Do activities in graded readers promote vocabulary learning? A Technique

Feature Analysis study

¿Las actividades en las lecturas graduadas promueven el aprendizaje de

vocabulario? Un estudio de Technique Feature Analysis

Diego Alins Breda

University of California, Davis

dalinsbreda@ucdavis.edu

ABSTRACT

Vocabulary acquisition through reading has been repeatedly studied in second language learning

research and several recent studies conclude that incidental learning through reading needs to be

complemented with intentional learning activities that target specific words. These learning

opportunities are potentially present in graded readers (i.e., books adapted to the proficiency level

of the learners). Seeking to contribute to this growing area of scholarship, this study analyzes the

activities in 10 elementary Spanish graded readers. The framework used to measure the activities'

quality is Nation and Webb's (2011) Technique Feature Analysis (TFA). Results show that graded

readers include only a low number of activities explicitly focused on vocabulary. In addition, TFA

scores were extremely low for most of the activities. Overall, the study indicates the necessity of

increasing the quantity and quality of vocabulary activities in these books.

Keywords: Intentional vocabulary acquisition, Technique Feature Analysis, Spanish graded readers,

Incidental learning

RESUMEN

La adquisición de vocabulario a partir de la lectura se ha estudiado repetidas veces en la investigación

sobre aprendizaje de segundas lenguas y varios estudios demuestran la importancia de

complementar el aprendizaje incidental en la lectura con actividades intencionales de aprendizaje de

léxico. Un tipo de lectura que brinda esta oportunidad son las lecturas graduadas (es decir, libros

adaptados al nivel de los estudiantes). Tratando de contribuir a esta área de estudio, este trabajo

evalúa las actividades incluidas en 10 lecturas graduadas de nivel elemental de español. El marco

teórico utilizado para medir la calidad de las actividades es Nation y Webb (2011): Technique Feature

Analysis (TFA). Los resultados muestran que las lecturas graduadas incluyen un número limitado de

actividades explícitas de vocabulario y que la mayoría tienen un TFA bajo. Estos datos confirman la

necesidad de incrementar la cantidad y calidad de las actividades de vocabulario en estos libros.

Palabras clave: Adquisición de vocabulario intencional, Technique Feature Analysis, Lecturas

graduadas en español, Aprendizaje incidental

Revista Nebrija de Lingüística Aplicada a la Enseñanza de Lenguas (RNAEL) ISSN 1699-6569

Vol. 15 Núm. 30 (2021) doi: 10.26378/rnlael1530430

Recibido: 10/01/2021 / Aprobado: 25/04/2021

Publicado bajo licencia de Creative Commons Reconocimiento Sin Obra Derivada 4.0 Internacional

1. INTRODUCTION

As Horst (2010) demonstrates, the classroom environment does not provide enough

lexically rich input for students to learn the necessary vocabulary to understand most words

in a given text in their L2. Concretely, when she analyzed the words used by a teacher in a

language classroom in every session of a 9-week course, she discovered that many words

that would be useful for the students were either not introduced at all or repeated only a

few times, making it difficult for incidental learning to take place. In this context, reading,

and extensive reading in particular, can be seen as a welcome addition to provide learners

with the additional input that they need to develop a broad lexicon. The practice of extensive

reading has thus been considered as a complement to other language learning practices

that students engage in during L2 classes. Indeed, reading has a demonstrated impact on

reading comprehension (Martinez, 2017; Yamashita, 2008) and on the development of a

positive attitude towards L2 reading (Brantmeier, 2005; Martinez, 2017; Saito, Horwitz &

Garza, 1999; Sellers, 2000; Yamashita, 2004; Yamashita, 2013).

When it comes to vocabulary learning, there is currently a broad consensus that it is

possible to achieve some, although limited, incidental vocabulary learning through reading

(Pellicer-Sánchez & Schmitt, 2010; Pigada & Schmitt, 2006; Schmitt, 2008; Teng, 2014).

However, the extent of such learning is very variable across studies and learners, and many

researchers are now proposing to use a more explicit approach to vocabulary

learning/teaching, even in the context of reading activities (Eckerth & Tavakoli, 2012;

Pellicer-Sánchez & Schmitt, 2010; Pigada & Schmitt, 2006; Schmitt, 2008; Teng, 2014).

Specially, the idea is to complement non vocabulary-focused reading comprehension

exercises, which do not explicitly tap into any determined set of target words, with

intentional vocabulary learning exercises focused on specific word-learning goals. This

combination of incidental and intentional vocabulary learning opportunities aims to tap into

both explicit and implicit lexical learning, thus increasing the chances of learning new target

words.

Graded readers can potentially satisfy these requirements. By using graded readers,

students have the chance to complement incidental vocabulary learning through reading

with activities focused on specific words. However, while graded readers' structure seems

promising, the exercises’ effectiveness will affect the amount of lexical learning that can

realistically happen when using these books.

