PROMOTING INCIDENTAL VOCABULARY LEARNING THROUGH VERBAL DRAMATIZATION OF WORDS


ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 1, December 2014 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

PROMOTING INCIDENTAL VOCABULARY LEARNING
THROUGH VERBAL DRAMATIZATION OF WORDS

Looi-Chin Ch’ng
Academy of Language Studies, Universiti Teknologi Mara, Sarawak, Malaysia

Email: looichinchng@gmail.com

APA Citation: Ch’ng, L. C. (2014). Promoting incidental vocabulary learning through verbal
dramatization of words. English Review: Journal of English Education,
3(1), 1-10

Received: 12-10-2014 Accepted: 29-10-2014 Published: 01-12-2014

Abstract: Despite the fact that explicit teaching of vocabulary is often practised in English
as a Second Language (ESL) classrooms, it has been proven to be rather ineffective, largely
because words are not taught in context. This has prompted the increasing use of incidental
vocabulary learning approach, which emphasises on repeated readings as a source for
vocabulary learning. By adopting this approach, this study aims to investigate students’
ability in learning vocabulary incidentally via verbal dramatization of written texts. In this
case, readers’ theatre (RT) is used as a way to allow learners to engage in active reading so
as to promote vocabulary learning. A total of 160 diploma students participated in this case
study and they were divided equally into two groups, namely classroom reading (CR) and
RT groups. A proficiency test was first conducted to determine their vocabulary levels.
Based on the test results, a story was selected as the reading material in the two groups.
The CR group read the story through a normal reading lesson in class while the RT group
was required to verbally dramatize the text through readers’ theatre activity. Then, a post-
test based on vocabulary levels was carried out and the results were compared. The
findings revealed that incidental learning was more apparent in the RT group and their
ability to learn words from the higher levels was noticeable through higher accuracy scores.
Although not conclusive, this study has demonstrated the potential of using readers’
theatre as a form of incidental vocabulary learning activity in ESL settings.
Keywords: incidental vocabulary learning, readers’ theatre, language learning

INTRODUCTION
In a traditional classroom of English

as a Second or Foreign Language, it is
common for teachers to adopt a
translation approach in teaching
vocabulary to the learners. Translation is
seen as a direct and explicit approach in
introducing more words to novice
learners. However, problems often exist
in this method of teaching since
translation may lead to problems in
miscommunication (Meidasari, 2014).
Despite that, more implicit approaches
in teaching vocabulary are introduced in

order to facilitate the comprehension of
words, one of which is repetitive reading.

Research in second language
learning has indicated that repetitive
reading is responsible for vocabulary
learning. Repetitive reading would
encourage the exposure of the
vocabulary that would then enhance the
word recognition (Elis, 1995; Schmidt
1993, 1995, 2001) of the targeted
language for language learning. Apart
from that, it also exposes the use of
vocabulary in context as to assist
learners to get the meaning across.
Indirectly learners pick up the



LOOI-CHIN CH’NG
Promoting Incidental Vocabulary Learning Through Verbal Dramatization of Words

vocabulary from the written text. This
incidental vocabulary learning
(Dowhower, 1994) is best achieved when
learners read aloud (Fisher, Flood, Lapp,
& Frey, 2004; Hickman, Pollard-
Durodola,& Vaughn, 2004; Santoro,
Chard, Howar& Baker, 2008) story based
text (Mason, 2004; McMaster, 1998;
Rashidi&Ganbari Adivi, 2010). In short,
repeated oral reading of story based text
in particular is highly favourable in
driving learners to learn the language
via incidental vocabulary learning.
Therefore, Readers’ Theatre (RT) would
be the best way to achieve this as it
certainly fulfil all the criteria mentioned
above for language learning, particularly
in terms incidental vocabulary learning.

Based on the review of previous
studies, RT has shown to give impacts
towards the improvement of learners’
fluency, reading motivation, reading
attitude and reading comprehension.
However, the impact of RT towards
vocabulary learning in the language
classroom has yet to be explored, albeit
the pivotal role of vocabulary in oral
reading has been recognized as lexical
knowledge (Srichamnong, 2009) and
critical in language mastery (Schmidt,
2008).

Despite that, previous research has
pointed the significant impact of RT in
terms of language learning, they are
mainly focused on the impact of RT
towards young children, elementary
students and students with learning
disabilities. Not many studies have been
dwelled into the possible students'
educational level differences in
explaining vocabulary learning via RT in
the light of the second language
classrooms among the university learners.

