Learning electronics and programming vocabulary with a specialised computer dictionary

摘要

The analysis of the data of this three months longitudinal study during the Summer Session of 1999 with daily data collections shows three major gains in vocabulary development of ESL users of an electronics and programming language dictionary in English-Chinese-English. First, there is evidence of an increased facility in the use of specialised language. The subjects show creativity and risk-taking. The second important development is the identification of subjects establishing verification strategies. The third major gain we observed is a negotiation of learning through an interpretation of the technical words and phrases until collaboratively the subjects arrived at the correct technical representation of the words they were learning. At this level of technical sophistication in language learning, the tool used also appears to have enhanced learners' cultural and workplace accumalisation. The next phase of this study is under way with the subjects now back in their technical college classrooms. This five-year research is subsidised by the Canadian Social Science and Humanities Research Council under EvNet, a strategic research network for the evaluation of computer technologies.