What Vocabulary Size Is Needed to Comprehend Harry Potter Series?: Implications for Incidental Vocabulary Learning

Abstract

The current study aimed to assess the vocabulary size necessary for understanding the Harry Potter book and movie series and to measure the number of potential words that could be learned incidentally through reading the book and watching the movie series. The findings showed that 4,000 (95% text coverage) or preferably 7,000 (98% text coverage) word families are necessary to understand Harry Potter book series, and learners should know 3,000 (96% text coverage) or preferably 5,000 (98% text coverage) word families to comprehend the Harry Potter movie series. It was also revealed that the learners with the vocabulary size of 4,000 and 7,000 word families might incidentally learn 996 and 475 word families respectively through reading the book series. In addition, the learners with the vocabulary size of 3,000 and 5,000 word families could incidentally learn 30 and 15 word families respectively through watching the movie series. The findings indicated that reading the Harry Potter book series provides substantial opportunities for incidental vocabulary learning, whereas watching the movie series does not seem to provide similar gains in vocabulary learning. However, the results implied that regular viewing of movies over an extended period time would give ample opportunities for vocabulary learning.