A Study of Positive Transfer on Junior High Students in English Vocabulary Learning

Language transfer can be classified into negative transfer and positive transfer. The former is caused by the similarities shared by source language and target language, the latter is attributed to the differences between two languages. Linguists abroad and home have put forward that native language can promote students' understanding of second language (Jarvis and Pavlenko, 2008; Wen, 2010). In the process of second language learning, especially for Junior High School students, the knowledge of native language can help students to complete their tasks. When learning the target language, they will unconsciously use the previous information to think and achieve the purpose of second language learning. Native language plays a fundamental role in second language learning. For students, it can facilitate the study of second language in some extent. Vocabulary is the foundation of language. As the beginning stage, English teaching in Junior high school should give priority to vocabulary learning. Then, whether Chinese plays a facilitate role in the process of students' vocabulary learning? And if it has, what are the factors that influence language transfer? What teaching methods can teacher employed to students' vocabulary learning? These are main contents of this study.