Development of lexical richness among beginning learners of French as a foreign language

Vocabulary knowledge forms the basis of all communicative skills and is a core component language proficiency. In educational contexts in which target input limited, acquisition new vocabulary can be challenging task for learners, lexical development might slow. This study explored extent to 14 upper-secondary students French as foreign (FFL) Norwegian schools showed signs increased richness their written production over period approximately six months. The data were taken from TRAWL (Tracking Written Learner Language) corpus, digital collection second foreign-language learner texts. Two aspects investigated: 1) sophistication was measured using MultiLingProfiler software frequency profiling supplemented by manual more detailed analysis five learners’ texts; 2) diversity D_Tools v.2.0 word family counts. revealed that although many learners somewhat varied time, it difficult find proof productive among beginning FFL within such limited period. suggests finer-grained measures could added existing automated tools make these useful beginner levels.