The present study is designed to examine the quality of the activities in a series of

graded readers. The framework Technique Feature Analysis, proposed by Nation and Webb

(2011), is used to measure these exercises. No previous study has used this framework

before to evaluate the quality of the activities in these types of books. In other words, the

aim of this article is to evaluate the activities included in ten graded readers for beginner

learners of Spanish to analyze the effectiveness of these books in developing lexical

knowledge.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1. Reading and vocabulary learning

Hulstijn (2001) defined incidental vocabulary learning as the learning of vocabulary

produced by any activity not explicitly focused on vocabulary. A number of studies on

incidental word acquisition have focused on learning through reading (Eckerth & Tavakoli,

2012) and have specifically looked at the number of exposures to a target word necessary

for students to learn said word. Findings in this area do, however, show significant variation

across studies given the multifaceted nature of word knowledge. For instance, five

exposures could be sufficient for orthographic recognition of a new word but not enough to

develop a strong association between the word's form and its meaning (Brown, Waring &

Donkaewbua, 2008; Pellicer-Sánchez & Schmitt, 2010; Pigada & Schmitt, 2006; Webb,

2008). As an example of such studies, Pellicer-Sánchez & Schmitt (2010) measured the

acquisition of the spelling, word-class, and meaning of 34 words both at the receptive and

productive level when reading a novel. The authors concluded that ten exposures allow

students to learn spelling and recognition aspects. However, more than ten repetitions are

needed to correctly recall a new word and know its word class. For this reason, they

highlighted the importance of explicit vocabulary learning activities to consolidate the

potential of incidental learning that takes place through mere exposure, a conclusion that

was shared by Pigada & Schmitt (2006). The latter authors evaluated the acquisition of

word meaning, spelling, and grammatical behavior in one French student reading four

different graded readers. They examined whether one month of extensive reading enhanced

knowledge of a total of 133 target words. Results demonstrated that even after 20

repetitions the learner had trouble retaining some of the words' meanings, indicating that

repetition alone is an insufficient learning tool. This is particularly clear when considering

that the student involved in this case study was a highly motivated learner, thus the

incomplete learning cannot be due to limited motivation. The obvious conclusion is again

that incidental vocabulary learning needs to be supported by additional intentional focus on

target words. On the same page, Teng (2014) proposes that explicit word-recall tasks

should be included in any vocabulary learning endeavor, even when reading is involved.

In conclusion, available evidence shows that reading alone can slightly enhance a

variety of word knowledge aspects when repeated encounters are ensured, but that, at the

same time, explicit vocabulary learning tasks are expected to dramatically improve the

learning rate of specific target words from the text (Hulstijn, 2001; Schmitt, 2008). One

type of book that provides opportunities to meet both requirements is graded readers. On

the one hand, they provide level-appropriate reading materials to the learners, by

containing a majority of words that students are expected to know at a specified level, while

also providing exposure to lower-frequency words relevant to the story. On the other hand,

most of these books include activities that tap into different skills, such as grammatical

knowledge, vocabulary learning, or reading comprehension. Finally, graded readers are

known for positively affecting L2 learners' attitudes towards reading as they cultivate

confidence, foster enjoyment, and decrease reading anxiety (Martinez, 2017; Rodrigo,

2016; Rodrigo, 2011).

Therefore graded readers appear to be an excellent tool to complement incidental

vocabulary learning through reading with activities focused on specific words. However,

before we get to any conclusion, it is essential to measure the quality of the activities to

understand the amount of lexical learning that students can learn when using these books.

The present study aims to analyze the activities (both those explicitly aimed at vocabulary

learning and those that do so implicitly) included in a series of graded readers aimed at

beginner learners of L2 Spanish. The next section thus addresses the different models that

have been used over time to evaluate the effectiveness of several types of exercises in

developing lexical knowledge.

2.2. Ways to assess the effectiveness of reading activities for vocabulary learning

Two models have been used so far to determine pedagogical activities’s usefulness for the

purposes of lexical learning: Laufer & Hulstijn’ (2001) Involvement Load Hypothesis (ILH)

and Nation and Webb’s (2011) Technique Feature Analysis (TFA). ILH builds a motivational-

cognitive construct that is based on the assumption that deeper processing results in better

retention (Craik and Lockhart, 1972). The model consists of three components: need,

search, and evaluation. Need is the motivational component and can be moderate (1 point),

if an external agent imposes the activity, or strong (2 points), if the task is self-imposed by

the student. The two other components constitute the cognitive dimension. Search is the

attempt to find the meaning or the form of an unknown L2 word (e.g., by consulting a

dictionary or a teacher). Evaluation entails comparing the different meanings of a word, or

comparing similar words to choose the one that best fits in a specified context. If the task

demands students to compare the difference between words' meanings or choose between

several meanings of a word (as in a fill-in-the-blanks activity where the target words are

provided), it is considered moderate. If the evaluation requires a decision about combining

several words with the target word (as in an original sentence or text), it is considered

strong. Each of the three factors can be absent (0 points) or present to a higher or lower

degree, receiving 1 or 2 points respectively. The sum of the scores obtained for need,

search, and evaluation represents the total ILH of a given task, with six being the highest

ILH possible. Hulstijn and Laufer (2001) provide two examples of tasks to explain how the

involvement loads can vary. In task one, students have to write sentences with words

provided by the teacher. The task induces a moderate need, as it was imposed by an

external agent, no search, because the words were given, and strong evaluation, as

students have to write an original text. The final score of this activity would thus be 3 (1 +

0 + 2). In the second task, students have to read a text with relevant words glossed, and

answer comprehension questions. Need is moderate because it is imposed by the teacher,

and search and evaluation are not present in this task because the meaning of the new

words are provided. This activity's involvement load is of 1 (1 + 0 + 0), meaning that this

activity should be less effective to learn vocabulary than task one.

