Using the Corpus

Task 1 : Dependent prepositions

Do you say Useful hints to writing essays or useful hints for writing essays

1. 2.

Enter [hint] in the search string. Make sure you use square brackets. This will include all possible forms of the word (both singular and plural forms in the case of nouns) After the [hint] enter a full stop followed by [n*] this will restrict the search to hint(s) as a Click on the context. From the drop-down menu below choose prep.ALL. Restrict the context to one word to the right of the node word (=key word) noun

3. 4.

Results Which preposition is most common? Study the examples. Are there any differences in the way the prepositions are used?

Task 2 : Collocations
Think of the word pairs your students may find difficult (e.g. injury / wound, house / home).

1. What are the different parts-of-speech (POS) associated with each word?

Looking up collocates
If the word you want to examine is a noun, look up verbs, adjectives and _________________ If the word you want to examine is a verb, look up ______________________ and ________________ If the word you want to examine is an adjective, look up ______________________ and ________________

2. Now search for the collocations of each word.

Associated POS 1 _____ Word 1 ____________

Associated POS 2 _____

Word 2 ____________

What is the difference between [v*] and [vv*] ?

Task 3: Synonyms 1.
What synonyms can you find for the adjective wonderful? What is their frequency?

2.

What is the difference in the use of these synonyms across different sub-corpora?

Spoken

ratio

Academic

ratio