The effect of multimedia vocabulary presentation before and while reading the text on reading comprehension and vocabulary retention

This research was conducted to investigate the effect of multimedia vocabulary presentation before and while reading the text on reading comprehension and vocabulary retention. Sixty three first grade Iranian high schools students between 15 and 17 years of age were randomly selected for the study. An experimental design with three groups was used. One class of 21 students were the control group and received traditional way of presenting words and the other two classes of 21 students each served as experimental groups. For the first experimental group (BR group), the image, audio, L1 translation, and a sentence context of whole new words were presented one by one before reading the text. For the second experimental group (WR group), new words were presented while the students were reading the text at the simple click of a mouse on the highlighted target vocabulary. The results show that both multimedia presentation of words before and while reading the text enhanced vocabulary development and reading comprehension of the learners in immediate vocabulary and reading comprehension tests as well as in delayed vocabulary tests. However, presentation of the words while reading the texts seemed to be more effective than the presentation of words before reading the texts.