Prepping a prep course: a corpus linguistics approach

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to explore and report some possible uses of corpus linguistics tools and techniques in a preparatory course for an international exam, focusing on helping students use corpora to find and analyze collocations and colligations when doing and creating multiplechoice cloze exercises. The participants were undergraduate students taking either a teacher training or a translation program. After discussing some research carried out on the pedagogical implications of using corpora, the article presents how a six-session preparatory course was designed and implemented, and the tools used to check participants’ perception of learning. The compiled data analyzed how participants reacted towards using an online corpus while getting themselves ready for the Use of English component of exams. The results demonstrated that corpus techniques were felt to be useful tools as far as fostering students’ autonomy was concerned. The study ends with a brief discussion on its limitations.

Teachers’ perceptions of incorporation of corpus-based approach in English language teaching classrooms in Karachi, Pakistan

“…Concept of a linguistic corpus became known in language teaching circles in 1987 with the introduction of first corpus-based dictionary for learners, i.e., Collins COBIULD English language dictionary, and research emphasizing the use of corpus-based materials in language classrooms. This sparked the interest in researching corpus-based language teaching (Boldarine & Rosa, 2019;Chao, 2010;Romer, 2006). The emergence of a linguistic corpus concept has caused a significant shift in the methodology and philosophy of the English language teaching and learning (Binkai, 2012).…”