We all recognize that words are the bedrock of language learning. As Michael Lewis quoting Earl Stevick in his book The Lexical Approach notes, when students travel abroad they carry a dictionary, not a grammar book. This talk will look at the place of teaching vocabulary in the curriculum and what it means to “know” a word. It will look at how learners acquire words and at the importance of both recycling and depth of processing as part of this process.
Why a vocabulary notebook? How to go about implementing the use of one? This talk looks at vocabulary notebooks in general and their place in the classroom. It then looks at one vocabulary notebook in particular that, in addition to giving students a template for recording new words and expressions, provides activities designed to explore different aspects of the words they have recorded.
