Exploring the Impact of Interlinear vs. L1 Marginal Glosses on Iraqi EFL Learner’s L2 Vocabulary Learning

This study investigates the impact of interlinear vs. L1 marginal glosses on the Iraqi Learning of vocabulary in EFL instructional setting. Along with all the efforts made during past 3 decades to improve the teaching of vocabulary via various strategies and techniques countywide, the classical grammar-translation method and its offspring are still widely used in most schools in Iraq. By analyzing the elicited data out of the management, treatment, and assessment of 92 pre-university students studying in two high schools in Iraq, the inquirer observed a reliable improvement of vocabulary learning in participants. To examine the effectiveness of the two glossing strategies, i.e., the implantation of L1 marginal and interlinear glosses, the results of pre and post-test of three groups were compared using One-Way ANOVA. We found reliable difference between the two groups in post-test vocabulary learning. Consequently, L1 marginal and Interlinear glosses both have come to make the learners understand L2 texts well, in comparison with the other group. Ultimately, Marginal glossing is more effective than the interlinear (text) glossing in the improvement of vocabulary development of Iraqi EFL learners.