Guessing has bad connotations for many
language learners because, let's face it, if you're guessing, it
means that you don't know. In a setting where knowing and
understanding is so vital to a feeling of success, being unsure can
be less than ideal.
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| GUESS WHO: One of my favorite board games! Picture Credit* |
However, this compensatory strategy
(i.e., one that compensates for missing knowledge) can be a great
tool for language learning. Studies have shown that that “guessing
meaning from action or context” is positively-related with language
learning achievement (1). Moreover, a study of language learners of
French found that students who were made to guess words from context
rather than being handed a word list not only learned more words in a
shorter amount of time, but also retained the knowledge of the words
longer (2).
A language learner's ability to guess
accurately is affected by several factors, including knowledge of
vocabulary, as language learners rely mainly on vocabulary, and
rarely on syntax clues, in their guessing. The higher the proportion
of comprehensible words in the dialog or text surrounding an unknown
word, the more accurate the language learner's guesses will be (3). One
study also showed that the guessing ability is improved in areas
where the students are cognitively similar to people from the target
language (by which the author seems to mean that they have culturally
similar ways of thinking) (4)
Despite the seemingly positive
applications of properly applied guessing strategies, it is not
always beneficial to promote guessing in language learning. Some
studies have shown that despite initial gains in vocabulary learning,
guessing often impairs some students' abilities to learn the right
definition quickly. Moreover, inaccurate guessing can quickly become
frustrating, as has been discussed in this blog post by The Linguist.
Instead of promoting a global guessing
strategy campaign, it may be better to teach learners to identify
situations where it is good to guess and situations where it is
better to ask or look up a word (3).
Promoting Guessing in Language
Learning
As guessing is a strategy for
understanding received data, it can be applied to both reading and
listening activities. When teaching students to guess while
developing these two macro-skills, it is important to focus on
teaching them when and how to make better
guesses, rather than just teaching them to make guesses. Increasing
language learners' awareness of context and guessing strategies, as
well as other, “mutually supportive” strategies (i.e. a strategy
chain) will allow learners to develop this strategy in a useful way
(5).
Other ways to promote good guessing
skills include teaching learners to activate their past knowledge on
a subject. Brainstorming words, topics, verbs, and ideas on the
subject at hand could enhance their guessing. Also, since learners
naturally look to known vocabulary words to support guessing, it may
also be beneficial to teach them how to better consider syntax and
any other non-linguistic clues.
This article offers an activity using a
guessing chart, based on Clarke and Nation's 1980 inductive 5-step
approach to guessing (the chart is on page 7). These five steps are, simply, one, to determine the part of speech of the word; two, to consider the
surrounding context; three, to consider the wider (syntactic) context; four, to guess; and five, to check the guess by making sure the part of speech
matches, by seeing if the parts of the unknown word relate to the
guessed word, by filling in the guess for the unknown word, and by
checking the dictionary (6).
What do you think? Any experience as a learner or as a teacher? Do you promote
guessing in language learning? Why or why not? Any suggestions for
activities that help?
- McGroarty, Mary E. (1989). The "Good Learner" of English in Two Settings. California Univ., Los Angeles. Center for Language Education and Research. Accessed: www.eric.ed.gov.
- Redouane, R. (2010). Assessing Instructional Methods in L2 French Vocabulary Acquisition: Guessing-From-Context Method versus a Word List Method. Annals of Spiru Haret University, Journalism Studies, 11. p. 73-87.
- http://www2.aasa.ac.jp/~dcdycus/LAC97/guessing.htm
- Qi, R. & Li, F. (2008) The influence of cognitive factors on guesses about the meaning of English word groups and phrases. U.S. - China Education Review, 5(9). Accessed: www.eric.ed.gov.
- http://web.ntpu.edu.tw/~language/workshop/read2.pdf
- http://english.tyhs.edu.tw/epaper/epaper9/thesis_eng.pdf
