Figure 1. Front Side
The past decades have witnessed the spectacular development of English language as a principal lingua franca, used by millions of people all over the world. Without a doubt, the transition and acquisition of knowledge in all daily respects, from daily communication to academic disciplines, are more closely linked with the competence of English language than ever before. Under impacts of the Fourth Industrial Revolution lately, English language education has also undergone numerous transformations, which turns mobile-assisted language learning into a phenomenon and seemingly replaces traditional methods of learning vocabulary among English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. Realizing the critical value of Anki, a prominent digital flashcard program, to vocabulary learning, this article aims at focally investigating the effectiveness of Anki in enhancing lexical resources together with some implications for users. To be more specific, Anki offers users an opportunity of simultaneously acquiring various linguistic components via spaced-repetition and flexible learning mode. The results reveal that with the support of Anki, learners are able to achieve high lexical retention and retrieval though some shortcomings still do exist.
Hunt and Beglar (2005) emphasized that second language vocabulary acquisition is deemed a cornerstone of foreign language learning, an integral part of that learning process. In other words, the level of language proficiency is primarily contingent upon the quantity of vocabulary items obtained, for both an infant learning his or her native language and children as well as adults gaining foreign languages at school (Shatz, 2001).
The pivotal role of vocabulary supported by numerous prominent scholars could be seen in many respects of language learning in which the two most significant ones could be highlighted as the following. It should be first noted that such success in communication lies in how copious the lexicon is. Wilkins (1972) emphasized the necessity of vocabulary in imparting information that “without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” (p. 111-112). This means that lexicon is deemed a linguistic center and critically crucial to any language learner (Coady & Huckin, 1997). This notion also receives the approval from Folse (2014) that without the proper use of words, grammatical knowledge of an individual seems to be never enough to convey his or her intended message.
What is more, macro language skills such as reading, listening, speaking, writing could barely be mastered with no adequate vocabulary acquisition (Nation, 1994). In receptive skills including listening and reading, one cannot absorb information without sufficient understanding of vocabulary, which probably leads to frequent practice of looking up the new words or referring to the listening transcript. When it comes to productive skills, namely speaking and writing, a lack of lexical resource may be a huge hindrance for language users to pass on their ideas (Uchihara & Saito, 2019).
In the wake of Industry 4.0, some outstanding mobile software and applications for vocabulary learning that could be named are Quizlet, Memrise, etc. in which Anki is the most preferable. This flashcard program has been commonly used by abundant language learners all over the world; so far, however, there has been little discussion about merits and drawbacks generated for users when using Anki, which they should pay close attention to. From the points noted above, a tough question raised by many teachers and EFL learners is how to utilize all the advantages of Anki and foresee any shortcomings of this application to effectively facilitate their vocabulary learning process.
This paper will look at some rudimentary concepts associated with vocabulary learning and Anki, together with the assessment of effectiveness when employing Anki into language learning. Besides, some potentials and challenges are also outlined to provide current and potential users a panorama of this digital flashcard program. With the view to achieving the aforementioned objectives of the study, the following question would be answered: What is the effectiveness of Anki in vocabulary learning among the EFL learners?
No doubt vocabulary can be considered as a prerequisite for any language learner if they would like to master a language (Cameron, 2001). The reason could be rooted from the fact that limited vocabulary range may lead to failure in utilizing functions and structures to communicate comprehensibly (Nunan, 1991). Used to be neglected and underestimated by educators and researchers, vocabulary has currently witnessed a renewed interest. Under diverse notions of numerous linguists, the way of defining vocabulary may vary greatly from person to person. In his analysis, Hornby (1995) defines vocabulary as "the total number of words in a language; vocabulary is a list of words with their meanings" (p. 1331). The similar concept is also shaped by Simpson (2013) when he points out that lexical items are merely a collection of all words existing in a particular language. However, the aforementioned definitions have overlooked the role of language learners when it comes to the practice of using vocabulary.