In addition, without a satisfactory
account of the vocabulary learning in the
higher learning institution, the impacts

of incidental vocabulary learning among
the university students is “bound to end
up stranded in an explanatory void”
(Cameron, 1997: 59). Studying the
vocabulary learning of the university
students offers empirically-driven
explanations that would inform the
status of syllabus planning and would
assist in the syllabus planning in the
future, apart from enhancing the
teaching and learning experience in the
classrooms. Eventually, incidental
vocabulary acquisition via RT may also
be applied across discipline which is not
merely confined in language learning.

Studies also indicated that students
who have poor academic performances
particularly in English language learning
is largely resulted by the fact that they
are lacked in the interest in reading,
poor reading habit and negative
attitudes towards reading (Akabuike &
Asika, 2012). The key for students not to
read is perhaps they are demotivated by
the challenges of decoding the meaning
of vocabulary while reading. Researches
shown that oral reading and story based
reading may assist vocabulary learning
and comprehension, nevertheless, few
studies explore the impact of RT in
offering rooms for them to achieve better
learning of vocabulary and
comprehension orally, especially for
students who are lacked of confidence
and are have weak command of English.
Besides that, Mraz et al. (2013)
conducted a study on struggling readers
by using RT in enhancing their fluency.
The results were very encouraging that
the leaners also showed greater interest
in reading since they can inject some
elements of drama in their RT.

Relevant studies in the field also
inform that read-aloud narrative or story
based text and repeat reading would be
fundamental for incidental vocabulary



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 1, December 2014 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

learning and comprehension.
Nevertheless, Jenkins, Stein and
Wysocki (1984) found that vocabulary is
not usually taught in the classroom
nowadays even though learning
vocabulary helps in the comprehension
of the reading texts. They also found that
more frequent presentation in context
increased the learning of vocabulary.
Therefore, it is hypothesised that RT can
really help in vocabulary learning as
compared to classroom reading as the
exposure to the vocabulary in context is
repeated; and students in the RT group
should learn better from the students in
the classroom reading group who are
only exposed to the text once, regardless
of whether they have any prior
knowledge of the vocabulary.

This study aims to investigate the
use of RT (verbal dramatization of
written texts) in promoting incidental
vocabulary learning as compared to
conventional reading lessons in the ESL
classrooms. The study was conducted to
answer the following research questions:
(1) What are the differences in the
students’ accuracy scores between the
use of conventional reading lessons and
readers’ theatre? (2). To what extent
readers’ theatre can promote students’
incidental vocabulary learning?

In second language learning,
research indicates that there is a strong
bond between language learning and
vocabulary learning. Vocabulary
learning enhances vocabulary
knowledge and thus enables language
use for the performance of language
skills such as reading and speaking by
the learners (Nation &Waring, 1997).

On the other hand, learners’
vocabulary learning starts from ‘notice’
the vocabulary (Elis, 1995; Schmidt 1993,
1995, 2001). The more exposure given to
learners to ‘notice’ new words would

better enhance their vocabulary learning
capability. Since this word repetition is a
favourable condition for vocabulary
learning especially it is in contextualised
manner (Cain, 2007; Jenkins, Stein,
&Wysocki, 1984) and also playing a very
important role in promoting incidental
vocabulary learning (Matsuoka & Hirsh,
2010) thus, reading is accepted as a rich
source for vocabulary learning. It is
mainly because it provides learners the
opportunity to ‘notice’ the words used in
the different context repetitively in the
reading text. It is also said the learning
of vocabulary is incidental when they
read extensively as the learners learnt
the vocabulary that appear in the text
even though the main purpose of
reading is not to learn the vocabulary
(Swanborn &de Glopper, 2002).
Incidental vocabulary learning is
essential particularly in tertiary
education. Studies from Koda (1989)
shown that, an increase of reading
proficiency is strongly attributed to
increased proficiency in vocabulary (in
Matsuoka & Hirsh, 2010). Therefore,
learners need to attain an adequate
amount of vocabulary in assisting
reading comprehension (Hwang &
Nation, 1995; Laufer 1991), in which it is
one of the basic skills in academic
settings for them to attain the world
knowledge. Another research done by
Rashidi and Ganbari Adivi (2010), also
agrees with the notion of when the
students get into the habit of learning
words incidentally, wide range of genre
may be incorporated in maximizing
students' interest in reading. Apart from
that, Cameron (1997) explains the
vocabulary learning in the light of the
second language classrooms among the
university learners have been
rudimentary. Without a satisfactory
account of the vocabulary learning in the



LOOI-CHIN CH’NG
Promoting Incidental Vocabulary Learning Through Verbal Dramatization of Words

higher learning institution, the impacts
of incidental vocabulary learning among
the university students is “bound to end
up stranded in an explanatory void” (p.
59).Therefore, in short, vocabulary
knowledge is strongly related with
reading comprehension especially when
the knowledge of vocabulary is acquired
incidentally.

