Text structure (e.g., left-to-right orientation) can bias later task performance by supporting scanning strategies on related tasks (e.g., scanning left-to-right when learning word pairs). The current study was designed to investigate how the reading habits of native Arabic speakers might affect the acquisition of English vocabulary in word lists. Forty Arabic-speaking ESL students were asked to learn two lists of Arabic-English word pairs. The experimental materials were two lists of low-frequency English words with their Arabic translations. In each of two sessions, 20 pairs of English and Arabic words were presented to the participants. The presentation order and position of the words in the list was counterbalanced across students (e.g., Arabic-English vs. English-Arabic). After attempting to learn from both lists, the participants were asked to complete an English-Arabic directional translation test. The results suggest that learning the word pairs from the Arabic-English list resulted in greater recall of English words.