Transcript Lesson 3

Lesson 3
Teaching Vocabulary
Chapter 14
Teaching Vocabulary
 How do students best learn new
vocabulary?
 How do you teach vocabulary? What
techniques/activities work and what
don’t?
Long-Term memory vs. Short-Term memory
 Short-term memory = small storage
capacity, holds information temporarily
while it is being learned
 Long-term memory = unlimited amount
of storage capacity, holds information
indefinitely
Long-Term memory vs. Short-Term memory
 It is crucial for students to create a
deep understanding of a word by
manipulating it and thinking about it
(activities) in order to transfer a word
from short-term memory to long-term
memory
 Requires meaningful recurring
encounters with a word over time
Explicit vs. Implict Learning
 Explicit Vocabulary Learning
 Students engage in activities that focus on
vocabulary
 Build recognition of words, integrate new words with old
ones, numerous encounters with words, deep level of
processing, imaging, independent learning strategies
 Global Service List of English Words
 2000 most commonly used words
 Academic Word List
 570 word families
Implicit vs. Explicit Learning
 Implicit Vocabulary Learning
 Incidental
 Learning when the mind is focused
elsewhere, for example understanding a
text or using language for communication
purposes
 Multiple exposure is necessary
 Extensive reading and listening
Teaching Techniques & Activities
 New words should not be presented in
isolation and learned by rote
memorization
 New words must be seen in context to
provide clues to meaning
 Multiple exposure is necessary
Teaching Techniques & Activities
 Word association
 Semantic mapping = helps illustrate
relationships among words in a text
 “Vocabulary Network”
 “Word Match Lists”
 Word Families/Forms
 Helps students see how word forms change
according to function
Teaching Techniques & Activities
 Language games help recycle
vocabulary learned in a text -- fun!






Scrabble
Word Bingo
Jeopardy
Pictionary
Taboo
Crosswords
Collocations
 Patterns of pairs or groups of words that cooccur with high frequency
 “the meaning of a word has great deal to
with the words with which it commonly
associates”
 example
Collocations
 Fall into two main groups:
 Grammatical collocations - nouns, verbs,
adjectives frequently occur with a
grammatical item (usually a preposition)
 Ex: account for, by accident
 Lexical collocations - consist of
combinations such as verb + noun,
adjective + noun
 Spend money, dense fog
Collocations
 If not learned, can create odd irregularities in
a student’s speaking & writing
 Examples:




start/set a fire, but not begin/commence/initiate a fire
Rancid butter/sour milk but not sour butter/rancid milk
Fast train/fast food but not quick train/quick food
Quick shower/quick meal but not fast shower/fast meal
Lexical Phrases
 “Chunks” of language that commonly occur
and are more idiomatically determined -central to communicative competence
 Ex: “How’s it going?”, “Do you speak X?”, “Thanks
so much.”. “Where is X?”
 Lexical phrases must be classified according
to function
Lexical Phrases
 Start with a fixed routine and expose
learners to varied phrases
 Drill routine - builds confidence and
fluency in students
 Ex: “What’s up?” --- “not much.”
 Ex: “How’s it going?” -- “not bad.”
Vocabulary Learning Strategies
 Guessing meaning from context
 Part of speech, relationship with surrounding
words, relationship with surrounding
sentences/paragraphs, overall context
 Dictionary
 Monolingual vs. Bilingual
 Learn how to use correctly
 Vocabulary Journals/Notebooks
 Keeping track of new words