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Explore strategies to teach, recall, and organize vocabulary effectively. Discover the importance of lexical sets, metaphors, and vocabulary learning activities for learners. Gain insight into lexical retention and usage for improved language acquisition.
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Helping learners to learn lexis Katie Courtney Bennett February 2015
Aims of this session We are going to try to answer the following: • What words should I teach? • How can I help my learners remember vocabulary? We are going to do some vocabulary activities
Vocabulary willNOTtake care of itself • Recycle • Magic 7 • High priority lexis
How do I decide? • Think about how useful a word may be to your learners • Consider: • frequency • context • purpose
Passive and active vocabulary • Passive • Active
Helping recall lexis • How do we store lexis in the mind? • Randomly? • In alphabetical order? • In an organised and interconnected fashion? • In the form of a list? • In groups of related words? • In groups of similar sound structure? Why is this important?
Lexical sets • A lexical set is a group of related words • Words can be related: • By topic furniture, clothes,animals • By synonymy gorilla, chimpanzee, ape By antonymy hot/cold, old/new, hard/soft By superordinates & hyponyms fruit: apple, plum By activity or process steps in making a cake In a scale boiling, hot, warm, cool, cold, freezing paint, painter, painting By word families
Metaphors • Being angry is like… beinghot or on fire • Burn with indignation • Have a fiery temper • Be hot-tempered • Have a heated argument • Have a blazing/flaming row • Flare up over nothing • Make one’s blood boil • Lose one’s cool • Get hot under the collar
Being confused is like… being lost or in the wrong place or position • ‘You’ve lost me.’ • Be at sea • Feel adrift, with no real sense of direction • Lose one’s bearings • ‘I don’t know if I’m coming or going’ • Feel like a fish out of water • ‘You’ve got it all back to front.’
Easier • Meaning • Magic 7 • Make it interesting • Integrated approach
Easier cont • Tasks • Acting out meanings • Different aspects of meaning eg metaphorical • Lyrical context – songs, poetry • Lexical chunks eg Collocations
Harder • Similar ‘form’ • Similar in ‘meaning • Antonymic pairs – ‘borrow’ and ‘lend’
Activities • Phrasal Verb questions • Lists from pictures, pictures from lists • The Creature • ‘Chunks first, then grammar’ • Vocabulary chart
Finally…. • Need to go beyond just teaching huge numbers of words • Educate • learners about effective vocabulary learning strategies • Inspire • learners to become autonomous vocabulary learners
More reading…. • Davis, P and Kryszewska, H. 2012. The Company Words Keep. Surrey: Delta Publishing • Lewis, M. 1993. The lexical approach: the state of ELT and a way forward. Hove: Language teaching publications • Lewis, M. 2000. Teaching Collocation. Hove: Language teaching publications • Morgan, J and Rinvolucri, M. 1986. Vocabulary. Oxford: OUP