There are several approaches that help students
improve their vocabulary. What matters is that you figure out which of them works
best for you. My own vocabulary learning system involves making as much use as
possible of my online vocabulary notebook. I am working with an excel file that
I’ve divided into various sections for each new word, phrase, collocation, example
sentence, synonym, antonym, explanation and translation. For now I am focusing on
words from the ‘Porter book’. As I come across other useful idioms and words every
day, I am planning to add those expressions to the list as well. Hopefully, the
vocabulary notebook will help me collect the vital information I need to really
learn By learning new words in the context of memorable example sentences I should
be able to improve my active usage of English.
Let’s now take a closer look at the advantages and
disadvantages of textbooks like the ‘Porter book’. As far as the use of
collocation goes, I definitely think I can benefit from this book’. I like the exercises
where you need to find the strongest collocations, which you then have to write
in the right gap. There are actually two demanding tasks in just one exercise,
which not only makes you reflect on these words more intensively, but also
helps you by giving them a context. What I consider a slight disadvantage of
the textbook, however, is that words are only seen from one perspective as
usually there is just one example for each word. This makes it impossible to
illuminate all sides of a word. The ultimate responsibility for learning more
aspects of a word in order to entirely ‘own’ it, eventually rests with each
individual student. Additional information must be taken from elsewhere. I
often help myself out by consulting other sources like corpora.
I like to look at several sample sentences in order to
derive as many meanings of a word as possible. This helps me as I get a better
appreciation of its various uses. I also consider corpora particularly helpful
when I want to search for possible collocations of words. My favorite corpus is
the Corpus of Contemporary American English. What I like most about it is that
you can narrow down the search options in the interface until the results are
as exact as possible. This feature is especially useful when it comes to
searching vocabulary within an academic context as it allows you to ignore all
other sources and focus solely on academic papers and journals. I am impressed
by the possibilities of this corpus and I am sure the more I learn to do with
it, the better.
Heaving computer-supported technology aside for a
moment I want to discuss a more old-fashioned way to learn new words. I am talking
about flash cards, which I can recommend to anyone who likes to learn words and
phrases by writing them down themselves. I use them a lot, because I am
convinced they help me prepare for exam, where you should be able to spell
words correctly without having autocorrection at your disposal. Flash cards are
also ideal for visual learners like me, who need picture in order to remember tricky
words
Finally, want to emphasize is that for me it is almost
impossible to rely on just one source or one way of learning vocabulary, as
efficient it may be. I think that in the end it also comes down to being
familiar with a variety of sources you can consult to gain as much information
as possible about how the new words and phrases are used appropriately. I hope
that following these strategies will significantly improve and boost my
vocabulary in English throughout this year.
