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Bibliografía - Mercedes Pérez Serrano

L2 Spanish vocabulary teaching in US universities: Instructors’ beliefs and reported practices

Claudia H. Sánchez-Gutiérrez, Pablo Robles-García, Mercedes Pérez Serrano (2025)

Studies on teachers’ beliefs about vocabulary learning and teaching have focused, so far, on English as a second language (L2), or foreign language (FL), in different contexts but little attention has been given to other L2s and FLs. In this study, 15 Spanish L2 instructors at large universities were interviewed in order to better understand where they stand when it comes to (1) the importance they give to vocabulary, as compared to grammar, in their classes, (2) how they decide which words to teach, and (3) how they assess students’ word knowledge. These interviews were subsequently analysed following Grounded Theory. Most instructors declared favoring grammar over vocabulary in their courses because the former is seen as more challenging and useful than the latter and because institutional practices and materials also present such a preference. When it comes to vocabulary selection, most of them declared feeling insecure in their decisions due to lack of access to useful resources and to vocabulary goals not being stated clearly anywhere in the syllabi. This lack of clarity when it comes to vocabulary learning goals also results in doubts about the usefulness of even evaluating word learning at all and an overreliance on informal assessments.

The effects of word frequency and typographical enhancement on incidental vocabulary learning in reading

Claudia H. Sánchez Gutiérrez, Mercedes Pérez Serrano, Pablo Robles García (2019)

En Journal of Spanish Language Teaching 6.1

This study examines the effects of word frequency and typographical enhancement (i.e., words in bold) on the learning of single words in Spanish L2 reading activities in a classroom setting. Learners read a text in which target words appearing in bold occurred one, five or 10 times. A parallel text was also provided in which those same words appeared un-bolded. Students were tested three times on both spelling and meaning of the target words: before, immediately after and two weeks after the reading activity. Results show that: (1) after five or 10 encounters, both spelling and meaning recognition skills increase; (2) words appearing in bold only lead to learning gains at a form recognition level immediately after the test is taken and do not contribute to the acquisition of meaning in the post-test; and (3) there is no interaction between typographical enhancement and frequency.

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Este trabajo pretende examinar los efectos de la frecuencia y el realce tipográfico (negrita) en el aprendizaje de palabras individuales a través de la lectura en el aula de español como L2. Los aprendientes leyeron un texto con palabras meta que aparecían 1, 5 o 10 veces. Este tenía a su vez una versión paralela en la cual dichas palabras aparecían en negrita. Los estudiantes fueron examinados en el reconocimiento de la forma y del significado de las palabras meta en tres ocasiones: antes, inmediatamente después y dos semanas después de la actividad de lectura. Los resultados demostraron que (1) el reconocimiento de la forma y del significado se incrementa cuando la palabra aparece repetida 5 o 10 veces; (2) el realce únicamente favorece el reconocimiento ortográfico inmediatamente después de la realización de la prueba y no contribuye al aprendizaje del significado; y (3) no existe interacción entre frecuencia y realce.

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