The Vocabulary Knowledge Scale: A Critical Analysis  

Oleh:

Bruton, Anthony

Jenis: Article from Journal - e-Journal
Dalam koleksi: Language Assessment Quarterly vol. 6 no. 4 (2009), page 288-297.
Fulltext: Language Assessment Quarterly, 6,288–297,.pdf (116.93KB)

Isi artikel

There are normally two major research reasons for assessing second and foreign language (L2) knowledge: either to gauge a participant’s actual level of competence/proficiency or to assess language development over a period of time. In testing, the corresponding contrasts are typically referred to as proficiency tests on the one hand and achievement tests on the other. There are various instruments used for assessing proficiency levels or breadth of vocabulary (Read, 2004), such as Nation’s (1990) Vocabulary Levels Test, but the concern here is an instrument developed for the assessment of L2 vocabulary development in empirical research. Probably one of the instruments in L2 empirical research that is currently best known for assessing both receptive and productive vocabulary development of specific targeted words from L2 reading is Paribakht and Wesche’s (1993) Vocabulary Knowledge Scale (VKS), which is similar to Dale (1965). The VKS has been used in at least 12 studies known to this author, mainly for L2 English, but also L2 Spanish (Pulido, 2004) and L2 German (Rott & Williams, 2003; Rott, Williams, & Cameron, 2002). Even though the VKS was introduced in 1993, the version of the VKS that offers the most explicit description and justification is Wesche and Paribakht (1996), which is the point of reference for the analysis of the scale that follows. After the description of the VKS, some features of lexical knowledge are considered, with particular emphasis on the distinction between lexical knowledge for receptive and productive use. This is followed by the critical analysis of the VKS for research purposes.

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