Comparison of Vocabulary in the Textbooks of Teaching Persian to Non-Persian Speakers with Persian Basic Words

Navidi, Amin; Ameri, Hayat; Abolhassani Chime, Zahra

doi:10.30479/jtpsol.2022.16550.1566

Comparison of Vocabulary in the Textbooks of Teaching Persian to Non-Persian Speakers with Persian Basic Words

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

¹ Ph.D. Student of Department of General Linguistics, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University,Tehran, Iran.

² Corresponding author, Linguistics assistant professor, Tarbiat Modarres University,Tehran,Iran.

³ Linguistics Assistant Professor, SAMT Organization.

10.30479/jtpsol.2022.16550.1566

Abstract

Language learning, in addition to the four skills of reading, writing, speaking, and listening, has two essential components: grammar and vocabulary. Given the short duration of language teaching to learners, they must choose the right content. Choosing the right words is one of the essential parts of preparing textbooks. One of the criteria for selecting appropriate words for teaching is choosing from the most widely used words in the language. In this way, the learner learns the most important words of the language faster and can approach their goal of communicating with the target community sooner. In the present study, we tried to assess the degree of adaptation of selected words in Persian textbooks to non-Persian languages to teach practical and basic Persian words. For this purpose, we compare the educational words of the four educational books First step, Mina, Vocabulary in Use, and Persian language at the elementary level with the high-frequency words of the Hamshahri, Frequency Dictionary, A Frequency Dictionary of Persian, and Advanced Learner's Persian Dictionary which are based on corpus study. It was found that the adaptation of the educational words of these books with the frequently used Persian words is between 5 to 26%, which is a small amount in total, and there is a need to modify the word teaching in these books and also review the list of frequently used Persian words.
Extended Abstract:

Introduction

Due to the limited time of language teaching, choosing the right content for teaching is very important. Choosing the right words that should be taught to the learner in order, is one of the aspects of selection. Language teaching should be based on teaching the necessary and basic words appropriate to the level so that the learners can enjoy learning and use the language well.

Theoretical Foundation

   Basic words are the most used and important words of any language that form the main part of the texts produced by the language. The definition of a basic word can be based on its frequency, commonality among speakers of the language, or the ability to define other words in the language with them. The keyword recognition method can also be based on token, type or lemma. In order to examine the basic words, in addition to their high repetition, the textual coverage and their scope are also considered. However, there are non-frequent approaches to recognize keywords.
Word as one of the main components of language plays an important role in language learning. Vocabulary curriculum as one of the new approaches to language teaching emphasizes the role of basic words in language teaching. In this program, the appropriate word is selected based on its teachability, similarity, accessibility, coverage and definition.

Review of Literature

    According to the research of Lee and Richards (1995), Milton and Vasilio (2000), Davis and Face (2006), Schickold (2008), Alexio and Konstantakis (2009), Konstantakis and Alexio (2012), Creado and Sanchez (2012), Jahangardi (2016) and Alexio et al. (2019), the words taught in different language teaching books are very different and do not correspond to the basic words of the language.

Methodology

   In this study, the words taught in the four books First Step (Sahraee et al., 2019), Mina (Sahraee et al., 2019), Vocabulary in Use (Sahraee et al., 2017), and Persian language (Saffar moghadam ., 2007) with high frequency words extracted from corpora based on Hamshahri (AleAhmad et al., 2009), Frequency Dictionary (Bijankhan & Mohseni, 2011), A Frequency Dictionary of Persian (Miller & Aghajanian-Stewart, 2017), and Advanced Learner's Persian Dictionary (Asi, 2020) were compared

Data analysis

   In data analysis, it was found that between 6 and 26% of the words taught in Persian language textbooks correspond to the basic words of Persian language. Although, these books were on the same level, only 30 words were common to them all: he, package, father, son, taxi, tea, house, goodbye, shopping, daughter, office, seeing, Day, night, city, morning, noon, food, coffee, worker, book, butter, bag, ear, clothes, glass, mother, teacher, table, bread.
This discrepancy can be seen even among the books written in a specific educational center (Saadi Foundation). So that, between the three books of this center, only 94 words were common.

Data interpretation

   Less than a quarter of the words taught in these books corresponded to the most commonly used Persian words (in the four corpora: Hamshahri, Frequency Dictionary, A Frequency Dictionary of Persian, and Advanced Learner's Persian Dictionary).
   The 30 common words between all the books can also be examined from different perspectives. Among these words, only two verbs (buy and see) can be seen. Just one word about greetings is one of the first language skills (goodbye). The presence of the necessary educational words in the classroom (office, book, bag, teacher, and table) shows that the emphasis of these books is on teaching in the classroom (instead of self-study). Vocabulary related to the times of day (day, night, morning, and noon) as well as basic family relationships (father, son, daughter, and mother) are taught in the books. Words related to eating (tea, food, coffee, butter, glasses and bread) make up one-fifth of the common words. It is also interesting to note that almost all of these words are objective and can be represented by an image.

Conclusion

   There are two reasons for the low similarity between the words taught at the elementary level and the widely used words in Persian language. First, these books have not been able to provide adequate coverage of the basic words needed by Persian learners. The second possible reason is the weakness in Persian language corpus research and the inaccuracy of frequency lists. But the lack of commonality between the words taught in these books (only 30 words) shows that there is not much agreement between the providers of Persian language teaching content in choosing the appropriate words.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Teaching Persian to non-Persian speakers

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