One of the most crucial abilities required for teaching and studying a foreign language is vocabulary. All other skills, like as reading comprehension, listening comprehension, speaking, writing, spelling, and pronunciation, are built on this foundation. Vocabulary is the most important tool for pupils to properly utilize English. Students will constantly need to operate with words whether presented with a native English speaker when watching a movie or listening to a favorite song when reading a text, or sending a message to a friend.
What is the significance of vocabulary?
Vocabulary instruction is crucial since, without it, nothing can be communicated. People need words to express themselves in English, and most students recognize the value of expanding their vocabulary. This is why the majority of the terms must be taught so that there are no communication issues due to a lack of vocabulary. Other students may experience the difficulty of forgetting terms shortly after the instructor has elicited the meaning of the words or after looking them up in a dictionary, which is also due to vocabulary luck. The more words a learner learns, the simpler it is for them to remember them.
The instructor plays a critical role in assisting pupils in expanding their vocabulary. Unfortunately, language instruction has not been sufficiently sensitive to these issues. When we go back in time, we can see that English employed teaching methods like Direct Method and Audiolingualism for a long time, emphasizing the necessity of teaching grammatical structures. Because the emphasis in such classes was on grammar, only a few terms were presented, and they were usually constrained and tied to the grammatical structures taught.
The teaching of English began to shift in the early 1970s. The emphasis shifted away from the Direct Method and Audiolingualism and toward the communicative Approach, which highlighted the necessity of vocabulary instruction. Students were exposed to a wide range of vocabulary and speaking tasks because to this approach. During such sessions, many people were presented, and students were urged to express themselves as much as possible.
Today, there is a great deal of flexibility in terms of the approaches that may be employed in English classrooms. The English curriculum is divided into two parts: vocabulary and grammar structures. As a result, teachers frequently have the time to insist on teaching and practicing vocabulary. Vocabulary is no longer regarded as an afterthought, which implies that instructors are becoming more conscious of the value of vocabulary and that special emphasis is made to the teaching of word grammar. However, not all students progress at the same rate, and some may have difficulty expressing themselves correctly, making speaking English challenging and tiresome. The pronunciation of some words is another factor that might make vocabulary difficult.
Approaches for recalling vocabulary As we have seen, some students have difficulty with vocabulary, such as in pronouncing specific words. Some techniques may assist the instructor in assisting the students. Students must not only learn as many words as possible in order to have a large vocabulary, but they must also remember them since learning includes remembering. One of the approaches that a teacher may use while teaching vocabulary is repetition. With reference to this, numerous techniques have been devised to assist learners in effectively retaining words and teachers make the learning process simpler for their pupils.
It’s a crucial approach for acquiring and teaching language. However, repetition alone will not be sufficient to keep the words in the memory for as long as possible; it must be accompanied by a grasp of the meaning of the words in question, as well as a correlation with other comparable previously acquired phrases.
Using freshly learnt terms is another useful technique. The role of the teachers is equally important in this scenario. Teachers should insist on pupils improving their vocabulary in the classroom by pushing them to talk as much as possible and creating language-focused activities and games. Practicing vocabulary is inextricably linked to applying language to real-life situations. Students will learn vocabulary more quickly if they practice linking terms with real-life events. For example, create a real-life event such as “traveling to Italy” and then have the students play out a situation in which all of the phrases may be used. This may be done both in the classroom and at home, and it will undoubtedly engage children while yielding beneficial effects.
When it comes to learning and teaching language, another strategy to consider is imagination. If kids are taught to correlate new words with their visuals, they will learn them quickly. If the topic is, for example, a travel agency, and the students have learnt to imagine and see an image of the building where we go for information about traveling, they are more likely to remember that term for a longer period of time. As a result, pupils must envision the words that they must memorize. This will aid in the learning process by ensuring that the word is retained in long-term memory.
Conclusion
When studying or teaching a foreign language, the most crucial skill is vocabulary. All of the other abilities, such as reading, writing, speaking, and listening, are built on vocabulary. This demonstrates the importance of learning new terms. Vocabulary helps students express themselves more clearly and sharpens communication abilities, but it also needs pupils to be cognitively proficient in academic language. When children acquire 90-95 percent of the vocabulary terms, they are better able to comprehend what others are saying and what they are reading. It’s difficult for pupils to comprehend others or express themselves if they don’t have a good command of the English language. Vocabulary instruction is vital in all subjects, from language arts to social studies to mathematics and science. Students can be more detailed while communicating their views and opinions if they have multiple terms at their disposal for describing events or feelings.
