Universal Journal of Educational Research 7(12A): 75-84, 2019 http://www.hrpub.org
DOI: 10.13189/ujer.2019.071910
Vocabulary Learning Strategies: Learning Engineering
Terminology among Engineering Majors for
Industry 4.0 Readiness
Amri Muaz Azmimurad
*
, Najah Osman
Centre for Modern Languages & Human Sciences, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Malaysia
Received August 31, 2019; Revised November 24, 2019; Accepted December 3, 2019
Copyright©2019 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the
terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License
Abstract It is imperative in the era of industry 4.0 for
scholars including engineers and practitioners to
communicate effectively through mastering technical
vocabulary in their specializations. The use of strategies in
learning vocabulary has been proven to have a significant
impact on the process of learning vocabulary. Nevertheless,
it was found that advance learning is insufficient, and the
digitization era requires more words to be mastered to have
clear communication. Hence, this research aims to discover
the strategies used among engineering majors in learning
engineering terminology. This research employed mixed
methods consisting of both quantitative and qualitative
approaches. The instruments of this research are, a
vocabulary learning strategies questionnaire and
semi-structured interviews. The questionnaires were
administered to 150 students majoring in engineering from
five engineering clusters. This research found that
engineering students employed determination and
metacognitive strategies most frequently. The most
frequently used strategy was found to be listening and
watching English media while the least frequently used
strategy was keeping a vocabulary notebook. Findings show
that future communication should focus on interactivity of
the media used to increase the proficiency of technical
vocabulary and the Malaysian government can drive industry
4.0 though strategies identified in this study.
Keywords Engineering Terminology, Explicit Learning
Theory, Industrial Revolution 4.0, Technical Vocabulary,
Vocabulary Learning Strategies
1. Introduction
Industry 4.0 has become one of the most discussed topics
in the literature and among policymakers (Dalenogare,
Benitez, Ayala, & Frank, 2018). While the benefits of
industrial revolution 4.0 (IR 4.0) have been outlined by
scholars, the readiness for firms and countries worldwide
remains empirically limited (Dalenogare et al., 2018). In
addition, firms face a shortage of engineers that are reliable,
with integrity and able to lead firms to industry 4.0 adoption
(Muhuri, Shukla, & Abraham, 2019). This poses a
challenge for scholars including engineers and
policymakers to increase their knowledge and technical
vocabulary to be relevant and in line with industrial
revolution 4.0. In Malaysia, the education board believes
that proficiency of students to achieve advanced technical
vocabulary in any specialization lies in English for Specific
Purposes (ESP) courses that are starting to rise as the needs
of language courses especially English language courses
that are related to future professions are starting to be the
center of attention. Students across all majors in University
of Malaya need to take English courses that are related to
their respective fields of study after they have finished the
English proficiency courses which are usually taken in their
first year of study (Ng, 2001). Designing of these courses
started with a project named University of Malaya English
for Special Purposes Project (UMESPP) and the research
was said to be the pioneer of the productions of materials
for teaching reading comprehension in the academic field
(Omar, 2017). University students are now expected to be
able to read and comprehend the reading materials that are
related to their fields of study (Boonkongsaen &
Intaraprasert, 2014a). Musikhin (2016) supported the claim
by stating that the language is now needed to be related to
professional areas or fields, especially for scientists and
engineers. After the introduction of UMESPP, most of
Malaysian universities adopt a similar approach to
strengthen the understanding of students in respective
studies. This is more relevant nowadays with Malaysian
government embedding industry 4.0 framework in its policy
(MITI, 2018).
CITE THIS PAPER
[1] Amri Muaz Azmimurad , Najah Osman , "Vocabulary Learning Strategies: Learning Engineering Terminology among
Engineering Majors for Industry 4.0 Readiness," Universal Journal of Educational Research, Vol. 7, No. 12A, pp. 75 - 84, 2019.
DOI: 10.13189/ujer.2019.071910.