Impact of Instruction Explicitness, Cognitive Learning Style, and Modality on the Effectiveness of Cognitive Linguistics-Based Visual Aids for Teaching Prepositions in Taiwanese EFL Classrooms

Abstract

This study investigates the roles of instruction explicitness and learning styles on the relative effectiveness of multimedia glossing with texts and cognitive linguistics-based image schemas presented in two modalities, i.e., static and animated, on Taiwanese college EFL students learning three polysemous prepositions: above, on, and over. Based on a pre-post-test design, the experiments consist of a free writing test and a gap-fill test, respectively used to gauge the active and passive aspects of learners’ receptive lexical gain. Three groups of intermediate learners were recruited, receiving the same text annotations but different treatments configured in presentation modes and explicitness: SI group with text-static imagery annotations under implicit instruction, AI group with text-animation annotations under implicit instruction, and AE group with text-animation annotations under explicit instruction. The results suggest the following: (1) animations, compared with static imagery, seem able to better enrich the meaningfulness of image schemas and elicit larger and more durable learning effects, especially on the more active aspects of the receptive gain; (2) explicit verbal cues enhanced the learning effects on the active aspects of the receptive gains; (3) visualizers benefit more from animations than verbalizers in both active and passive aspects of the receptive gains, especially if verbal cues are provided. Pedagogical suggestions include the utilization of image schema visual aids in a dynamic presentation mode accompanied by sufficient explicit instruction to optimize the effects of learning polysemous words.