Summary: What It Means to Know a Word

Consider your teaching context and answer the question.

The native speaker is able to	Which aspects do you think are most important/achievable in teaching context?
recognize the spoken and written form of a word
spell a word correctly
use it in an appropriate context
pronounce a word in a proper way
recall it at will
relate it properly with other words
choose appropriate style (formal/informal)
relate it to an appropriate object or concept

Vocabulary HO₄

Ways of Presenting Vocabulary

Visual Techniques

1. Realia

Show real objects or pictures of real objects to your students. Example:

The topic of a lesson is Travelling. Bring the following items into class and show them to your students:

Towel, Comb, Hairbrush, Soap, Shampoo, Needle and thread, Scissors, Toothbrush, Tin opener

Put the things into your luggage repeating the new words and asking the students what they would take on a journey.

2. Mime and gestures

Example:

Ask students to think of the Zoo. Invite them to call out with appropriate mime and sound effects any vocabulary they know related to the topic Zoo. List relevant words on the board. Elicit the position of stress. Kangaroo, zebra, penguin, giraffe, crocodile ...

Verbal Techniques

3. Word-building

Use parts of words to help learners build words or guess their meaning. Example:

We can change the meaning of an adjective by putting a prefix in front of it. Add the prefix un-, in- or im- to these adjectives and put them in the correct column. Check in your dictionary to see if you put un-or in-. You put im- in front of most adjectives beginning with m or p.

tidy

happy

friendly

realistic

dependent

precise

expensive

possible

safe

adequate

interesting

human

exciting

polite

competent

perfect

mature

patient

4. Matching

Students match words with words (e.g. synonyms) or sentences (e.g. definitions) or pictures. Example:

Read the story below and find words or phrases that mean: to give as a present, a wizard, to visit, to put "Which Witch?" Santa isn't the only person to hand out presents! In Italy, a kind witch named La Befana pops round on 5 January and leaves goodies in children's shoes- if they remember to take them off first.

Example: Match the words and act the song out.

The Monster Rock (song)

Click

Clap

Shake

Snap

Stamp

Swing

Wiggle

arms

tongue

feet

toes

hands

head

fingers