Several studies have examined the efficacy of ILH. Hulstijn & Laufer (2001) measured

the retention of ten words by adult English as a Second Language (ESL) students in Israel

and Netherlands after the completion of three different tasks: reading comprehension with

marginal glosses, with an involvement index of 1 (moderate need, no search, and no

evaluation), reading comprehension plus fill-in-the-blanks, with an involvement index of 2

(moderate need, no search, and moderate evaluation), and writing a composition using

target words, with an involvement index of 3 (moderate need, no search, and strong

evaluation). The findings related to the students in Israel were in line with the predictions

of the ILH. The composition group scored higher than the reading plus fill-in students, and

this group scored higher than the reading with glosses group. However, students of the

Netherlands obtained higher results in the composition group but the two remaining groups

did not show significantly different results. This latter set of data, thus, only partially

supports the ILH's predictions. Following Hulstijn & Laufer (2001), Kim (2008) used the

same three tasks (i.e., reading with marginal glosses, reading plus fill-in, and writing a

composition). The results were similar to those obtained by the Netherlands students in

Hulstijn & Laufer (2001) experiment. Writing a composition, the task with the highest ILH,

had the best score and, as in Hulstijn & Laufer (2001), there was no significant difference

between reading with marginal glosses and reading plus filling-in. Finally, Keating (2008)

measured retention after completing different tasks with beginning learners of Spanish. In

line with the predictions of the ILH, retention was highest in the task with the highest

amount of involvement (sentence writing using target words), lower in the reading plus

filling task, and lowest in the reading with glosses. In sum, ILH has received support in the

literature, based on evidence of its usefulness, but critics have also arisen who defend that

other factors may be more (or just as) important than the three aspects taken into account

in ILH in how words are ultimately remembered in the long term.

For example, Keating (2008) and Kim (2008) measured the role of time on task and

partially criticized ILH because it does not consider this important factor. Likewise, Folse

(2006) selected three tasks: one fill-in-the-blank exercise, three fill-in-the-blank exercises

(i,e., the same words were practiced three different times), and one original sentence

writing exercise. From the perspective of ILH, the third task was supposed to have the best

effect on learning but, when time on task was controlled, students doing activity 2

outperformed learners doing the other two tasks. Based on these results, the author claimed

that "the important feature of a given L2 vocabulary exercise is not the depth of word

processing but the number of word retrievals required" (Folse, 2006, p.273). Moreover,

Eckerth & Tavakoli (2012) worked with advanced learners of L2 English to investigate the

effects of the variables' word exposure frequency' and 'elaboration of word processing' on

word retention. Results showed that the elaboration with which unfamiliar words are

processed is more relevant to word retention than repeated encounters with the same

words. Finally, two more recent studies partially support ILH. Zou (2017) compared a cloze

task, a task that required writing a sentence, and another that asked students to write a

composition, and found that the first one (1+0+1) promoted less learning than both writing

tasks (1+0+2), which supports the ILH. However, the composition-writing outperformed

the sentence-writing even though they were accorded the same load. Yang et al. (2017)

showed that the task with the lowest involvement load (comprehension only) was

outperformed by sentence writing and cloze task as predicted by the ILH. Nevertheless, no

difference was found between the students' performance on the cloze task (1+0+1) and

the sentence-writing task (1+0+2).

In 2011, Nation and Webb created another theoretical framework: Technique Feature

Analysis (TFA). TFA introduced more criteria to operationalize depth-of-processing than

those in the ILH. This framework has five components: noticing, retrieval, generation,

motivation, and retention. These factors are formed of different criteria, and each of these

criteria can have a score of one, if it is present, or zero if it is absent (Nation & Webb, 2011).

As seen in Table 1, the highest possible score for an activity is 18, and, as in ILH, the higher

the score, the better the activity.

CRITERIA

SCORES

Motivation

Is there a clear vocabulary learning goal?

0 1

Does the activity motivate learning?

0 1

Do the learners select the words?

0 1

Noticing

Does the activity focus attention on the target words?

0 1

Does the activity raise awareness of new vocabulary learning?

0 1

Does the activity involve learning?

0 1

Retrieval

Does the activity involve retrieval of the word?

0 1

Is it productive retrieval?

0 1

Is it recall?

0 1

Are there multiple retrievals of each word?

0 1

Is there spacing between retrievals?

