Design and Evaluation of a Tutor Platform for Personalized Vocabulary Learning

The problem of vocabulary gap among students in the early years of school, and the resulting impact on school success have received significant attention in the past [3-5, 18, 20, 23]. Early introduction of vocabulary through either direct or indirect instruction helps children learn to read well and forms a strong foundation for literacy, which in turn helps children in accelerated reading to learn. Importantly, while reading new texts, children tend to connect the words they are familiar with to the words exposed in the texts; hence, greater and diverse vocabulary leads to better comprehension of the texts being read. Given the enormity of vocabulary in English language (and most languages in general), new word acquisition is an ongoing process for many years, and 1 sometimes is even lifelong for many people. However, the highest rate of vocabulary development happens in the early years, and teachers in elementary schools focus (often in their own ways, since no universally standardized word lists or procedures exist) a nontrivial amount of time in introducing words to children through both direct and implicit instruction.