Dictionaries for learners of English

Author’s Original (Preprint) version of: Lew, Robert. 2016. “Dictionaries for learners of English”, Language Teaching 49, 2: 291–294. This version is more substantial than the final published version (which was cut down due to space budget constraints), so I recommend this version

Which learning tools accompanying the paid online version of LDOCE do advanced learners of English find useful?

 The aim of the report is twofold: to (1) briefly describe the learning tools of the Long-man Dictionary of Contemporary English (LDOCE6) which are available to English learners in the paid online version of the dictionary (sixth edition); and (2) present the results of the questionnaire that was conducted on 114 students of English at the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn. The participants completed a questionnaire in which they were asked to assess the usefulness of the learning tools of the paid online version of LDOCE6. The first section of the paper introduces the reader to the five major British monolingual learners' dictionaries on the market and the most prominent features of LDOCE. The second section is a description of the learning tools available to learners of English in the paid online version of LDOCE6. The following section elaborates on the earliest questionnaire studies conducted in the field of dictionary use, and some of the problematic aspects of this research method are discussed. The report ends with a presentation of the results of the questionnaire and a brief discussion.Keywords: Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, online dictionaries, questionnaires, learners' dictionarie

Underwriting Good Jobs: How to Place Over 20 Million Americans on a Pathway to the Middle Class Using Federal Purchasing Power

This report presents new research on the scope of federally-supported employment in the private economy and shows how, using our over $1.3 trillion dollars in federal purchasing, the President of the United States can place over twenty million Americans on a pathway to the middle class

“The Song of Words” teaching multi-word units with songs

The need to integrate songs into English Language Teaching (ELT) has been recognized on numerous occasions. Song lyrics host multi-word units which learners can reuse as building blocks in their English, thereby reducing language processing time and effort, and improving their fluency as well as idiomaticity, thus bringing them closer to the native speaker norm. We report on two studies into the effectiveness of using songs for teaching multi-word units to high-school Polish learners of English. The same items were taught to two groups of EFL learners, but only one of the groups heard them in a song. Learners’ vocabulary recall was measured at three points in time relative to the teaching: before, immediately after, and a week after. The group taught with songs showed a significant recall advantage over the other group, especially when tested a week from teaching. The results suggest that songs can be an effective vehicle for teaching English multi-word units

An algorithm for collapsing sign alternating sequences of real numbers

AbstractA table with two rows and n columns may be thought of as two vectors with n components. The distance between the two rows then corresponds to the norm of the difference between the rows. We examine the problem of how to collapse the adjacent columns of the table while keeping the norm of the difference as large as possible. First a stepwise algorithm is given which achieves this end with respect to the norm of the vector of differences. After proving the optimality of the stepwise solution we extend the result to the norm which arises from minimizing the number of persons misclassified. The same algorithm suffices

The quality of sexual life and personality of men addicted to gambling

INTRODUCTION: In Poland, every second Pole declares that he participated in this type of activity at least once. Addiction affects many other forms of human activity including sexuality. The aim of this research is to determine a connection of the quality of sexual life, undertaken sexual activity and personality traits with gambling addiction. MATERIAL AND METHODS: there were 95 adult male gamblers included in the research. The research group comprised 50 men addicted to gambling, the control group consisted of 45 non-dependent men. The research was conducted by means of: the NEO-Five Factor Inventory, the Sexual Quality of Life-Male questionnaire and the Changes in Sexual Functioning Questionnaire-Male. RESULTS: a negative, statistically significant connection between the intensification of gambling addiction and undertaken sexual activity (p = 0.026) and a general tendency of the decrease in sexual life along with the increase in addiction (p = 0.017) were determined. Also, a significant statistically positive connection between the intensification of a neuroticism feature and a tendency to gambling addiction (p = 0.003) was demonstrated. Additionally, the research results show that the increase in obtained results at the level of gambling addition corresponded to lower obtained results at the level of conscientiousness (p = 0.001) and agreeableness (p = 0.002). CONCLUSIONS: men addicted to gambling are characterised by a low level of the intensification of agreeableness and conscientiousness features in comparison to non-dependent people. There is a statistically significant connection between elevated neuroticism and a tendency to gambling addiction. The quality of sexual life in people addicted to gambling decreases along with the increase in the intensification of addiction

Differences in the scope of obstruent voicing assimilation in learners' English as a consequence of regional variation in Polish

The question of what factors, and to what extent, shape the phonetic performance of second language learners has been the subject of much debate (see for instance Ioup & Weinberger 1987 or James & Leather 1987). One factor whose importance has remained, and is likely to remain, relatively unchallenged is the influence of the sound system of learners' native language. This effect is usually referred to as L1 transfer in the ESL/EFL literature, as parameters (speech habits, features, realisations, rules, processes, etc. - specific formulations vary with different approaches) of native language (L1) pronunciation are transferred or carried over to the second (L2, learned) language. In the present study I undertake to investigate if, and how, regional differences in Polish with respect to regressive sandhi voicing assimilation may influence the corresponding aspects of learners' English pronunciation. I will also consider some practical implications of the results for pronunciation teaching

The Web as corpus versus traditional corpora: Their relative utility for linguists and language learners

The paper compares systematically the utility of specially-made text corpora and the textual resources of the World Wide Web for linguists and language learners. Different modes of access are discussed, including via dedicated concordancing software, web-concordancing and the universal search engine

How can we make electronic dictionaries more effective?

Pre-publication draft. Not for quotation or copying.This chapter examines some of the ways in which electronic dictionaries of today can be further improved so as to serve human users better. The focus is on two major areas: effective access to lexicographic data and novel types of data. In terms of access, I consider how electronic dictionaries can help in situations when users are unsure about the spelling of the word they want o lookup. Two further issues discussed are efficient entry navigation and access to multi-word expressions. In the second part of the chapter I discuss the degree to which the use of multimedia can benefit electronic dictionaries. This includes audio (recorded or synthesized), static pictorials, as well as animations and videos. Preliminary research indicates that not all of the above may be equally useful for dictionary users