Studies have shown that, in most
cases, oral reading is recognised to be
more effective in terms of promoting
reading comprehension and improving
incidental vocabulary learning. Recent
studies have established that effective
read-aloud contributes to students’
comprehension development (Fisher,
Flood, Lapp, & Frey, 2004; Hickman,
Pollard-Durodola,& Vaughn, 2004).
Meanwhile Beck, Mckeown, Hamilton,
and Kucan (1997), suggests that text-
based discussions as part of read-aloud
may increase vocabulary learning
besides improving comprehension
particularly for students who struggle
with decoding skills or who are just
learning to read fluently, it would seem
reasonable that comprehension
strategies be taught through oral
language opportunities (e.g. read-aloud).
In the other studies, learners seem to
have better incidental vocabulary
learning and comprehension via oral
reading when the genre of text is story
based. Rashidi and Ganbari Adivi (2010)
reported from their study on the
incidental vocabulary learning through
reading short stories that the high school
students demonstrated positive
vocabulary learning when they were
engaged in extensive reading. Leaners’
interest grows greater when they are
involved in various oral activities, such
as storytelling (Mason, 2004) and
dramatic play (McMaster, 1998). Results
from the studies done by Santoro, Chard,

Howard and Baker (2008) strengthen the
point that vocal reading enhances
incidental vocabulary learning in
assisting students to comprehend the
text, narratives or story based texts.
Their studies reveal that students who
gone through the read-aloud lessons are
able to make a longer retellings
specifically in narrative texts as
compared to those who did not. Besides,
they also demonstrated a depth of text
comprehension in their retellings and
vocabulary knowledge, even though the
main purpose of their readings are not
learning the vocabulary. Thus, it would
be true that Silent Reading , which is
commonly practised in most of the
classroom reading lessons might not be
able to help students to achieve good
comprehension as it leaves no space for
them to express what they have read
and understood orally (Young &
Rasinski, 2009). With that said, when
comprehension is challenging normal
reading classrooms, it also means it
would be difficult for learners to learn
the vocabulary incidentally in this
context too.

Hence, it is believed that utilising
Readers Theatre (RT) in the reading
classroom would encourage incidental
vocabulary learning and thus promotes
better comprehension as learners need to
go through repeated readings
(Dowhower, 1994) which facilitates the
recognition skills of the words in the
context of a narrative and enable them to
express their reading vocally. RT is an
approach that has been extensively used
in the language classrooms, especially in
the ESL/EFL classrooms, and it
successfully worked on the young
children, elementary students and
students with learning disabilities.
Recent studies suggest that RT gives a
great impact towards language learning



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 1, December 2014 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

in various areas. It contributes towards
the improvement of learners’ fluency,
reading motivation, reading attitude and
reading comprehension. For example,
among the middle school students,
Allinder, Dunse, Brunken and
Obermiller-Krolikowki (2001) found that
the comprehension scores for students
(including students with learning
disability) who were exposed to daily
oral reading increased. Similarly, Chard,
Vaughn, and Tyler (2002) found that the
reading fluency of the elementary
students with learning disability
significantly improved after repeated
reading interventions. A lot more
studies have proved the success of RT in
improving the attitudes (Morris, 2011;
Rees, 2005; Smith, 2011), confidence,
word recognition (Rinehart, 1999),
fluency (Rasinki, 2006) and motivation
to read (Carrick, 2001; Rinehart, 1999).
These researches have consistently
shown that RT is a successful approach
for language learning.

RT is able to link reading
comprehension and vocabulary learning
as it improves reading fluency, accuracy,
automaticity, prosody which further
leads to good comprehension (Rasinski,
2006). Through RT, students are able to
recognize the words and pronounce it
without error (accuracy), and this is the
first step of language learning. When
students have the ability to read the
words correctly, effortlessly and
meaningfully via their finite cognitive
resources (automaticity), they are able to
perform a successful RT. On top of that,
RT requires students not only merely
read their script but with the ability to
render the text with appropriate
expressions and phrasing (prosody).
This allows the readers to reflect their
understanding of the script semantically
and syntactically (comprehension).