0 1

Generation

Does the activity involve generative use?

0 1

Is it productive?

0 1

Is there a marked change that involves the use of other words?

0 1

Retention

Does the activity ensure successful linking of form and meaning?

0 1

Does the activity involve instantiation?

0 1

Does the activity involve imaging?

0 1

Does the activity avoid interference?

0 1

Maximum score

Table 1. Technique Feature Analysis (adapted from Nation and Webb, 2011, p. 7)

Motivation is related to whether the activity has a clear vocabulary goal and motivates

learning. Noticing concerns whether the activity focuses attention on the target words or

not and if the activity involves negotiation. Regarding retrieval, the authors differentiate

between receptive and productive retrieval, the number of retrievals, and spacing between

them. They also determine if the activity focuses attention on recall or recognition of the

target words. Generation involves encountering (receptive generation) or using (productive

generation) a word in a novel context. Fill-in-the-blanks exercises with previously taught

words entail receptive generation, while sentence production activities involve productive

generation. Finally, retention focuses on whether the activity ensures successful linking of

form and meaning and if the activity involves instantiation or imaging, and whether or not

it avoids interference.

Nation and Webb (2011) made a scoring comparison between ILH and TFA on

different vocabulary activities, and they found some disagreements between these two

frameworks. For example, upon calculating the final score for a fill-in-the-blanks activity,

this task had a low TFA score (8 out of 18) but a high ILH score (4 out of 6). These diverging

results entail different predictions depending on what framework is used when evaluating

an activity. Therefore, a few studies have empirically examined and compared such

predictions. Hu and Nassaji (2016), for example, contrasted TFA and ILH in four different

tasks (i.e., reading a text with multiple-choice items, reading a text and choosing

definitions, reading plus fill in the blanks, and reading and rewording the sentences) with

adult ESL students who aimed to learn the meaning of 14 unknown words. These learners

were divided into four groups and completed one of four vocabulary activities ranked

differently by TFA and ILH. The results showed two important conclusions: (1) TFA was

more accurate than ILH in predicting vocabulary learning gains during task performance

and in pretest to post-test vocabulary gains, and (2) form-focused tasks (i.e., activities

directly related to the target words) were more productive to gain lexical learning. Gohar,

Rahmanian, and Soleimani (2018) also worked with ESL students to assess the diverging

predictions of TFA and ILH into three different activities (i.e., sentence making, composition,

and reading comprehension). This investigation concludes that, although none of the

vocabulary frameworks predicted vocabulary learning entirely, TFA was better than ILH at

predicting the pretest to post-test score change, but was not as useful to predict students’

learning during the task. Finally, Zou et al. (2018) compared four different vocabulary tasks

to evaluate the TFA predictions' effectiveness. The post-test results were consistent with

the TFA checklist, and the authors approved the reliability of this framework to measure

word learning activities. The present study will rely on TFA, rather than ILH, as results from

previous literature seem to indicate that it is more precise and accurate to determine the

quality of a specific vocabulary learning task.

3. RESEARCH QUESTIONS

This investigation aims to use the TFA framework to assess the usefulness of the exercises

included in ten graded readers for L2 Spanish beginner learners and, therefore, answer the

two following research questions:

(1) How many explicit vocabulary exercises are included in each book's total number

of activities, as compared to other types of reading comprehension or grammar exercises?

(2) What TFA scores do all the books' activities have, both those that explicitly tap

into lexical learning and those that may do so more implicitly?

4. METHODS

4.1. Corpus

Ten graded readers were randomly selected from a pool of books from a variety of

publishers from Spain. It needs to be said here that locating published graded readers from

publishers that were not from Spain was extremely difficult, thus explaining the selection

bias towards Spanish books. As a consequence, six of the stories take place in Spain, while

only four take place in three different Latin American countries (Costa Rica, Cuba, and two

of them in Mexico). Based on CEFR standards (Common European Framework Reference

for Languages), the level of all the graded readers analyzed was between A1 and A2,

ranging from El secreto de su nombre, an introductory A1 level book, to La llamada de la

Habana with a high A2 level. In other words, these graded readers are focused on beginner

learners but have different publication years, editorials, and activities. The reason for this

diversity is to have a sample as much heterogeneous as possible to replicate the graded

readers market at the elementary level of Spanish. By doing so, we will be able to

understand what type of activities are proposed at this specific level.

TITLE

YEAR OF

PUBLICATION

PUBLISHER

LEVEL

WORDS USED

NUMBER

ACTIVITIES

Muerte en Valencia

1987

Edelsa

Level 1

n/a

La sombra de un

fotógrafo

1991

Santillana

Level 1

Less than 400

El secreto de su

nombre

2014

Santillana

Introductory

level

Less than 300

Me llamo Yago, Yago

Ayala

2014

EnClaveELE

A1- A2

500 words

La llamada de la

Habana

2003

Difusión

A2 +

n/a

Fantasmas en la

escalera

2009

Difusión

n/a

Dos semanas con los

ticos

2008

Difusión

A1- A2

n/a

Ojalá que te vaya

bonito

2014

Difusión

A1- A2

n/a

Amnesia

2002

Edinumen

Initial Level

n/a

Historia de una

distancia

2001

Edinumen

Initial Level

n/a

Table 2. Graded Readers

4.2. Activities in the books

In addition to the text itself, most graded readers include activities to work on listening and

reading comprehension, oral and writing production, and vocabulary and grammar

acquisition. Only one of the books, Muerte en Valencia, has no activities and Fantasmas en

la escalera has only three. On the other hand, La sombra de un fotógrafo and El secreto de

su nombre have the most activities with 46 and 36, respectively. The rest of the graded

readers include around 20 activities each.

