Vocabulary
- is it more than words?
No
language learner has ever doubted the importance of words
in a foreign language. The desire to understand vocabulary
we come across and the feeling of satisfaction when we add
new words to our own lexicon is common to most language
learning experiences.
Vocabulary
hasn't always been so highly valued by teachers and syllabus
designers, however. For a time words were seen as tokens
to be hung on structural branches, and it was acquiring
those structures that were considered to be the main objectives
in language learning, Now, however, vocabulary has once
again assumed its correct place at the heart of language
- and how to learn it.
What
does knowing a word mean?
People
sometimes think that knowing a word just means being able
to read it or say it, and indeed we couldn't really claim
to have learnt our new vocabulary item if we couldn't do
at least one of these things. But word knowledge is much
more than that since really knowing a word also involves
understanding what language patterns it is used in and with,
how it changes, what circumstances it is appropriate for,
what connotations it has and how frequently it occurs in
the language. All of these aspects, and more, are known
subconsciously by competent language speakers, and it is
this kind of automatic knowledge that we must aim for with
our students.
We
need to turn our attention, therefore, to how students can
best learn these things, and how they will remember words
and be able to produce them. Research suggests that the
way students meet new words, the number of times they are
re-exposed to them, the kind of associations they make between
new words and other things they know, and the mental 'games'
they play with words all play a part in helping them achieve
vocabulary success. It is clear that word learning is multi-faceted,
something which is addressed in the Development
Pack.
Chunks
and approaches
A
focus on vocabulary was greatly stimulated by discussion,
in the 1990s, of a 'Lexical
Approach', which was seen as being in opposition to
more traditional structure and vocabulary classes. The claim
made for the Lexical Approach was that instead of concentrating
on structures we should have students study language chunks,
and that they, rather than grammar, should be the building
blocks of any classroom syllabus.
Yet
how valid is this claim? To call something an 'approach'
suggests that it has a coherent view not only of language,
but also of learning, and it is far from clear that this
is the case. On the other hand a heightened interest in
the way that vocabulary operates must be a good thing, surely.
So
what does 'knowing' a word mean?
How can we help students to remember the new words they
come across?
What activities help students to learn vocabulary?
What, if anything, do we have to learn from the intense
discussion of the Lexical Approach in the 1990s?
Download
the Development Pack now
to find out more. I'm also pleased to say that Scott
Thornbury will be joining me live in The
Forum via a video link in the Chat Session on 24th
March at 16.15 GMT to answer your questions. If you
can't be there, send in any questions
you would like answered.
Jeremy Harmer