Lastly, RT also helps students to become
a more fluent speaker (fluency). Since
the key step to language mastery would
simply start from vocabulary learning,
reading is accepted as a rich source for
vocabulary learning in a contextualized
manner; and RT is much encouraging,
especially for students who are lacked of
confidence and are of lower proficiency
in English.

METHOD
The study involved 160 diploma

students of various disciplines in a
public university. They were divided
equally into two groups – classroom
reading (CR) group and Readers’
Theatre (RT) group. Only those who
have given their consent to participate in
the study were selected for the study as
the willingness of the participants were
valued in order to avoid dishonest
responses for the data collected.

A proficiency test was conducted on
both groups to determine their
vocabulary level. The test items were
adopted from Laufer and Nation (1999)
database. Based on the results, a
suitable story was selected as their
reading material.

The CR group read the story
through a normal reading lesson in class
while the RT group was required to
verbally dramatize the text through
readers’ theatre activity. Then, a post-
test based on vocabulary levels
(Vocabulary Test) was carried out.

In general, Laufer and Nation (1999)
have categorised words from frequently
seen to least encountered into 5
categories (1K word level, 2K word level,
3K word level, 5K word level,10k word
level and academic words level).

Thus, this test adopted 10 question
items for each category of word level
making it a total of 50 question items



LOOI-CHIN CH’NG
Promoting Incidental Vocabulary Learning Through Verbal Dramatization of Words

from the database of Laufer and Nation
(1999),
http://www.er.uqam.ca/nobel/r21270/levels/
2kc.html. Participants were requested to
only complete the spelling of the word

instead of filling in the blank as the main
purpose of the test is to examine the
participants’ familiarity of the words of
different levels instead of the proficiency
of the language as a whole.

The procedures in collecting the data needed for this study is illustrated in Figure 1.

Proficiency Test
Laufer& Nation (1999)
(to measure current
vocabulary proficiency
level)

Readers’
Theater (RT)

Vocabulary Test
Selected words from text
by 30

Classroom Reading group
(CR grp)
(80 students)


(before reading activity)

X 
(To measure the effects of
classroom reading in ESL
incidental vocabulary
learning)

Readers’ Theatre Group
(RT grp)
(80 students)


(before RT performances)

 
(To measure the effects of
readers’ theatre in ESL
incidental vocabulary
learning)

Figure 1.Data collection procedures.

The results from the proficiency test
for all 160 participants revealed the
following accuracy percentage for each
level (10 words for each level) as shown
in Table 1.

Table 1.Accuracy percentage of each word level
(N=160)

Levels Accuracy
1K 92%
2K 66%
3K 56%
5K 35%
10K 27%

In general, the proficiency level of the
participants were largely between 1K to
3K word levels. Only a small number of
them were able to identified words
beyond 3K level and the accuracy was
also very low. Based on this, it has
provided a good indicator on the choice
of texts to be used in this study.

The most frequently encountered words
in the story are to be chosen from the
texts upon the majority agreement of the
researchers as to enhance the common
agreement of the most frequently
encountered words in the story. The
word form of the selected words from
the story were ensured to be the same in
the Vocabulary Test as a means to fulfil
the criteria of contextualisation. For
instance, the chosen word “pursue” is a
Verb in the written text, its word form
remained in the Vocabulary Test while
constructing the question items. The
amount of words or test items for the
Test is not limited, all majority agreed
words chosen are to be taken into the
Test.

A frequency count on the correct
items for the Vocabulary Test was done
for both CR and RT groups. During the
marking, minor spelling and
grammatical mistakes are ignored as the

Participants

Tests
/instruments



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 1, December 2014 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

main purpose of both Tests is to test
their familiarity of the words instead of
the proficiency of their language as a

whole. The total scores of the
Vocabulary Test of both CR and RT
groups were then compared.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Table 2. Overall performance of the two groups
Scores Non-RT Group (n=80) RT Group (n=80)
Total 933 1544
Average 12.4 19.3

Table 2 shows the scores obtained
by the two groups of students. For the
non-RT group, the total score obtained is
933 with an average of 12.4 for each
student. As for the RT group, the total
score obtained is higher with 1544 and
an average of 19.3 per student. It means
that out of 30 words in the vocabulary

test, the Non-RT group only managed to
correctly use 12 words (40% accuracy)
while the RT group managed to get 19
words (63% accuracy). The difference in
the scores obtained by the two groups
provides an initial positive outcome on
the use of RT as a technique to increase
vocabulary learning.