From another different perspective, vocabulary deals with the meaning and real-life applicability as a foundation to facilitate discourse and perform skills of speaking, listening, reading and writing. This notion evidently manifests itself in the statement claimed by Richards and Rennadya (2002) that vocabulary is a key component of language proficiency, serving as a benchmark for how well learners master those language skills. Similarly, Sheehan (as cited in Phỉ et al., 2016) also states that vocabulary is an individual's ability to “understand and use words to acquire and convey meaning”. In light of the aforementioned discussion, vocabulary can be fathomed as a group of words vital for speakers to express their ideas in various communicative contexts.
When it comes to vocabulary acquisition, knowing a word has been a center of controversies. According to Laufer (1991), knowing a word falls into five major forms: first, ability to recognize a word via listening and reading, spell and pronounce it; second, morphemes or word form; third, syntactic features which allude how a word together with other components form a sentence; fourth, meaning including referential, affective and pragmatic meaning; fifth, lexical relations dealing with synonyms, antonyms, collocations, etc. Therefore, the more features of a lexical item are taught, the more effective the vocabulary learning application is.
In comparison with current digital flashcard programs, Anki is seen as the most intelligent English learning application which can be used on the platform of both website and smartphone, offering practical characteristics to boost the efficiency of vocabulary absorption among learners (Godwin-Jones, 2008). In other words, they can get access to their card groups on the official website using computers synchronized with their mobile phones. This user-created flashcard program enables its users to generate the word cards with the support of various components, from videos, audios, visual images to self-designed exercises for revision. Furthermore, these word cards can be categorized into separate word classifications called decks to allow learners to systemize their lexical resources according to topics, levels, purposes of learning, parts of speech, and so on.
It is not difficult to use Anki provided that learners can assure permanent learning (Nation, 2001). After a question or an image is presented on a flashcard, learners are provided with a suggested timeframe to recall the word before clicking “show answer” button (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Front Side
Based on how well they remember the vocabulary item, users can choose different options of intervals, namely less than one minute, less than 10 minutes and four days to meet that word later on (Figure 2). This default setting can be flexibly modified to suit learners' needs. It should be noted that after the first time of encountering the new words, users are frequently expected to memorize them for one or two days before learning again. Moreover, Anki is pre-programed to record the number of reviewing times, intervals for learners to recall the words, the number of correct answers and so forth. Based on the database collected, a certain number of lexical items to practice on the following day will be forecast.
Figure 2. Back Side
Numerous research studies have been conducted to investigate the effectiveness of Anki in boosting learners' capacity in acquiring vocabulary. Agca and Ozdemir (2013) found out that students outperformed in their posttest results of vocabulary after the experimental period. It is worth mentioning that the use of images in digital flashcards, similar to the way Anki operates, is highly recommended by Shehane (2015) since aural and visual aids generate a strong connection between concept of the target word and verbal language, thereby enhancing the power of retention. Anki can even check spelling of the word by requiring learners to type it down instead of merely choosing the “show answer” button.
Basically, Anki is still developed on the basis of paper flashcards with the target word on one side and the answer on the other. Thus, the practice of retrievals becomes more convenient and effective when new words and their meanings are shown simultaneously. However, what sets Anki apart lies in the utilization of spaced repetition, which proves to be more productive than massed repetition (Nation, 2001). While massed repetition is characterized by a huge effort of learners put into practicing vocabulary for a continuous course of time, spaced repetition requires them to divide repetition into certain sessions over a long duration. According to Nation in his “Learning vocabulary in another language” (2001), contingent upon different criteria, a learner needs to meet a word repeatedly from five to just over 20 times to acquire that new vocabulary item. This view is strongly supported by Horst et al. (1998) who affirms that over ten repetitions will help learners to gain an in-depth insight of a lexical item. Hence, the method of spaced repetition study proves to be beneficial to English language learners via avoiding heavy burden of learning a great deal of lexicon within a continuous period of time, which in the long run, may deter their motivation for selfpractice. This usefulness of digital flashcard program has been investigated in a plethora of research studies which identify the advantages of recording learners' improvement and allowing them to see and practise difficult words more frequently (Hung, 2015; Nakata, 2008; Pyc & Rawson, 2007; Spiri, 2008). From the aforementioned merits, Anki truly manifests itself to be a powerful tool for the second language learners in absorbing vocabulary.
