Translation and Bilingual Practice for German Vocabulary Teaching and Learning Prisca Augustyn Florida Atlantic University Abstract This article offers a critical examination of the current practices and beliefs about vocabulary teaching and learning in typical communicative-approach German classrooms. While research on vocabulary acquisition is scarce, frequency dictionaries reveal that current practice is based heavily on the use of concrete, referential lexemes that may be easier to teach but may not represent the most frequently occur- ring vocabulary in spoken and written texts. For teaching high-frequency vocabulary, which is often abstract and non-referential, this paper explores strategies for bilingual practice, validating the pedagogi- cal use of the learners’ first language. These strategies integrate translation into the classroom as a produc- tive strategy for learning that promotes learner autonomy. By discussing techniques for bilingual class- room practice for the acquisition of core vocabulary at the introductory and intermediate level, this article lends support to recent proposals for integrating translation and extensive reading as key strategies for developing vocabulary. § Vocabulary Building without Translation? Vocabulary acquisition has not received much attention from applied linguists and SLA researchers; and instructors usually rely on their textbooks to “take care of that” (Nation, 2011, p. 532). Language instuctors trust that the materials they use expose learners to the vocabulary that is necessary to develop foreign language skills; but a closer examination of vocabulary teaching practices shows that what makes it into the vocabulary displays in typical communica- tive-approach teaching materials is not based on solid or extensive research on vocabulary acquisition. First, I will address the question why vocabulary teaching and learning has not been researched very much in order to explore the fundamental beliefs that underlie the current approach to vocabulary teaching and learning. As observed some three decades ago by Krashen and Terrell, even today in most foreign language teaching materials vocabulary-building objectives are built around topics such as “description of students, clothing, colors, objects in the classroom, favorite activities, sports and games, climate and seasons, weather, seasonal activities, holiday activities, family and rela- tives, physical states, emotional states, daily activities, holiday and vacation activities, [and] pets ” (Krashen & Terrell, 1983, pp. 67–68) Textbooks usually offer familiar iterations of these themes and, following the recommendations of Krashen and Terrell (1983), a common approach is a presentation of images, line drawings, or cartoons to achieve what Terrell (1986, p. 214) called “binding.” 27