the comparative effect of think pair share (tps) and student teams achievement divisions (stad) on reflective and impulsive efl learners' vocabulary retention

While vocabulary knowledge has an important role in almost all areas of language learning, the lack of vocabulary still is a big problem among efl learners. this vital role necessitates studies focusing on the most effective techniques of teaching vocabulary. the present study was an attempt to investigate the comparative effect of think pair share (tps) and student teams achievement divisions (stad) on impulsive and reflective efl learners' vocabulary retention. accordingly, the participants of the present study were selected from among the upper elementary students from six classes of ninth grade. the total number of the participants was 123. 147 participants were selected non-randomly and homogenized through key english test (ket) out of 216 students studying in the same grade. these 147 students sat for the eysenck and eysenck's (1991) impulsiveness questionnaire (eiq). thus 64 students were identified as impulsive and 59 as reflective (a total of 123 participants and assigned into four groups of impulsive and reflective learners. two main types of treatment employed in this study including tps and stad. before the treatment phase, a piloted pretreatment test was administered to all 4 groups in order to make sure that the four groups bore no significant difference in their vocabulary knowledge at the outset. after treatment sessions, a piloted vocabulary posttest was administered twice with a 15 days delay, in order to measure the retention of the learners. the collected data were analyzed through a mixed method repeated measures anova using spss software. the results of the statistical analysis revealed the personality style functioned as a significant moderator in this case, as tps was found a better instructional type than stad for impulsive and reflective efl learners. moreover, while stad did not show a significantly different effect on impulsive versus reflective learners, tps was found more effective for impulsive ones.