What makes Anki stand out is the possibility of empowering its users to take full control over their learning process, so they are completely aware of how to schedule their timetable. To be more specific, based on the results indicating how well learners could recall a word, the application would arrange the revising schedule appropriately for them to meet that lexical item again. Compared with the traditional methods of learning vocabulary, Anki appears to be far more appealing when it allows users to learn and practise whenever and wherever they want, thanks to the advancement of mobile devices (Suwantarathip & Orawiwatakul, 2015). In other words, studying now is no longer restricted in the space of classroom. From the perspective of Altiner (2011), vocabulary acquisition via Anki yields myriad promising results of amelioration. Anki is deemed a portable online library that enables users to organize their vocabulary items in the decks in accordance with specific topics and purposes of revising, etc. Additionally, this mobile application is also wisely preprogramed to record the history of learning activities by users, from times of reviewing per day, intervals of recalling the answer, to prediction of lexical amount to be revised on the following day. As a result, learners are more likely to enhance their vocabulary resources quickly and effectively.
Though Anki might prove to be one of the most effective tools to assist the explicit vocabulary learning process, some drawbacks of this application should still be taken into account. To begin with, self-study activities with no direct support of teachers in the classrooms about the usage and necessary components of vocabulary to acquire cannot maximize the effectiveness of learning (Altiner, 2011). Another shortcoming of Anki which may deter the frequency of revision is the lack of reminder mode to remind users to log on the program to learn. The fact remains that due to heavy workload of assignments at schools, many students tend to forget their daily learning routine in Anki, which possibly leads to the massive accumulation of lexis day by day. As a consequence, the initial concept of spaced-repetition no longer plays any significant role in increasing vocabulary for users. Besides, if learners are not provided with adequate information about the usefulness of Anki and spaced repetition in enhancing vocabulary learning process, their serious attitudes and commitment in using this flashcard program cannot be guaranteed.
When it comes to the perceptions of learners about using Anki, they reported to be satisfied with its usefulness, usability, and enjoyableness, so they will continue using this digital flashcard program in the future (Altiner, 2011). Likewise, Tsourounis and Demmans Epp (2016) draw our attention to the use of mobile-assisted language learning application to create a sense of achievement for learners to endeavor further, and in this case, Anki motivates its learners via the recorded database of the lexical resource acquired throughout the whole learning process.
As mentioned above, Anki is presented to be full of necessary functions to assist EFL learners in vocabulary selfstudy by virtue of its flexibility in integrating various components, namely definitions, examples, audio-visual aids, spaced-repetition, spelling-check and so on. This method of learning is claimed to facilitate the vocabulary learning process and retention of lexicon in the long term (Zhang, 2009; Laufer & Shmueli, 1997). Nevertheless, more attention should be drawn to some impediments related to the lack of some features such as reminder mode and the need of detailed guidance from educators.
To make use of this application, teachers are highly recommended to provide learners with initial support in using and revising lexis through creating sample card decks or keeping track of them in revising words on a daily basis. However, when students are gradually familiar with Anki, they are suggested to create their decks since the practice of searching and typing down the words is also one of the contributing factors to boost the vocabulary retention.
Most of research studies only focus on certain aspects of vocabulary acquisition, namely ability to recognize a word via listening to pronunciation and reading definitions, or to recall a vocabulary item through examples and syntactic features; meanwhile, other aspects still remain untouched. As a result, this paper has not provided a complete picture about the usefulness of Anki in boosting vocabulary absorption.
Therefore, further research should be conducted to examine how effective Anki is in learning lexical relations and morphemes. The participants are also recommended to be not merely restricted among English-majored students, but learners from various other disciplines and professions.