Journal of English Language Teaching

Pair Work and Group Work: A way to Enhance English Vocabulary

V. Srilatha

Dept. of English, Stanley College of Engineering & Technology for Women

Keywords: Pair and Group work, ESL, Vocabulary improvement strategies

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Abstract

When students are asked to speak on a given topic, they try to speak, but they may not express their views effectively due to lack of vocabulary. Owing to this, they lose confidence and hesitate to speak. Even to write a piece of composition they need to generate ideas. So they try either to escape from it or postpone it due to scarcity of appropriate words. Though it is difficult to grasp words, it has become unavoidable to the students of vernacular background to build up communicative competence. Moreover, they show reluctance to learn vocabulary in English as there is no coordination between spelling and pronunciation in many of the words. After several experiments the author felt that pair or group work was the best way to motivate the students of a heterogeneous group to enhance their communicative competence. The present article focuses on teaching vocabulary (synonyms, antonyms and one-word substitutes in particular) through either pair or group work.

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