into



According to many studies, learners tend to notice and remember words in
chunks, particularly the ones which they consciously or unconsciously recognize as
variable (semi-fixed expressions) because they can perceive that by changing the
slot-filler, they can use the expression in many ways (it‟s “highly generative”).
Imagine a learner sitting at the dinner table and he/she hears the following:
“Would you please pass the sugar?”
“Would you please pass the butter?”
“Would you please pass the soup?”
“Would you please pass the ketchup?”
The learner will store the fixed part of the expression, “Would you please

pass the _____?” because their brain recognizes it as a structure which can be varied
and applied in different situations to achieve a communicative end. Likewise in this
popular song, the third line would be the most easily acquired by a learner because of
its generative value, i.e., it can be used in a variety of ways (with different names).

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear Mary
Happy birthday to you
2.2.3 Research on the benefits of lexical approach to students’ proficiency
There have been many attempts done by researchers concerning the
relationship between lexical chunks and EFL learner‟s proficiency. What is meant
by EFL (English as a Foreign Language) is a traditional term for the use or study of
the English language by non-native speakers in countries where English is generally
not a local medium of communication (Crystal, 2003, p. 256). Starting with Erman
and Warren (2000) who investigated written discourse finding that lexical chunks
constitute 52.3%. In another study, Granger (1998, p. 151) mentions that “learners
use fewer lexical chunks than their native speaker counterparts”. Haswell (1991)
stated that: in order to be a successful academic writer, an L2 learner is required to
master the use of lexical chunks.
7


On the contrary, the absence of such lexical chunks is a characteristic of
novice writers. Many other linguists have conducted experiments on the effect of
lexical chunks on writing proficiency. For example, Nattinger and Decarrico (1992)
did an experiment to examine the ways that lexical chunks are organized in written
discourse. They concluded that the input of these lexical chunks can help EFL
learners to express themselves well in the writing. In another study, Ilyas and Salih
(2011) investigated experimentally the effect of lexical chunks on the achievement

of second-year-university students of English in composition writing. They found
that the lexical chunks were beneficial to the second-year students. Finally,
Snellings, Van Gelderen, and de Glopper (2004) found out that lexical chunks have
a positive effect in improving narrative L2 writing.
After all, all of these studies indicate, in a way or in another, to the
importance of adopting the lexical chunks in developing writing skill. And that the
mastery of these chunks is crucial to create successful academic writers. To date, to
the researcher's knowledge, no study has investigated the impact of lexical chunks
on developing EFL learners skill in descriptive essay writing.
2.2.4 Implications for Teaching
The average educated native speaker knows about 40,000 individual words
and between 250,000 to 300,000 lexical chunks. If you were to teach 10 items a
lesson, five days a week, it would take about 120 years to teach them all! This
calculation is based on the recommended number of new items that should be
introduced in a lesson (10 –15) and does not even take into take into account the
fact that studies have shown that a word (lexical item) must be encountered or used
about seven times before it is acquired!
What should become obvious is that we cannot teach the bulk of the lexicon.
Then how do language learners go from absolute beginners to native-speaker level
in a relatively short time, often in less than ten years? The answer is that most of the
lexicon is not overtly taught but incidentally learned. Learners are constantly
acquiring new lexical items whenever they meet the language, be it listening to the

8


teacher talk in class, watching a film or using the internet. Therefore, if the majority
of lexis is incidentally learned, we should be focusing not on the tiny portion of the
lexicon that we can “teach” in the classroom but on strategies to make the
acquisition of the bulk of the lexicon more effective. How can we help students

more easily acquire language during their exposure to it, both in the classroom and
outside of it?
The most important learning strategy we can give students is just to train
them to NOTICE lexical chunks during their exposure to language. First we have to
raise their awareness of the fact that language consists of lexical structures, then we
need to define the main types of lexical structures (collocations, fixed and semifixed expressions) and finally we need to develop some activities that help them
notice the lexical chunks in spoken and written texts.
Once students have located the lexical chunks, they need to be analyzed so
the learners can understand their construction, what they mean and how they are and
might be used. Again, in keeping with the idea that we are trying to give students
strategies to notice and process new language, the purpose of analyzing the chunks
is not so much so that students understand those particular chunks but, more
generally, that they gain practice in doing this sort of processing with new language
and they develop some global knowledge of lexical structuring. To provide a simple
example of this, if you have students find collocations in a text and then determine
their structure, they will not only understand those collocations but they will be able
to make some basic generalizations about collocations. Below are some collocations
extracted from this paragraph:
Collocation
lexical chunks
keeping with the idea
give students strategies
process (new) language
gain practice
new language
global knowledge
simple example
basic generalizations

