MEASURING SPOKEN VOCABULARY LOAD ON MEDICAL ENGLISH STUDENTS: A LEARNER CORPUS EVALUATION

Abstract

English for Specific Purposes (ESP) teaching urges the students to have a deep understandingof specific vocabularies. Specifically, in medical English class, spoken diagnosis explanationinvolves specific vocabularies. This corpus study was aimed to reflect the students’ achievementof spoken vocabulary during speaking practice on explaining the diagnosis. Computer softwarewas utilized to calculate frequency and range of words. The students’ vocabularies werecompared with listening tapescript corpora from a medical English textbook to evaluatevocabulary pattern. Additionally, the students' spoken corpora were contrasted with 2000 highfrequencywords and other three word lists to assess word distribution. This study revealed thatmedical students used few specialized vocabularies in order to deliver their explicable messageto the patient. The analysis of students’ vocabulary can be used as a reference to contemplate thesuccess of language instruction and future betterment, particularly spoken diagnosis explanationat medical English program.