Table 3.Students’ performance byWord levels

1000 word family lists Categories No. of words used
in the test

No. of words Non-RT group
scored higher than RT group

1k-3k High-frequency 16 words 0
4k-10k Low-frequency 14 words 1

The 5 word levels were grouped
into two main categories: high-
frequency and low-frequency to allow
clearer comparisons since only 30 words
are used in the vocabulary test. For the
high-frequency level (1k-3k words), the
RT group outperformed the non-RT
group in all 16 words while they only
scored lower for 1 word in the low-
frequency level (3k-10k).

The clearer breakdown of the scores
obtained by the two groups are shown
in Table 4.

The RT group managed to score
significantly higher for low-frequency
words such as eerie, snarled and quiver.
Clearly, verbal dramatization of the
words during RT actually promote
learning of words in context since most
of the low-frequency words related to
the similar “family” seemed to be
retained by the participants in the RT

group more than those in the non-RT
group. This finding echoed the outcomes
reported Schmidt (2001) and Rashidi and
GanbariAdivi (2010) in which repetitive
readings allows better attainments of
vocabulary and RT allows a greater
active reading process since the learners
need to learn to verbally dramatize it as
well (Rinehart, 1999). However, the
word that the RT group scored lower
than non-RT group is the word “scared”.
38 students from non-RT group
managed to answer the word correctly
as compared to 27 students from the RT
group. Interestingly, both groups scored
lower than expected for the word. Upon
close checking, the participants used
mostly “scary” which gives a different
meaning. This somehow indicates the
common confusion that students have in
relation to the use of “scary” and
“scared”.



LOOI-CHIN CH’NG
Promoting Incidental Vocabulary Learning Through Verbal Dramatization of Words

Based on the scores reported earlier,
students in the RT group has shown
greater grasp of the words in context.
The accuracy scores of the RT group are
also higher. This indicated the
usefulness of readers’ theatre in

encouraging learners to be more aware
of the words they read. They do not
merely memorise the words but the
verbal dramatization of the words
actually assist them in understanding
the usage of the words.

Table 4.Total cores obtained by the participants for each word

Words
Scores Scores

Differences
Non-RT Group RT Group

Shake
Shadows
Blood
Pointy
Dark
Midnight
Died
Frightened
Roared
Fright
Thundered
Spell
Tombstones
Graveyard
Haunted
Willies
Giant
Creaked
Groaned
Howled
Scared
Skull
Shiver
Piercing
Eerie
Snarled
Skeleton
Quiver
Quake
Gripped

9
25
57
10
75
53
70
44
55
12
11
55
26
24
71
57
12
30
28
9
38
17
42
3
16
9
53
13
0
2

48
42
79
21
78
67
77
55
77
23
31
76
57
60
80
70
20
53
63
36
27
34
65
22
66
52
63
49
33
16

39
17
22
11
3
14
7
11
22
11
20
21
31
36
9
13
8
23
35
27
-11
17
23
19
50
43
10
36
33
14

* Negative sign indicates non-RT group did better.

CONCLUSION
Thus far, vocabulary learning has

been explored using different methods.
However, little research has been done
on using RT for vocabulary learning in
the ESL context. The findings revealed
that incidental learning was more
apparent in the RT group and their
ability to learn words from the higher

levels was noticeable through higher
accuracy scores. This study has
highlighted the potentials of RT to be
included as part of the teaching
pedagogy in order to enhance incidental
vocabulary learning for beginning level
students, comprehension for
intermediate students and promoting
language mastery for intermediate and



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 1, December 2014 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

advance level students. The results may
not be conclusive since it only involved
the use of a small set of words, but it
provides an apparent glimpse on the
usefulness of verbal dramatization in the
form of RT. It not only enables students
to engage in active reading and learn
new words, but also increase their
motivation in learning the English
language. Further research can be done
by including more reading texts of
different genres to check on RT’s
significance in promoting incidental
vocabulary learning in a contextualised
manner.

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Promoting Incidental Vocabulary Learning Through Verbal Dramatization of Words

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