How To Teach Vocabulary

Question

Hi everyone. I'd like you to help me. What is the best way to teach vocabulary? Are there motivational activities can help students remember words? Thanks.

Mandrake · Accepted Answer

Do you know about graded readers?

Have a look at Oxford University Press or Penguin Readers. Extensive reading is a good way to introduce vocabulary and also to recycle that vocabulary with enough frequency so that students are able to internalize vocabulary more than say copying and memorizing vocabulary from pre-determined lists.

Alternatively, have a look at:

www.extensivereading.net

TeacherJoe · Answer

I have tried various methods to teach vocabulary - mnemonics (memory 'tricks'), word games (including quiz games), flash cards, etc. However, the most effective way was already hinted at in the post on 'graded readers'. The very best way to learn, and therefore teach, vocabulary is IN CONTEXT. When students see new words or expressions in context, there are two advantages: 1) students remember the words better 2) students see HOW the words are used.

When I teach, I use all kinds of stories. I use children's stories, news stories, jokes, (), magazine articles. Sometimes I introduce the difficult vocabulary first, sometimes I let students read quickly first to get the main idea. I always have many questions prepared before class. Some are relatively simple comprehension questions, some are discussion questions. Most of the questions encourage students to use the vocabulary when speaking, but I don't want to force them to use any words unnaturally.

Now, there is one advantage to teaching vocabulary out of context, from word lists or with games of any kind. Students see the words they are supposed to study and believe they must be making progress. At least, they feel that way in class. When they leave the class, they don't remember the words or don't use them correctly and so are misunderstood. By then, of course, they can't blame the teacher, they blame themselves! So teaching vocabulary 'out of context' is safer for the teacher. Teaching vocabulary 'in context' is more effective.

Anyway, this is what I have observed in teaching and in learning French, Spanish, Japanese and Chinese. Other opinions are welcome!

Teacher Joe

Anonymous · Answer

0I'm an English teacher.I'm also puzzled about how to teach vocabulary.But in recent days I read a lot of useful passages on how to teach it.They are helpful.0-

Titithi · Answer

0 I think before teaching vocabulary, we need to choose active and passive vocabulary. For passive words, we only realize and don't spend a lot of time to explain them. Students will research themselves by looking up in the dictionary or guessing from the context. Thus, we have to define which word as a passive or active vocabulary to teach.02br
00For active words, we should save time by choosing the real active words which are needed to teach. By eliciting or brainstorming, we will find out which words are really new words and which words are needed to review. Sometimes ,we have to ask directly our students which words they don't know.The best way to teach active words is setting up the context (as Mr Joe has mentioned) by realia, real object, real story, pictures, visual aids, mapped- dialogue etc...Translation is obviously one way round the problem of difficult concept ,however it's not good for grasping the meaning. A suitable mother tongue equivalent is not always available.02br
00Besides,we can use synonym, a quick and efficient way of explaining unknown words. With simple English, we explain new words by antonym and words family including suffixe and prefixe.Gestures and mimic play an important role when conveying new words. To understand a new word fully, a student must know not only what it refers to but also where their boundaries are separate.In other words, the affective meaning of an item can vary according to the context and speaker.The meaning of a word can only be understood in terms of its relationship with other words in the language.This is why translation is the brief way of explanation and necessary in some situation but it's not suitable to target the language.0-

Anonymous · Answer

0What will be important for Titithi to learn in teaching is to move from the theoretical jargon that is covering what appears to be your use of English as a second language so that you can simply have fun in the classroom without needing to describe your activities with this jargon. The most important information we can glean from your statement is that students appreciate visual cues and they are content to know what a word means and even what it does not mean. Yes, I agree!0-

Pete West · Answer

0 Apart from resorting to the tried and tested method of associating pictures and images with words there are also other methods you can employ to teach vocabulary. This TESL video looks at some of these.02br
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Anonymous · Answer

miming,drawing,real objects and flash cards

Anonymous · Answer

Hello , my name is Fatima .
I am from Morocco and really interested in the technicques of teaching, i was reading people's opnions and it is really interesting .
I teach Arabic to non native speakers and i use a lot of these things that i just red here but one thing that i would love to ask about is that sometimes i have to teach private classes and a lot of the games here are just used with class of students and this is someimes a challenge since that i can't use these games to break the routine of the class because i do not have a class.So in your opinion what would be the best games that can be played one by one in which the teacher can focus on vocabulary.
Thanks in advance.

Emmeladelyn · Answer

I also teach one to one and find it a little hard to teach vocabulary in a varied and fun way. I do think it helps if it's not always the same style - one week I read the words to the student with multiple choice definitions, another week they match up synonyms, sometimes we revise vocab using cut-out words that the student picks out and has to turn into a sentence or a story. I also find that my students are more engaged if the exercise is more of an activity. For example, I'll give them sentences to complete with new or recently encountered words and those words are on little stickers or pieces of paper with sticky-tack on the back. They have to do something with their hands as well as their mind and it doesn't feel too academic and school-like.

Anonymous · Answer

I think the best way to teach vocabulary is through games...because every students likes game so it will easily help them to remember the vocabulary better

How To Teach Vocabulary

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