Archive | 2019
Cognitive Linguistic Approach to Teaching English Phrasal Verbs: Experimental Evidence on “V+down/up” Constructions
Abstract
English phrasal verbs are difficult for foreign language learners to learn. Some experiments have been conducted under the Cognitive Linguistic (CL) approach and found that it is more effective than the traditional teaching method. But all of their subjects are not Chinese English learners (CELs). Therefore, this paper will conduct an experiment on teaching adult mid-level CELs “V+down/up” constructions. The subjects are divided into two groups, one is experimental group taught by CL approach, and the other is controlled group taught by the traditional teaching method. The finding is that the two groups differ significantly (p<0.05) in learning “V+down/up” constructions, indicating that the adult mid-level CELs taught by CL approach perform better than those by the traditional teaching method. This paper also argues that teaching two constructions as a pair with several related metaphorical concepts at a time under CL approach is an effective way for the adult mid-level CELs without English language environment.