As mentioned above, students not only become aware of the particular
collocations but they should be able to make more general assumptions about
lexical structures. For example, two types of collocations seem to be most common
in the previous paragraph, adjective + noun and verb + noun. One might conclude
that these are the most common types of collocation in English, but further
investigation of other texts would reveal that that might be true for adjective + noun
collocations, but the frequency of verb + noun collocations is actually particular to
this type of text, i.e., one that gives instructions.
The final step in the clarification stage with new lexical items is to illuminate
the usage by supplying some slot-fillers. This is a good thing to do for several
reasons. Firstly, it gives students multiple new lexical chunks rather than just one.
Also, it emphasizes the structure by giving students other examples of it. And
finally, it gives students an idea of the generative value of the structure, i.e., all the
different ways it can be used.
gain
get
practice

give
provide
2.3 Implementing lexis in the class of FIC

At Food Industrial College (FIC), Grammar has been the focus of language
teaching for years. In reality, we do not have to be grammatically correct to
communicate effectively, but we need to be correct with our use of lexis. According
to John Sinclair (1996):“A lexical mistake often causes misunderstanding, while a
grammar mistake rarely does” and Michael Lewis (1997): “However unpopular it
is with teachers, language which contains grammatical errors is unlikely to be
misunderstood

in

context,

but

with

lexical

errors

misunderstanding,

incomprehension, or in rare cases even offence, are quite likely. Recognizing the
lexical nature of language, and the centrality of lexis to the creation of meaning,

10


and consequently to communicative power, demotes grammar – and in particular,
the often unnatural, inaccurate grammar of standard EFL – to a subsidiary role”.
Grammar has been the basis of language teaching for so long because there
are a limited number of essential structures and they can be quite easily graded and
organized into a syllabus. Therefore, most course books are based on a grammatical
syllabus.
So how the lexis could be included to the English lessons? Lewis (1998)
proposed several involving questions which should be considered by a teacher
before entering a classroom:
1. Do you think your learners will learn most of their vocabulary in class or outside?

2. How will you use valuable class time to make learning vocabulary less daunting,

more enjoyable and more efficient?
3. Will you concentrate on the quality or quantity of learners‟ lexicons?
4. What proportions of class time will you spend on vocabulary and grammar

respectively?
5. How will you decide which lexical items deserve special attention in class?
6. How will you encourage learners to use their dictionary to help build their

lexicon? What activities will you use to develop their dictionary skills?
7. How will you decide what items are worth recording in learners‟ notebooks?
8. Will you follow up what has been recorded in later lesson? How?

It is important to take into consideration not only what a teacher is going to
teach, but also how, when, the reason and purpose of the lesson, with what
materials, etc. (Lewis, 1998, pp. 44-45). In addition to this, Ruth Gairns and Stuart
Redman suggest following, more specific, items which should be also taken into
account: frequency, cultural factors, need, level and expediency (1990, pp. 58-64).
What is more, teacher‟s knowledge of the particular language as well as his or her
knowledge of teaching, learning and interpersonal skills are equally crucial (Lewis,
1998, pp. 44- 45).

11


Besides, speaking about the Lexical Approach, more time should be
dedicated to multi-word items. As for the amount of words the learners are supposed
to master to be able to communicate at a decent level, it is approximately two
thousand words. However, it is important to add that if students are not given

