VOCABULARY learning is a major focus in English classrooms because the words students use while speaking, reading, and writing will influence their success in any academic area. In order to understand words, it is important for students to construct meaning in many ways. You can practice the following activities.
* Vocabulary development
Step 1: Provide students with direct or indirect experiences for new words through classroom discussions, activities, or personal examples from your experience.
Step 2: Ask students to describe (rather than define) the new word in terms of their experiences.
Step 3: Ask students to form a mental image of the new word by using the information generated in steps 1 and 2.
Step 4: Ask students to compare related words to develop sensitivity to word meanings.
Step 5: Provide students with synonyms, relationships, approximations, or categories for words.
* Keeping a vocabulary notebook
Step 1: Ask students to describe the context of their initial encounter with the word.
Step 2: Ask them to discuss and formulate a definition related to that context.
Step 3: Ask them to write a definition in their own words and then compare it with a dictionary or glossary.
Step 4: Develop appropriate attribute charts, and comparison diagrams to help students with vocabulary acquisition.
Step 1: List all the words from a text that you feel may give students difficulty on a piece of paper. After each word, provide space for note taking.
Step 2: Distribute the words to students. Ask them to circle all the words that they do not know.
Step 3: Put students in pairs. Student A asks student B to define and use any uncircled (familiar) word on his/her paper in a sentence. When they have discussed those words and feel comfortable with all the uncircled words, ask them to compare meanings of the circled words on either student’s paper. When agreement is reached on a word meaning, they should both make sure that it is recorded on their word list sheet.
Step 4: Students group in fours and continue the process. A fifth person (the “contact” person) who will be the only person with a dictionary/thesaurus and the textbook may be added. This student may speak only when spoken to, and he/she will settle disputes and look up the words.
Step 5: By this time all the words should be defined. The teacher then asks the “contact” students to report which words were the most difficult.
Step 6: List the reported difficult words in the order that they appear in the text on the blackboard. Ask students to read the text, and then verify the definition, changing their original definition when necessary.
Step 1: Choose a word and write a number instead of each letter plus an extra number representing the word’s synonym at random on the blackboard. If the word is “pretend”, you will have numbers “one” to “eight”. The extra number represents “acting in a different way to how you really are”.
Step 2: Put students in two teams and ask them to choose a number in turns.
Step 3: Replace the chosen number with the letter it represents, and then let them guess the word until one team wins.
* Spell aloud
Step 1: Spell out the words and synonyms aloud, such as “d-i-s-p-l-a-y = s-h-o-w”. While students listen, they cannot see the words or hear them said as words.
Step 2: After each word pair is spelt, ask students to say them aloud, and give help if necessary.
Step 3: Write all the words and synonyms on the blackboard at random and ask students to try to match them.
* Vocabulary tables
Step 1: Take one piece of A4 paper for each word. Fold the papers in half lengthwise. Write the new word on one half and the synonym on the other. The words should be upside down to each other when the paper is open so that when the paper is folded, the words appear on opposite sides, with the tops of the letters near the fold.
Step 2: Put a table at the front of the classroom. Open the pieces of paper a little so they stand up, and so that one side of the papers can be seen from one end, and the other side can be seen from the other end.
Step 3: Ask a student to stand at either end of the table. One calls out a word that he/she can see; the other has to find the appropriate synonym from the words that he/she can see.
Step 4: If the second student is right, he/she chooses a word from his/her side, and so on. Increase the number of students involved by immediately replacing a student who gives a wrong answer, or having teams of two, three, four on either side of the table.
* Vocabulary testers
Step 1: Ask four or five student “testers” stand at the front of the classroom with a list of three to four words. Their job is to ask other students the meaning of these words.
Step 2: Ask students to form queues in front of each tester, and the first in line is asked to give a meaning of a word from the list.
Step 3: If he/she gets it right, he/she goes to one of the other queues. If not, he/she goes to the back of the same queue and tries again.
Step 4: The tester alternates between the different words on his/her list, so the same word is not asked to two students consecutively.
Step 5: When a student has visited all testers, he has finished.
* 猜词
第一步:选择一个单词，用任意数字代替单词的字母写在黑板上，并附加上一个额外的代表单词的同义词的数字。例如，如果选择的单词是pretend，则准备从1到8八个数字，额外的数字代表“acting in a different way to how you really are”。
