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Summary How to Teach Vocabulary
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Chapter 1What's in a word?
Word classes
Words play different roles in a text. They fall into one of eight
different word classes:
1. Nouns
2. Pronouns
3. Verbs
4. Adjectives
5. Adverb
6. Prepositions
7. Conjunctions
8. Determiner
In terms of the meanings associated with these word classes, we
can make a crude division into two groups:
1. Grammatical words (function words): words like for, and,
them, to that mainly contribute to the grammatical structure
of the sentence.
2. Content words: those that carry a high information load:
usually nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.
Word families
Words may have the same root, but take different endings. This is a
feature of the grammar of most languages: the use of add-ons
(affixes)
Inflexions: different grammatical forms of a word
Derivative: a word that results from the addition of an affix to a
root, which has a different meaning
Inflexions and derivatives are both formed by the process of
affixation. End-of-word affixes are suffixes. Beginning-of-word
affixes are called prefixes.
A word family comprises the base word plus its inflexions and its
most common derivatives. The mind groups different forms of the
same word together.
Word formation
Affixation is one of the ways new words are formed from old.
Another one is compounding: combining two or more independent
words.
Two words can be blended to form one new one.
A word can be co-opted from one part of speech and used as
another, a process called conversion.
New words can be coined by shortening or clipping longer words.
Multi-word units
Lexical chunks: groups of more than one word can function as a
meaningful unit with a fixed or semi-fixed form.
,Sentence frames: provide a structure on which to hang a
sentence, and are especially useful in reducing planning time in
rapid speech.
Phrasal verbs: common in informal language, compounds of verb
+ adverb, or verb + preposition
Lexeme: a lexeme is a word or group of words that function as a
single meaning unit.
Collocations
Collocation: two words are collocates if they occur together with
more than chance frequency. When we see one, we can make a
fairly safe bet that the other is in the neighbourhood.
Corpus data: databases of text, allows us to check the statistical
probability of two words co-occurring.
Homonyms
Words that share the same form but have unrelated meanings are
called homonyms. Words that sound the same but are spelt
differently are called homophones. Words that are pronounced
differently, but are spelt the same are called homographs.
Polysemes
Words that have multiple but related meanings, each of which is
called a polyseme.
Synonyms and antonyms
Synonyms are words that share a similar meaning.
Antonyms are words with opposite meanings
Hyponyms
A hyponymous relationship is a kind of relationship. Co-hyponyms
share the same ranking in a hierarchy. The superordinate is the
collective noun.
Lexical field
Words that have a kind of thematic relationship are said to belong to
the same lexical field.
Style and connotation
Expressions suggest a style of language that is closer to spoken,
informal English. A distinction is often made between style and
register. A register of English is a variety of the language as used
in specific contexts.
Linked to style is the issue of connotation. Two words may be
synonyms but each may evoke quite different associations.
Chapter 2
How words are learned
, What does it mean to know a word?
At the most basic level, knowing a word involves knowing:
It's form and (morphological)
It's meaning (semantically)
How is our word knowledge organised?
The mind seems to store words neither randomly nor in the form of
a list, but in a highly organised and interconnected fashion, what is
often called the mental lexicon.
How is vocabulary learned?
In learning their first language the first words that children learn are
typically those used for labelling, that is, mapping words on to
concepts. However, acquiring a vocabulary requires not only
labelling but categorising skills as well.
Network building: constructing a complex web of words, so that
items are interconnected. Network building serves to link all the
labels and packages, and lays the groundwork for a process that
continues for as long as we are exposed to new words.
False friends: false friends are words that may appear to be
equivalent, but whose meanings do not in fact correspond.
Generally speaking, languages that share words with similar forms
(cognates) have many more real friends than false friends.
Strangers: words that have no equivalent in the L1 at all, since the
very concept does not exist in the learner's lexicon.
Acquaintances: learners have met the words, they know them by
name, but they will never be quite as familiar to them as their
mother tongue equivalents.
How many words does a learner need to know?
2000 words is around the number of words that most native
speakers use in their daily conversation. About 2000 words, too, is
the size of the defining vocabulary used in dictionaries for
language learners. An English dictionary includes over 80.000
words. Most adult L2 learners will be lucky to have acquired 5.000
word families even after several years of study.
How are words remembered?
Researchers into the workings of memory customarily distinguish
between the following systems:
The short-term store
Working memory
Long-term memory
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