ACTIVITIES

FINAL

SCORE

EXAMPLE

Word cards

An activity that uses cards to help students to remember the

meaning of the words.

Completing a word

parts table

An activity that asks students to use prefixes to form new

words.

Writing using target

words

An activity that involves oral or written production using

specific words.

Using the keyword

technique

An activity that requires students to use what a word sounds

like to visualize something memorable that will help them

later recall the definition.

Filling in the blanks

An activity that requires students to complete a sentence

with a word retrieved from memory.

Finding the words in

the text

An activity that asks students to find sentences in the text

about a specific topic.

Reading plus fill in

An activity that involves completing a text or a sentence with

words from a list.

True/ False

statements

An activity that involves students to answer comprehension

questions about a given text using true and false statements.

Multiple-choice items

about a given text

An activity that asks students to answer comprehension

questions about a specified text with multiple-choice

options.

Rewording sentences

An activity that asks students to rewrite a sentence.

Reading the words,

choosing the definition

An activity that requires students to join different

expressions with their meanings

Reading with glosses

An activity that focuses attention on the reading of a text

with the help of glosses.

Table 3. TFA applied to 12 different activities (adapted from Nation and Webb, 2011)

As an illustration of how the TFA framework could help define the characteristics of

L2 pedagogical activities from the perspective of vocabulary learning, Nation and Webb

(2011) calculated the TFA scores of 12 different activities shown in Table 3. Most of the

graded readers' activities were listed in those TFA analyses, but some exercises from the

books were not considered in the original table presented by the authors. To evaluate all

the activities in the books, three different Spanish teachers were asked to assess them

using the TFA framework. In the first round of ratings, two teachers attributed a TFA score

to each of the tasks and reached 80% of inter-rater agreement. In a meeting, the

differences in the tasks' scores were discussed to reach an agreement. Based on those

agreements, they wrote a detailed document with instructions on how to calculate TFA

scores. A third rater was then invited to use the document to rate the 20% of activities

where a consensus had not been initially reached. The final inter-rater agreement between

the three final raters for those activities reached 100%. Finally, the activities that did not

match any of the activities in Table 3 were organized in Table 4. The description, final TFA

scores, and examples of the types of activities that were not in the original study by Nation

and Webb (2011) are provided in this table.

ACTIVITIES

FINAL

SCORE

EXAMPLE

Look for words in the dictionary

An activity that focuses attention in a word to look

up the meaning.

Find information related to a

topic

An activity that asks students to look up

information on the internet.

Look up target words and use

them in oral or written

production

An activity that asks students to find words in a

text and write a text with them.

Join columns based on a given

text

An activity that focuses attention on reading

comprehension and asks students to link the

information in the columns.

Identify similar words.

An activity that focuses attention on target words

and asks students to link the information in the

columns.

Reading and listening plus fill in

about a text

An activity that requires students to read or listen

to a story and answer questions about it.

Read plus verify the information

An activity that asks students to read a story and

verify the information previously listened

Writing or speaking without

target words

An activity that asks students to talk with other

students about a specific topic

Writing or speaking based on an

image

An activity that asks students to describe a photo

Writing or speaking specific

vocabulary based on an image

An activity that requires students to write the

correct word to identify each illustration

Identify cognates

An activity that asks students to recognize the

words that are cognates.

Crosswords

An activity that requires students to complete a

crossword based on definitions or in a picture.

Write a list of words about a

specific topic.

An activity that asks students to think about a

topic and write words related to it.

Inflectional morphology

An activity that asks students to write the plural

of a word or its conjugation.

Table 4. TFA scores and description of the activities that were not listed in Nation and Webb (2011)

5. RESULTS

The number of activities included in the analyzed graded readers varied greatly across

books. While most of the books analyzed had between 15 to 25 activities, two of them

included several tasks much higher than the rest: El secreto de su nombre (36 activities)

and La sombra de un fotógrafo (46 activities), both published by Santillana. On the other

hand, Fantasmas en la escalera included only three activities, and Muerte en Valencia did

not propose any activities. In this context, not all books presented the same potential in

terms of how much vocabulary could be learned through explicit activities. However, a book

with few activities focused on vocabulary learning may be more efficient in developing

lexical knowledge than a book with multiple activities that do not tap into specific vocabulary

at all, or do so with a very low TFA.

