Vocabulary Analysis
on Reading Texts Used by EFL Students
Cucu Sutarsyah
The vocabulary in the texts is the
aspect that needs to identify. It is claimed that the condition of the words in
a text has a great influence to readers’ comprehension. It is also commonly
believed that comprehension depends on the extent that the words in a text are
familiar to the readers. This case study was carried out in the English
Education Department of State University of Malang. The aim of
the study is to identify and describe the vocabulary in the text and to look if
the text is useful for reading skill development. The reading materials under
investigation were a collection of reading passages based on the syllabus (Reading
Comprehension I) and limited to the passages that were used in class during the
second semester, 1999. Based on the nature of the investigation, a descriptive
qualitative design was applied to obtain the data. For this purpose, some
available computer programs were used. The vocabulary analyses in the texts
reveal some constraints. It was found that the texts, containing 7, 945 words
of 20 different texts, are dominated by low frequency words which account for
16.97% of the words in the texts. In terms of high frequency words occurring in
the texts, function words dominate the texts. Of the 50 most frequent words,
only two content words (people and say) were found. In the case
of word level, it was found that the texts being used have very limited number
of words from GSL (General Service List of English Words) (West, 1953).
The proportion of the first 1,000 words of GSL only accounts for 44.6%. The
data also show that the texts contain too large proportion of words which are
not in the three levels (the first 2,000 and University Word List).
These words account for 26.44% of the running words in the texts. Based on
these findings, some conclusions were drawn. It is believed that the
constraints are due to the selection of the texts which are made of a series of
short-unrelated texts (20 different topics). This kind of text is subject to
the accumulation of low frequency words, especially those of content words and
limited words from GSL. This vocabulary condition could defeat the development
of students’ reading skills and vocabulary enrichment.
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Sutarsyah, C. (2001). Vocabulary analysis on reading texts used by EFL students. TEFLIN
Journal, 12(2), 194-209.
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