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c) Set aside a regular time for vocabulary learning or memorising — e.g. just
before you go to bed, or when travelling to and from university.
d) Spend more time on the words that you find difficult. Often, when learning
vocabulary, people create a list with the target words on one side and meanings on the
other, and go down the list from the first word to the last, trying to memorise each
one. This method can have two problems: firstly, the words at the top of the list tend
to be remembered better than those further down; and secondly, time is wasted going
over words that the learner has already learned. One way of overcoming these
problems is to spend more time on the words that you find difficult. A simple way of
doing this is to delete the words you know from the list. If you sort in Word, you can
also change the order of the list, so that it’s not the same every time. An alternative is
to post words onto a wall or board, and take them down when you know them.It is
essential that the learner to evaluate his vocabulary learning. It's very important for
most learners to have an idea of whether they're making progress or not. Finding that
you are actually making progress can be a big help to your confidence.
Every day you hear or read many new English words. You also find them in
your dictionary when you are translating from your own language. You can’t possibly
learn all these new words, so your first problem is to decide which ones to concentrate
on.
• learn the words that are important to the subjects you are studying
• learn the words that you read or hear again and again
• learn the words that you know you will often want to use yourself
• do not learn words that are rare or not useful (your teacher can help you with this)
Once we have chosen which words to learn, next we have to decide how are we going to
learn them. Here are a few ideas:
say the words many times (if you have an electronic dictionary you can hear how the
word is pronounced)
put the words into different groups (you could use a graphic organiser)
write them in a file for use with a computer program
make associations (in pictures or with other words)
ask someone to test you
use the words in your own speaking or writing
Some students put a tick or cross in their dictionary next to every word they look up. The
next time they turn to a page with a marked word, they quickly check to see if they
remember the meaning of that word. In all of the above ways, we are doing something
with the words. It’s usually not enough to just read through a list of words with their
definitions or translations and try to remember them. Most students find that they
memorise words better if they do something with them. Even better is to try and learn the
word in a typical combination with other words. Learning that to apologize means to say
sorry is a good start, but it's much better to learn a whole expression containing the word,
e.g. He apologized for being late. Not only is this often easier to remember, but we are
also learning some very important information on how the word is used. The way we
learned very many of the words in ourr own language was by meeting them in the books
and magazines we read. The context of a new word in a sentence or story was often
enough for us to guess the meaning. Meeting the word again and again in our reading
helped us learn it for use in our own speaking and writing. Doing lots of extra reading for
pleasure - both fiction and non-fiction - is an excellent way to learn new English words,
too. But choose books that you find quite easy to read. Difficult stories or texts that you
struggle to understand will not help you to develop your vocabulary the natural way.
Being able to remember one meaning of a list of words within a week or two is easy,
developing a functional lexicon that contains morphological, semantic, syntactic,
pragmatic, and emotional connections needs a gradual process that takes much more time
and effort.
It is well known that people who have a strong English vocabulary receive more attention
and respect from their peers, colleagues, subordinates and authority figures? This is
because speaking with a strong vocabulary indicates that you take yourself seriously.
Language and the way we use words conveys intelligence and authority. A person who is
a mathematical genius or an expert software developer may be highly respected for
technical skills, but if the words that come out of mouth consist of a poor vocabulary, it
will, unfortunately, communicate a lack of intelligence.