Therefore, all books’ activities were classified into (1) explicit vocabulary activities

and (2) other activities that did not explicitly tap into any specific target words to learn.

This second set of activities, however, could potentially require readers to use new

vocabulary or, at least, understand it, in order to answer reading comprehension questions,

for example. Thus, the main difference between both was that the former type of exercises

would explicitly aim at practicing and using a specific set of target words whereas the latter

would not specifically target any word in an explicit way. Table 5 provides a list of the total

number of activities in each book and the number of vocabulary-focused and non

vocabulary-focused activities. As evidenced in the table, vocabulary is rarely at the center

of the activities. Only in Fantasmas en la escalera are all the activities, albeit limited in

number, explicitly focused on vocabulary acquisition. The rest of the books include less than

40% of vocabulary oriented activities. For instance, in Me llamo Yago, Yago Ayala only 4.5%

of the total activities explicitly address lexical learning, La llamada de la Habana includes

12 activities, but none of them focus on vocabulary learning, and only 8.7% of the activities

in La sombra de un fotógrafo are geared towards the learning of specific words. This last

graded reader deserves a special mention because it includes 46 activities, and only four of

them are focused on vocabulary, which indicates that the inclusion of an overall high number

of exercises does not necessarily entail an increase in vocabulary activities. In the same

way, a clear relation between publishers and vocabulary activities was not found. In other

words, graded readers from the same publisher had different proportions of vocabulary

activities with no apparent preference among publishers for more, or less, vocabulary-

oriented activities. For example, La llamada de la Habana, Ojalá que te vaya bonito, and

Fantasmas en la escalera are published by Difusión, but the first book includes 0% of

vocabulary activities while the second includes a total of 41.2% and the latter a total of

100% of such activities.

EXPLICIT

VOCABULARY

ACTIVITIES

OTHER

ACTIVITIES

TOTAL NUMBER OF

ACTIVITIES

Ojalá que te vaya bonito

6 (35.3%)

11 (64.7%)

17 activities

Dos semanas con los ticos

4 (28.6%)

10 (71.4%)

14 activities

Historia de una distancia

8 (34.8%)

15 (65.2%)

23 activities

La llamada de la Habana

0 (0%)

12 (100%)

12 activities

Me llamo Yago, Yago Ayala

1 (4.5%)

21 (95.5%)

22 activities

Amnesia

9 (34.6%)

17 (65.4%)

26 activities

La sombra de un fotógrafo

3 (6.5%)

43 (93.5%)

46 activities

El secreto de su nombre

7 (19.4%)

29 (80.6%)

36 activities

Fantasmas en la escalera

3 (100%)

0 (0%)

3 activities

Muerte en Valencia

0 (0%)

0 activities

Table 5: Number of vocabulary focused vs. non-vocabulary focused activities

In order to address the second research question, we further explored the TFA of all

the activities in the graded readers. Table 6 lists the average TFA scores of the activities in

each graded reader and the number of activities in each book that pertain to the following

ranges of TFA scores: 0-5, 6, 7-8, 9-10, 10+. As a reminder, a higher TFA indicates that

the activity is expected to better serve the students in learning new vocabulary, and the

maximum TFA score is 18.

ACTIVITIES

AVERAGE

SCORE (TFA)

0-5

7-8

9-10

+10

Ojalá que te vaya bonito

(17 activities)

6.88

8 (47.1%)

9 (52.9%)

Dos semanas con los

ticos (14 activities)

6.57

9 (64.3%)

4 (28.6%)

1 (7.1%)

Historia de una distancia

(23 activities)

6.39

16 (69.6%)

7 (30.4%)

La llamada de la Habana

(12 activities)

12 (100%)

Me llamo Yago, Yago

Ayala (22 activities)

6.18

19 (86.4%)

3 (13.6%)

Amnesia (26 activities)

6.4

15 (57.7%)

7 (26.9%)

4 (15.4%)

La sombra de un

fotógrafo (46 activities)

6.21

41 (89.1%)

4 (8.7%)

1 (2.2%)

El secreto de su nombre

(36 activities)

6.64

22 (61.1%)

12(33.3%)

2 (5.6%)

Fantasmas en la escalera

(3 activities)

3 (100%)

Muerte en Valencia (0

activities)

Table 6. Activities Score

As evidenced in Table 6, most activities present low TFA scores, with all books, except

for one, having overall average scores that range between 6 and 7. Fantasmas en la escalera

is the graded reader with the highest average score, even though eight is far from the

maximum possible score of 18, and the book only includes three activities. Only four graded

readers have at least one activity with a score of nine: Dos semanas con los ticos (one

activity), Amnesia (four activities), La sombra de un fotógrafo (one activity), and El secreto

de su nombre (one activity). Finally, El secreto de su nombre is the only graded reader with

an activity that reaches a score of 10, which is the highest in this analysis. There are no

activities with a score lower than six and no activities with a score higher than 10.