enough time to learn and practice so many items, they will never acquire those
items properly. Therefore, the Lexical Approach points out the importance of a good
L1/L1 dictionaries and subsequent dictionary-based activities (Lewis, 1998, pp. 4547).
In addition, Lewis as well as Woolard or Hill (in Lewis, 2000, p. 43, 65) also
propose “the concept of a Lexical Notebook” (Lewis, 1998, p. 49) instead of the
traditionally used vocabulary book where only individual words are kept. This kind
of notebook should preferably include phrases, collocations and expressions (not the
individual words) and those ought to be organized according to some sections,
headings or topics (Lewis, 2000, p. 26) for better orientation.
Next, as Lewis recommends (1998), it is necessary to devote the time to help
the learners develop their learning strategies concerning lexical items. Those
strategies include suggestions such as: not being worried if not every word is
understood during reading or listening; not being worried about making mistakes…
Furthermore, teachers should also realize that the “mere” listening or noticing from
learners‟ side can be as fruitful, especially at the beginning, as speaking itself. As
Dave Willis (1990) explains, and Sarah Phillips (1993, p. 17) shares similar opinion
as well, learners: “must also be given exposure to language relevant to the task they
have performed or are about to perform, and in particular they must be given the
opportunity to see how competent speakers and writers use the target language to
achieve similar outcomes”. This is basically the core of TPR, which is a method
used mainly with young learners. Within this method, they are not forced to speak;
they start speaking and using the language only when they want to.
Another helpful tool for vocabulary acquisition is repetition. Although being
considered as annoying and boring, many researchers have come to the conclusion
12


that “repeating certain kinds of activities such as summarizing a text orally one day
and again a few days later may be the most efficient way of improving learners’
language” (Lewis, 1998, p.51). The effect of this statement may be increased if a

certain word (multi-word lexical item) is met several times without any particular
intention. Therefore, it follows that the traditional learning lists of new words,
which usually appear in many textbooks and which have to be learnt by heart only
for a test, does not seem to be appropriate and useful. Instead, collocations and
expressions should be learnt and reused several times (Lewis, 1998, pp. 51-52).
Gairns and Redman, apart from recycling, also suggest frequency as the basis for
the lexical item acquisition (1990, p.88).
Lewis also mentions so called Noticing, which is a technique based on a
learner‟s unconscious noticing of language regularities such as “lexical chunks and
grammatical or phonological patterns” (1998, p. 53).And last but not least, it is the
principle of pedagogical chunking which should encourage the lexical awareness of
the learners. Lewis, however, warns that teachers should “not break language down
too far in the false hope of simplifying; your efforts, even if successful in the short
term, are almost certainly counterproductive in terms of long-term acquisition”
(2000, p. 133).
Speaking about implementing lexis in a class, there is also another principle
according to which it is possible to introduce lexis. This principle includes ten
aspects, each dealing with different point of view from which the implementation of
the lexis can be approached. The aspects are the following: topic, situation,
collocation, notion (functional language, e.g. apology, requirement, wish, etc.),
narration (making sequences), metaphor (metaphor as a pattern), person (changing
grammatical persons), phonological chunking, keywords (especially de-lexicalized
verbs) and grammar.
Dave Willis, dealing with the lexical syllabus, adds to these principles the
necessity of organization of exposure. The organization is based on three stages.
Firstly, difficulty of the language the learners are supposed to learn should be
13


gradually graded so that the learners would not have to face some complexities at

the very beginning, for it could be demotivating for them. Secondly, the language
should be carefully selected and not only randomly chosen. It is preferable so that
the chosen language would consist of patterns which the learners are most likely to
come across outside the classroom. Thirdly the language ought to be itemized
(Willis, 1990, p. iv).
2.4 Activities and Exercises
This chapter briefly introduces several basic types of activities and exercises
which are typical of the Lexical Approach. However, what is important to mention
here again is that neither all the following exercises nor the Lexical Approach are
something absolutely new and innovative. The Lexical Approach only approaches
teaching, and consequently exercises, from different point of view, and thus the aim
(i.e. vocabulary) is what differs.
Also Lewis distinguishes Activities and Exercises. The reason is that: firstly,
he finds Activities more cooperative, secondly, Activities have non-linguistic as well
as linguistic outcome, and thirdly they are usually used in the class (1998, p. 86).
Gairns and Redman also highlight activities stating that they, besides the points
mentioned above, support realism, authenticity, engagement, learners „self-reliance,
and last but not least they also help learners to “commit information to long term
memory” (1990, p. 90). Whereas Exercises fit rather for the individual work, they
are usually paper-based, they have only linguistic outcome, they are used for
homework or reflective class (1998, p. 86) and, as Willis completes, they “involve
the production of language but not the use of language” (1990, p. 1).
Below there is a list of the most common Exercises:
*

Identifying chunks (it is the crucial skill which helps to work with dictionaries, to
translate better, to avoid mistakes, and also it encourages to record accurately in
the notebooks).

*

Matching (matching parts of collocations and expressions).

*

Completing (the focus is lexical; it is extended by the double-gap filling).
14