Hey, what about

vocabulary?
Practical Techniques and Activities
to Support Vocabulary Acquisition
AARON ROYER, ENGLISH LANGUAGE FELLOW
Agenda
Why Address Vocabulary?
Extensive Reading
Vocabulary Journaling
Exploring Collocations
 “Without grammar very little can be
conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can
be conveyed” (Wilkins, 1972, p. 111)
Why Address Vocabulary?
Building block of language acquisition and progression through,
e.g., CEFR
Why Address Vocabulary?
Multiple exposures (as many as 20) needed
Incidental vs. intentional learning
According to Gu (2003), repetition and spaced recall should
happen after first encounter
Also found that structured, intentional approach to vocabulary
more effective than purely incidental
Especially for beginners

* Gu, P. Y. (2003). Vocabulary learning in a second language: Person, task, context, and strategies. TESL-
EJ, 7(2), 1-25.
Extensive Reading
In short, reading a lot
Encourages incidental vocabulary acquisition
Setting it up:
Find appropriate (i+1) texts
 newsela.com
 newsinlevels.com
 learningenglish.voanews.com
 twitter.com
 Englishprofile.com
Set weekly goals
Prepare students with strategies
 E.g., using context clues
Choose vocabulary/collocations to focus
on (optional)
Vocabulary Journaling
Essential to systematically organize new vocab and review it at
regular intervals
Students add words from extensive reading and/or class
activities (readings, listening activities, etc.)
At a minimum, you must know meaning, spelling, and
pronunciation
part of speech, related word forms, collocations, synonyms and/or
antonyms, examples
Hold students accountable via in-class activities, games, or
quizzes
Have students share their words with rest of class
 Vocabulary Journaling
Word Meaning Related Collocations Synonyms Antonyms Example
(POS) Word
Forms

Deal (n.) Agreement make a deal, compromise, disagreement, The U.S.

btw. two reach a deal, accord refusal struck a
parties close a deal, new trade
(people, strike a deal deal with
businesses, Canada.
etc.)

Devotion
(n.)
 Exploring Collocations
get married
take a test

go bankrupt
quick shower close a deal

great fun
take a picture
Do your homework
Exploring Collocations
Two or more words that often occur together
Important aspect of 'knowing' a word
Make a habit of brainstorming collocates when encountering new
words and noticing collocations in texts
Again, multiple exposures needed...enter games
Guess that Collocate
 www.freecollocation.com
Collocation Pelmanism
Collo-Storm
Guess That Collocate
Present (n.)
------------------
Buy
Receive
Give
Wrap
Exchange
Guess That Collocate
Light (n.)
------------------
Turn on
Leave on
Dim
Shine
Turn off
Collocation Pelmanism
Your
Hand in
work

Come up
with

A
solution
 Collocation Pelmanism
get married
take a test

go bankrupt
quick shower close a deal

great fun
take a picture
Do your homework
Questions?
Email: aaronbroyer@gmail.com
Slides: goo.gl/4rpCCs