6. DISCUSSION

Previous literature highlights the importance of incorporating explicit vocabulary learning

activities in otherwise incidental learning approaches based on repeated exposure to new

words through reading (Pellicer-Sánchez & Schmitt, 2010; Pigada & Schmitt, 2006; Schmitt,

2008; Teng, 2014). Because of their structure, graded readers have the potential of being

excellent tools to combine this type of complementary, incidental and intentional,

vocabulary learning opportunities. Indeed, these proficiency-adapted books offer repeated

exposures to target words and generally include activities at the end of the text. This

analysis aimed to respond to two questions that explore the usefulness of 10 beginner L2

Spanish graded readers for vocabulary learning:

(1) How many explicit vocabulary exercises are included in each book's total number

of activities?

(2) What TFA scores do all the books' activities have, both those that explicitly tap

into lexical learning and those that may do so more implicitly?

Upon analyzing the readers, it is evident that none of them focused their end-of-

book activities on specific vocabulary learning goals. In all the books, except for two,

vocabulary-oriented activities represented less than 40% of the total exercises proposed,

with some books including zero activities aimed at developing lexical knowledge. These

results indicate that graded readers' potential as tools for vocabulary learning is limited due

to the lack of opportunities for explicit lexical learning. This means that learners have to

rely almost exclusively on incidental learning through repeated exposure to learn new words

from the text. However, not only activities that are explicitly focused on vocabulary learning

can promote such new word acquisition. For example, reading comprehension exercises can

require that learners go back to the text and use the new vocabulary to respond to the

questions, hence developing lexical knowledge in a more incidental way but with more

attention than by simple exposure through reading. Therefore, the second question

addressed the extent to which all activities, explicitly focused on specific target words or

not, could promote lexical acquisition, as evidenced by their TFA scores.

While the maximum possible TFA score for an activity is 18, most of the exercises

had a final score ranging between 6 and 8. This shows that the usefulness of those activities

for lexical development is relatively low overall. Nonetheless, these results are similar to

the ones presented by Nation and Webb (2011) when they analyzed a list of 12 different

activities, as most of the activities they studied also scored between 6 and 8. The highest

score found in their list was a word card activity with 11 points and a word part table activity

with 9 points. Two important conclusions can be drawn from this analysis. First, in this study

and in the examples proposed by Nation and Webb (2011) the results show that the final

score of tasks explicitly focused on vocabulary are higher than the score on non-vocabulary

focused activities. For this reason, this analysis claims for the inclusion of more vocabulary

focused activities on graded readers to complement the incidental learning approach of

reading and, therefore, increase the opportunities for lexical learning. Second, the fact that

no activities, either in this study or in Nation and Webb’s reach a score that is even close to

the maximum may also mean that the TFA framework includes too many variables to

actually reflect real activities.

This means that a revision of the framework may be needed to make it easier and

more useful for teachers. As a first step, it would be necessary to eliminate the points that

are not present in most of the exercises. From all the activities analyzed in this project,

there are five TFA criteria not presented in any of the activities and only presented in one

of the exercises introduced by Nation and Webb (2011). In other words, a number of the

criteria in the TFA framework are not relevant enough to evaluate the most important

activities for lexical development. As a second step, future studies should be focused on the

importance of each criterion. Although Nation and Webb (2011) give scores of one and zero

to each factor, it would be necessary to analyze if activities with different factors involved

but with the same TFA score have the same effectiveness. By doing so, language instructors

could use the TFA framework to choose the most valuable activities.

7. CONCLUSION

When the goal is vocabulary learning, graded readers can be useful in the L2 classroom.

These books provide an opportunity to learn new words incidentally through reading and

have the opportunity to complement this reading with activities that tap into different skills.

However, the exercises included in this study’s graded readers did not focus primarily on

lexical learning and, very few of the exercises presented a high TFA. Given that explicit

vocabulary learning tasks score the highest in terms of TFA, the most useful way to

complement incidental learning through reading would be for L2 teachers to design

additional exercises that tap into the specific words that they want their students to learn.

By letting students simply read the story and respond to the few available questions in the

graded readers, it would be unreasonable to expect much lexical learning to take place.

One possible explanation for the lack of activities focused on vocabulary learning in

the graded readers analyzed can be the students' level. At the elementary level, graded

readers' tasks might have to be more focused on reading comprehension activities' to make

sure students understand the text's main ideas. When the student's level increases, graded

readers can dedicate more activities to work on grammatical knowledge and vocabulary

learning. For this reason, in future studies it would be relevant to include a broader range

of graded readers, which include books aimed at students with different levels of proficiency.

On the same page, a revision of the TFA framework is suggested by this study. Five

of the 18 criteria are not present in any of the activities analyzed in the graded readers and

are not relevant enough to measure vocabulary activities in the graded readers.

Furthermore, the TFA framework gives the same value to the 18 components. A future

study should analyze if a number of the criteria are more important than the others.

REFERENCES

Brantmeier, C. (2005). Anxiety about L2 reading or L2 reading tasks? A study with advanced

language learners. The Reading Matrix, 5(2), 67 -85.

Brown, R., Waring, R., and Donkaewbua, S. (2008). Incidental vocabulary acquisition from reading,

reading-while-listening, and listening to stories. Reading in a Foreign Language, 20, 136– 163.

