ACADEMIC VOCABULARY

Academic Vocabulary

If your goal is to read academic writing (college textbooks, etc) and

write academic papers (essays, etc), you can save yourself a lot
of time and effort by focusing on academic vocabulary
What is Academic
Vocabulary?
Academic Vocabulary is a specialized vocabulary of 570 word
families that commonly appear in all academic textbooks,
regardless of major field of study
Academic Vocabulary
Learning
In general In academic
vocabulary learning, vocabulary learning,
to go from 80% to go from 80%
understanding to understanding to
86% understanding 86% understanding
would require you to would require you to
learn 2,000 more learn 570 more
word families word families
DO YOU THINK STUDYING
ACADEMIC VOCABULARY
WILL BE HELPFUL?
This semester,
we will focus
on learning
academic
vocabulary
Academic Vocabulary

In each unit this semester, approximately 100

word families from the academic word list will
appear.
KEEPING 4 PRINCIPLES IN
MIND WILL HELP YOU
DEVELOP YOUR
VOCABULARY AS MUCH AS
POSSIBLE THIS SEMESTER
VOCABULARY LEARNING
STRATEGIES
IN ORDER TO DEVELOP YOUR
VOCABULARY, YOU SHOULD
KEEP
4 MAIN PRINCIPLES IN MIND
4 Main Principles
Number 1

You should be active in developing your understanding of words

and ways to learn them
 Active Learning Strategies

• Semantic Mapping:

Making a graphic representation of the relationship between words

Semantic Mapping
 Active Learning Strategies

• Definition Mapping:

Working with grammar, meaning,

and sample sentences
 Active Learning Strategies

• Grouping:

Recognizing the relatedness of a word

to other words
Grouping
massive extensive

Words that
huge Describe Large enormou
Scale s

immense vast
4 Main Principles
Number 2

You should personalize your vocabulary learning

 Personalized Learning
Strategies

• Choosing words:

Identify key concepts and the words required to understand these

concepts
 Personalized Learning
Strategies

• Choosing words:

Identify important terms you need to learn

 Personalized Learning
Strategies

• Choosing words:

Identify meaningful similarities and differences among the concepts

/ words being studied
Personalizing words
• Node Acquisition and Integration Technique (NAIT):
• Students identify key concepts or important terms they
need to learn within a text.

• Studentsconstruct a semantic network around each of the

selected key concepts.

• Studentsthink of examples or potential applications of the

key concepts and record these examples on the definition
worksheet.

• Students
identify meaningful similarities and differences
among the different concepts being studied.
4 Main Principles
Number 3

You should be immersed in words

 Immersion in Words

• Opportunities:

Put yourself in a word-

and language-rich environment
 Immersion in Words

• Opportunities:

Become aware of words and how they are used in the input you
receive
 Immersion in Words

• Opportunities:

Try to use new / interesting words

in your speaking and writing
4 Main Principles
Number 4

You should use multiple sources of information to learn words

through repeated exposures
 Repeated Exposure

• Opportunities:

Watch television news / programs that are related to the topic of

environment
 Repeated Exposure

• Opportunities:

Read newspaper / magazine articles

related to the topic on environment
 Repeated Exposure

• Opportunities:

Discuss environment-related topics with friends, family,

classmates, etc
Summary
4 Principles of Vocabulary Learning

• You should be active in developing your

understanding of words and ways to learn
them
• You should personalize your word learning
• You should be immersed in words
• You should use multiple sources of information
to learn words through repeated exposures
 KEEPING THESE 4
PRINCIPLES IN MIND WILL
HELP YOU DEVELOP YOUR
VOCABULARY AS MUCH AS
POSSIBLE THIS SEMESTER
Two important elements of
vocabulary learning
1 Quality:

How well do you know each word?

Quality

Goal:

To improve how much you know about each word

Quality
• Spoken Form:

What does the word sound like?

How is it pronounced?
Quality
• Written Form:

What does the word look like?

How is it written?
Quality
• Meaning:

What meaning does this form

of the word have?
for example:
consider vs. considerably
individual vs. individualism
Quality
• Concepts:

What things can the concept refer to?

for example:
fertile soil
fertile mind
Quality
• Associations:

What other words does this word make you

think of?

for example:

fundamentally - basically
vast - massive - huge - extensive
Quality
• Grammatical Patterns:

In what patterns does the word occur?

• transitive vs. intransitive verbs

• two-word verbs: opt out of
• prepositions: interest in, responsible for
• relative clauses: suggest that, conclude that
Quality
• Collocations:

What words or type of words occur with this

word?
for example:
• complex problem
• complex issue
• complex person
• complex idea
Quality
• Restrictions on use (register differences):

Where, when, and how often would you expect to meet this
word?
for example:
ethos, kin, institutionalize =
formal academic words
Quantity

Goal:

To increase the number of words you know

Quantity

Educated adult native speakers of English know approximately

20,000 word families
Quantity

College freshman ESL students know approximately 2,000 -

3,000 word families
Quantity
If you know the
most frequent 1,000
words of English, you
Unknown should be able to
understand 72% of
Known
the words on the
page of a book,
newspaper, or
magazine
Quantity
If you know the
most frequent 2,000
words of English, you
Unknow n
should be able to
understand 80% of
Know n the words on the
page of a book,
newspaper, or
magazine
Quantity
If you know the
most frequent 3,000
words of English, you
Unknow n
should be able to
understand 84% of
Know n the words on the
page of a book,
newspaper, or
magazine
Quantity
If you know the
most frequent 4,000
words of English, you
Unknown
should be able to
understand 86% of
Known the words on the
page of a book,
newspaper, or
magazine
Quantity
In order to In order to
understand 95% of understand 99% of
the words on a the words on a
page of a book, page of a book,
newspaper, or newspaper, or
magazine, you need magazine, you need
to know to know
approximately approximately
12,500 words 44,000 words