Suggestopedia in Improving Students' Mastery of Vocabulary

Abstract

The present study was done to test the effect of Suggestopedia on the first year secondary pupils’ mastery of vocabulary. Since this latter is central to English language teaching and learning, because without sufficient vocabulary students cannot understand others or express their own ideas. This research is based on two hypotheses the first one is that Suggestopedia helps secondary pupils effectively to retain and recall words and new vocabularies. The second hypothesis is the teachers will hold positive attitudes towards some features of Suggestopedia in teaching vocabulary. To confirm these hypotheses, an experimental study was done with first year pupils of Draa Mohammed Sadak secondary school during the third trimester of the academic year 2017/2018. The sample of this study consisted of 32 pupils randomly chosen and assigned equally to experimental and control groups, i.e., 16 students for each group. Firstly, both groups had the pretest; they were asked to answer 5 exercises. After that students in the experimental group were taught following Suggestopedia features. This phase is called the treatment period. The lessons to be taught were chosen from their textbook (Unit04, sequences 01 and 02). At the end of this phase, a post-test took place and was directed to all the participants. In addition, a questionnaire survey was used to support the second hypothesis of this study. The aim of it is to know the teachers’ attitudes towards the Suggestopedia features. The results showed that the experimental group performed better than the control group in the post-test (retaining and recalling words). The teachers also showed satisfaction towards some features of Suggestopedia.