THE ROLE TOPIC FAMILIARITY IN DEVELOPING BILINGUALS AND MONOLINGUALS’ VOCABULARY KNOWLEDGE

Teaching vocabulary is one of the main components of any language teaching methods concerned with English as a second or foreign language (ESL/EFL). Therefore, this study investigated the role of topic familiarity in developing vocabulary retention and recall through incidental teaching of vocabulary among intermediate bilingual (i.e., Arabic/ Farsi) and monolingual (i.e., Farsi) students. Administering a homogeneity proficiency test (Fowler & Coe, 1975) at the intermediate level, 60 students (i.e., 30 bilinguals and 30 monolinguals) were randomly selected and divided into two groups as the participants of the study. They participated in six weeks of teaching vocabulary while both groups received the same instruction and materials. Two types of topics (i.e., familiar vs. unfamiliar) were adopted among the pool of topics and the participants were taught the intended vocabularies during the research period. Data analysis was administered through Independent Samples t–test at the end of treatment period to assess the learners’ differences on the level of vocabulary retention and recall. The results showed the difference between the two groups was significant (p < .05). In other words, the group who dealt with familiar topics outperformed the group who worked on unfamiliar topics concerned with vocabulary achievement post-test. The results also indicated that bilinguals outperformed monolinguals in vocabulary learning. In sum, it may be claimed that topic familiarity can enhance incidental vocabulary acquisition in reading comprehension skill, especially among bilinguals rather than monolinguals.