Craik, F. I., & Lockhart, R. S. (1972). Levels of processing: A framework for memory research.

Journal of verbal learning and verbal behavior, 11(6), 671-684.

Eckerth, J. and Tavakoli, P. (2012). The effects of word exposure frequency and elaboration of word

processing on incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition through reading. Language Teaching

Research, 16, 227 – 252.

Folse, K. S. (2006). The effect of type of written exercise on L2 vocabulary retention. TESOL

Quarterly, 40, 273–293.

Horst, M. (2005). Learning L2 vocabulary through extensive reading: A measurement study. The

Canadian Modern Language Review, 61, 355–382.

Hu, H. M., and Nassaji, H. (2016). Effective vocabulary learning tasks: Involvement load hypothesis

versus technique feature analysis. System, 56, 28–39.

Hulstijn, J. H. (2001). Intentional and incidental second language vocabulary learning: A reappraisal

of elaboration, rehearsal and automaticity. In P. Robinson (Ed.), Cognition and second language

instruction (pp. 258–286). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Hulstijn, J. H., and Laufer, B. (2001). Some empirical evidence for the involvement load hypothesis

in vocabulary acquisition. Language Learning, 51, 539–558.

Jafari Gohar, M., M. Rahmanian, H. Soleimani. (2018). Technique feature analysis or involvement

load hypothesis: estimating their predictive power in vocabulary learning. Journal of

psycholinguistic research, 47(4), 859-869.

Keating, G. (2008). Task effectiveness and word learning in a second language: The involvement

load hypothesis on trial. Language Teaching Research, 12 (3), 365–386.

Kim, Y. J. (2008). The role of task-induced involvement and learner proficiency in L2 vocabulary

acquisition. Language Learning, 58 (2), 285–325.

Laufer, B., and Hulstijn, J. H. (2001). Incidental vocabulary acquisition in a second language: The

construct of task-induced involvement. Applied Linguistics, 22, 1–26.

Martinez, L. (2017). Adult Hispanic ESL Students and Graded Readers. The CATESOL Journal, 29 (2),

41- 59.

Nation, P., and Webb, S. (2011). Researching and analyzing vocabulary. Boston: Heinle.

Pellicer-Sanchez, A., and Schmitt, N. (2010). Incidental vocabulary acquisition from an authentic

novel: Do things fall apart? Reading in a Foreign Language, 22 (01), 31-55.

Pigada, M., and Schmitt, N. (2006). Vocabulary acquisition from extensive reading: A case study.

Reading in a Foreign Language, 18, 1–28.

Rodrigo, V. (2011). El primer libro, la primera victoria. Actitud de los estudiantes hacia la lectura

extensiva. In J. de Santiago Guervós, H. Bongaerts, J. Sánchez Iglesias, and M. Seseña Gómez

(Eds.), Del texto a la lengua: La aplicación de textos a la enseñanza aprendizaje del español

L2–LE (755–768). (Vol. 2). Spain: Universidad de Salamanca.

Rodrigo, V. (2016). Graded Readers: Validating Reading Levels across Publishers. Hispania, 99 (1),

66–86.

Saito, Y., T. J. Garza, and E. K. Honvitz. (1999). Foreign Language Reading Anxiety. Modern

Language Journal, 83, 202-218.

Schmitt, N. (2008). Instructed second language vocabulary learning. Language Teaching Research,

12, 329–363.

Sellers, V. (2000). Anxiety and Reading Comprehension in Spanish as a Foreign Language. Foreign

Language Annals, 33 (5), 512- 520.

Teng, F. (2014). Incidental Vocabulary Learning by Assessing Frequency of Word Occurrence in a

Graded Reader: Love or Money. LEARN Journal, 7 (2), 36–50.

Webb, S. (2008). The effects of context on incidental vocabulary learning. Reading in a Foreign

Language, 20, 232–245.

Yamashita, J. (2004). Reading attitudes in L1 and L2, and their influence on L2 extensive reading.

Reading in a Foreign Language, 16 (1), 539-578.

Yamashita, J. (2008). Extensive reading and development of different aspects of L2 proficiency.

System, 36, 661–672.

Yamashita, J. (2013). Effects of extensive reading on reading attitudes in a foreign language. Reading

in a Foreign Language, 25 (2), 248- 263.

Yang, Y., Shintani, N., Li, S., and Zhang, Y. (2017). The effectiveness of post-reading word-focused

activities and their associations with working memory. System, 70, 38-49.

Zou, D. (2017). Vocabulary acquisition through cloze exercises, sentence-writing and composition-

writing: Extending the evaluation component of the involvement load hypothesis. Language

Teaching Research, 21 (1), 54-75.

Zou, D., Wang, F., Kwan, R., and Xie, H. (2018). Investigating the effectiveness of vocabulary

learning tasks from the perspective of the technique feature analysis: The effects of pictorial

annotations. Technology in education: Innovative solutions and practices, 3-15.