Successful Vocabulary Acquisition Strategies

Vocabulary learning is the basic building block to successful language learning for all multilingual learners of English (MLEs). What strategies are best for acquiring new vocabulary? Studies show that vocabulary learning is less effective if it is accidental (e.g., during reading or conversations) because it is slow, and students may not retain that new vocabulary; however, intentional vocabulary learning will speed up the vocabulary acquisition process (Nation, 2001). 

The commonly used glossary list, although helpful, will not be enough to prepare students for higher education (Nation, 2001). For academic English language learning, we recommend using Coxhead's (2000) academic word list (AWL) because these 570 words are found in 90% of academic texts (Coxhead & Nation, 2001). If MLEs could study ten items from the AWL per week, they would have acquired all 570 AWL items within a year, setting them up for success in college.

So, how should MLEs intentionally learn these key academic words?

Beyond Flashcards

Several studies have shown that students using free digital flashcards like Quizlet learn quickly and in less time than their paper flashcard peers (Lander, 2016; Yanus et al., 2016; Dizon &Tang, 2017). Additionally, Quizlet users can remember words better because of various vocabulary learning strategies embedded in Quizlet: (1) using a multimedia format of seeing and listening, (2) deriving the vocabulary by typing out the words, (3) learning through gamification, and (4) collaborating and competing with other teams live. Those are the advantages of using the free Quizlet digital flashcards. 

Other strategies are needed, however, to support MLEs with limited or no internet connectivity. How can they learn vocabulary successfully? Dizon and Tang (2017) noted that students can still learn and remember new words effectively using paper flashcards if they are also taught vocabulary learning strategies, which are critical components of vocabulary acquisition. 

Thus, this article provides both offline vocabulary strategies and free online sources to assist students in acquiring new English vocabulary. 

Spaced Repetition

First, an essential aspect of vocabulary learning is understanding the limitations of short-term memory. Short-term memory lasts only a few seconds and will fade away—remember how we forget a name or phone number after a minute into a conversation? Additionally, our memory bank is limited. We can learn only five to nine new words at a time because of cognitive overload, so last-minute cramming for an exam simply does not work. However, through intentional, repetitive usage, the new word can stick into our long-term memory (see the short-term memory activity at the beginning of our TESOL Convention 2024 presentation).

Spaced repetition is a vocabulary learning strategy in which information is reviewed at different time intervals to enhance long-term memory retention. For example, this might look like a course plan with multiple vocabulary reviews over time, such as weekly vocabulary quizzes, mid-term oral exams, and a final exam a few months later. Because of natural language attrition, spaced repetition creates opportunities for students to use their vocabulary regularly.

Making Connections

Second, another vocabulary learning strategy is making connections with the new vocabulary, because our mind is like a spider web forming many associations or connections. When students can interweave what they learned and make connections, they will maintain vocabulary better. 

In this strategy, when learning a new vocabulary item, students should do the following:

1. 1. Learn the synonyms to expand their vocabulary.
   2. Learn the various word forms (affixes) so they can create complex sentences using the word as a verb, noun, adverb, and so on.
   3. Create sentences using the new vocabulary so they learn the appropriate contexts and collocations associated with each word.

Figure 1 shows, for example, that when learning the new word happy, we use synonyms, affixes, collocations, and sentence construction to help students gain a better grasp of the meaning.

Figure 1. Using the making connections strategy with happy.

In this manner, students will learn to appropriately use the new vocabulary as a noun or adjective with its collocations (e.g., happy to meet you, happy for you). Additionally, students can naturally associate happy with other synonyms, like how they associate words in their mother tongue. For classrooms with internet access, free online dictionaries, such as Longman and those listed here, can help our MLEs make connections with their new vocabulary.

Developing Higher Order Thinking Skills

Research shows that after seven to nine varied exposures to a word, students will feel confident using it. To create those opportunities, another effective, challenging, and fun way of teaching vocabulary is to use Bloom's Taxonomy to create lesson objectives, curriculum designs, and test formats to enhance critical and creative thinking skills. Applying Bloom’s Taxonomy (see Figure 2), we find that low-level foundational knowledge requires one to comprehend vocabulary, but to build higher level thinking skills, students need to apply that knowledge and create stories using the new vocabulary. 

Figure 2. Bloom's Taxonomy of low-, middle-, and high-level thinking skills.

Use the action words for each category of learning (see Figure 3) to guide you in creating objectives for your lesson plans. You can design activities or assessments in which students must recite, classify, or compose to produce written recipes, poems, songs, or movie scripts using the required vocabulary. 

Figure 3. Action words for creating lesson plans and classroom activities.

Here are two sample activities that require students to practice higher order thinking skills with their new vocabulary: 

1. 1. Students can work in pairs to identify, discuss, and write a proposal to relevant administration about a problem on campus and suggest three solutions to the problem. They will also need to use specific academic vocabulary in the process.
      
      
   2. After testing students’ knowledge of word forms (e.g., prefixes), ask them to create a story using the new vocabulary (see the example in Figure 4, with target words underlined). This creative story writing has piqued the interest of my MLEs, who enjoyed showing the creative side of their writing. 

Figure 4. Sample vocabulary test using Bloom’s Taxonomy to assess higher order creative knowledge.

Free Online English Language Resources

The three vocabulary learning strategies that we have presented are not dependent on access to the internet. However, for students with access to a laptop or mobile device, here is a curated list of free online resources to use for English language acquisition.

Highlighted websites include the following: 

• • Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab: Novice, intermediate, and advanced MLEs can listen to a short dialogue (and even read the script), then complete five comprehension questions with immediate feedback.
  • English Connect: This site offers free downloadable booklets to promote conversation skills and a manual for teachers filled with lesson activities.
  • Our TESOL 2024 Convention presentation: “Online Vocabulary Learning Acquisition Strategies”

In conclusion, vocabulary acquisition requires intentional practice, such as spaced repetition and making various connections (synonyms, affixes, collocations, sentence construction), so that students can use vocabulary appropriately. We have also shared how to design activities and assessments using Bloom's Taxonomy to help MLEs gain the needed 21st-century skills while learning vocabulary. Finally, sharing several free online tools, we hope to equip teachers with additional resources to effectively and successfully help our MLEs master the elusive English language.

References

Coxhead, A. (2000). A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly, 34, 213–238. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587951 

Coxhead, A., & Nation, P. (2001). The specialized vocabulary of English for academic purposes. In J. Flowerdew, & J. Peacock (Eds.), Research perspectives on English for academic purposes (pp. 252–267). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9781139524766.020 

Dizon, G., & Tang, D. (2017). Comparing the efficacy of digital flashcards versus paper flashcards to improve receptive and productive L2 vocabulary. The EUROCALL Review, 25(1), 3–15

Lander, B. (2016). Quizlet: What the students think–a qualitative data analysis. In S.Papadima-Sophocleous, L. Bradley, & S. Thouësn (Eds.), CALL Communities and Culture–Short Papers from EUROCALL 2016 (pp. 254–259). Research-publishing.net. https://doi.org/10.14705/rpnet.2016.eurocall2016.571

Nation, P. (2001). Learning vocabulary in another language. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139524759

Yanus, M.M., Salehi, H., & Amini, M. (2016). Impact of using CALL on Iranian EFL learners' vocabulary knowledge. English Language Teaching, 9(1), 173–187. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1087092