ELT News Think Tank

This Month's Think Tank Panel

Marc Helgesen

Peter Viney

Setsuko Toyama

Rob Waring

Panelists: Marc | Setsuko | Peter
Guest panelist: Rob Waring
Date: February 2001

Topic: "How should teachers incorporate vocabulary teaching into their classes?"

Marc Helgesen

A key concept in vocabulary teaching is that students need to meet the words‚ in context‚ several times.

A tool that is often overlooked for this is mental review. Students can meet the new vocabulary mentally as well as actually seeing the words on the page. Most pair- and groupwork tasks involve some kind of a topic – even if the lesson is based on grammar or a function, the learners are talking about something so there is a lexical set related to the topic. After students have finished the main task, have them close their books. Still in their pairs or groups, they work together to see how many of words related to the topic they can remember. In the process, the learners are still thinking about the context and are "mentally meeting the words" again. Decide if you want them to write the words or just say them. If you have them write the words, a good follow-up is to have groups compare their results with other groups. To do it as a game, they get one point for each item they wrote and one extra point for each item they wrote that the other team didn't. You may want to repeat the mental review as a warm-up/review at the beginning of the next class (and as a way for them to meet the words yet again).

Here's another type of mental review. At the end of class, it's not at all unusual for the chalkboard to be covered with words that have just come up during activities. I sometimes ask each students to choose about three words that they want to remember. They close their eyes and get a mental picture showing the meaning. Next to the picture, they mentally write the word. In their minds, they hear each letter as it is being written. They then hear the word being pronounced. (If any students have difficulty visualizing the picture or the word, have them write the word with their finger on the palm of their other hand. Adding this physical element usually makes visualizing easier.)

Once they've done this for all three words, they decide on a time when they will mentally review the words. It should be a time when they are alone or at least not talking to anyone. They get a mental image of something specific that they are doing (sitting in the bathtub, pouring a cup of coffee, etc.). Tell them to think of that situation. Then, when it happens later in the day, they should remind themselves to think of the three words and the images. Many students prefer to close their eyes when they do this. They should do they everyday from now to the next class. During the next class, spend a couple minutes reviewing the activity.

If I had to choose a single most effective way to help students develop their vocabulary, it would be an easy choice: Extensive reading. Extensive Reading (ER) means just that: learners read a lot. It is important that they are reading at a level that is easy for them. This requirement, along with the obvious issue of student interest, means that they usually choose the books they want to read. Note that extensive reading is very different than the word-by-word grammar-translation (yakudoku) reading that Japanese students are usually asked to do in school. ER is reading for pleasure. Students usually don't need to use dictionaries. If there are more than 2-3 words on a page they don't know, the book is too difficult and they should choose a different one. They don't need to answer comprehension questions after they read. (Yeah, there are often questions in the back of the books or on worksheets available from the publishers. But they aren't really for ER. They are there so the publishers can try to sell them to teachers who don't understand what ER is and what it's for).

To have your students do ER, of course, you need books. Most teachers choose graded readers which are available from the major ELT publishers. These are short, often 40-80 page books written to be easy for learners to understand and of high interest. And, because they are real stories, there tends to be natural recycling of vocabulary. The same words often come up in context through out the story. This is the "meeting words in context repeatedly" that leads to vocabulary learning.

Even if you are teaching conversation, you can often add ER as an outside of class activity. If students get grades for the class, the number of books or pages they read can be part of the course requirements. In a non-graded situation like a conversation school, you can still encourage ER as a great way to build vocabulary and come into contact with English out side of class.

Teachers interested in ER can check out the Extensive Reading Home Pages at

http://www.kyoto-su.ac.jp/information/er/er.html

There are a lot of resources on the pages, many of which come from Japan-based teachers.

Students read, and enjoy, and the vocabulary takes care of itself.

Panelists: Marc | Setsuko | Peter
Guest panelist: Rob Waring

Marc Helgesen, Miyagi Gakuin Women's College

Co-author of English Firsthand and Active Listening

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