Senin, 24 Oktober 2011

THE TEACHING OF VOCABULARY

Traditionally, the teaching of vocabulary above elementary levels was mostly incidental, limited to presenting new items as they appeared in reading or sometimes listening texts. This indirect teaching of vocabulary assumes that vocabulary expansion will happen through the practice of other language skills, which has been proved not enough to ensure vocabulary expansion.

Nowadays it is widely accepted that vocabulary teaching should be part of the syllabus, and taught in a well-planned and regular basis. Some authors, led by Lewis (1993) argue that vocabulary should be at the centre of language teaching.

There are several aspects of lexis that need to be taken into account when teaching vocabulary. The list below is based on the work of Gairns and Redman (1986):
1. Boundaries between conceptual meaning: knowing not only what lexis refers to, but also where the boundaries are that separate it from words of related meaning (e.g. cup, mug, bowl; hand, leg, arm, neck; kitchen, garage. garden).
2. Polysemy: distinguishing between the various meaning of a single word form with several but closely related meanings (head: of a person, of a pin, of an organisation).
3. Homonymy: distinguishing between the various meaning of a single word form which has several meanings which are NOT closely related ( e.g. a file: used to put papers in or a tool).
4. Homophyny:understanding words that have the same pronunciation but different spellings and meanings (e.g. flour, flower ; see, sea).
5. Synonymy: distinguishing between the different shades of meaning that synonymous words have (e.g. extend, increase, expand ; accept, receive).
6. Affective meaning: distinguishing between the attitudinal and emotional factors (denotation and connotation), which depend on the speakers attitude or the situation. Socio-cultural associations of lexical items is another important factor. (e.g. He runs away, He is running on my eyes).
7. Style, register, dialect: Being able to distinguish between different levels of formality, the effect of different contexts and topics, as well as differences in geographical variation.
8. Translation: awareness of certain differences and similarities between the native and the foreign language (e.g. false cognates).
9. Chunks of language: multi-word verbs (e.g. blow up), idioms (e.g. Take it easy), strong and weak collocations (e.g. fast food, NOT quick food), lexical phrases(e.g. What you are saying to me is ...).
10. Grammar of vocabulary: learning the rules that enable students to build up different forms of the word or even different words from that word (e.g. sleep, slept, sleeping; able, unable; disability).
11. Pronunciation: ability to recognise and reproduce items in speech (consult it to your monnolingual dictionary).

The implication of the aspects just mentioned in teaching is that the goals of vocabulary teaching must be more than simply covering a certain number of words on a word list. We must use teaching techniques that can help realise this global concept of what it means to know a lexical item. And we must also go beyond that, giving learner opportunities to use the items learnt and also helping them to use effective written storage systems.

Revised from Solange Moras, Sao Carlos, Brazil, July 2001
Dedicated for English Teachers (candidate)

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