"Over the course of the book, a number of the sacred cows of vocabulary teaching are toppled by research findings. For example, there is no reason that learners should not use L1-L2 translation equivalents to remember words, and some good reasons that they should. There is no reason that learners should not use bilingual dictionaries. Words should not be presented in closely related groups (this causes interference and forgetting). Natural occurrence will not furnish learners with even a minimal lexicon."


http://www.er.uqam.ca/nobel/r21270/cv/Nation_2001.htm

I haven't read the article yet but a professor came to the school where I work (in Japan) and gave a lecture to the English teachers on learing vocabulary.

He had some questions for them (referencing Nation). I got them wrong but then I'm not a real teacher so its ok.

LEARNING VOCABULARY IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE

Test of teachers’ knowledge 1
The most effective way of beginning to learn the meaning of a word is:
(A) the use of a picture
(B) translation into the first language
© a dictionary definition
(D) seeing a word in context

Test of teachers' knowledge 2
Initially opposites like hot and cold should be learned:
(A) at the same time
(B) in quick succession
© as part of a bigger lexical set
(D) at widely separated times

Test of teachers’ knowledge 3
In order to have a good chance of guessing the meaning of an unknown word from context clues, what percentage of the running words in the text does the learner need to know?
(A) 78%
(B) 80%
© 90%
(D) 98%

It's funny how the review talks about how so much had changed in the decade from 1990-2000, but this book is now nearly a decade old as well. I'm more interested in the most recent discoveries

jonjimbo2000 Wrote:He had some questions for them (referencing Nation). I got them wrong but then I'm not a real teacher so its ok.

Well don't keep us in suspense!

So what are the best ways to learn vocabulary?

Yeah, what's the answer to the multiple-choice questions? The article you linked says you need to know 95% of the running text to infer an unknown word, so maybe that answers your last question -- 90%. But what about the first two questions?

Actually it is 98% for some corpus.

But what about the other 2?

http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/resources...testa.aspx

Got it. It has the answers in the bottom.

This answer really surprised me:
(B) translation into the first language

Well, I never really used it alone. I always use all the 4:

A the use of a picture
B translation into the first language
C a dictionary definition
D seeing a word in context

Now this is awesome, it supports my ideas on learning perfectly.

wccrawford Wrote:

jonjimbo2000 Wrote:He had some questions for them (referencing Nation). I got them wrong but then I'm not a real teacher so its ok.

Well don't keep us in suspense!

Sorry
These are the answers he gave.

Test of teachers’ knowledge 1
The most effective way of beginning to learn the meaning of a word is:
(A) the use of a picture
(B) translation into the first language
© a dictionary definition
(D) seeing a word in context
ANSWER B

Test of teachers' knowledge 2
Initially opposites like hot and cold should be learned:
(A) at the same time
(B) in quick succession
© as part of a bigger lexical set
(D) at widely separated times
ANSWER D

Test of teachers’ knowledge 3
In order to have a good chance of guessing the meaning of an unknown word from context clues, what percentage of the running words in the text does the learner need to know?
(A) 78%
(B) 80%
© 90%
(D) 98%
ANSWER D

mentat_kgs Wrote:Well, I never really used it alone. I always use all the 4:

Which of course makes it the best answer. I've always said that picking just 1 method to learn from is sub-optimal.

Easiest to hardest: BADC
C is the hardest because you probably can't read the dictionary. _I_ can't read the Japanese dictionary.
I've heard cover-cover reading of dictionaries is a good way to improve one's skills though.

Very late parts of Nakama (textbook series I use @ classes @ Harvard) have few English parts in the late chapters. Only culture, vocabulary, and grammar explanations are still in English.

Four strands! Paul Nation is a boss.

dabrowskiowski Wrote:Four strands! Paul Nation is a boss.

A bit of a necro, but I had missed the answer before, so I'm thankful.

Cool! I missed this topic too. Thanks mentat_kgs for the link, and dabrowskiowski for the necromancy!

Don't you think there's something weird about this:
"5 How many words does an average learner of English as a foreign language know after five or six years of four 50 minute English classes per week?
A 1,000
B 3,000
C 5,000
D 10,000
E don't know"
Answer: B
?

Another interesting one:
"13 Which of these most helps vocabulary learning?
A meeting or using the word in a new way
B having its meaning explained
C meeting the word in context
D searching for the word in a dictionary
E don't know"
Answer: A

Actually, I don't think either of those is odd.

The first assumes that you're *only* taking the classes, and not studying on your own. Much of each 50 minute class is going to be paperwork and tests and explanations for someone else.

I've been studying with iknow.jp for about 6 years, 5 minutes per day on average, and I'm at about 4000 words, according to them. Now, I know other words from having used the language, but that's what I've learned through it.

As for the second, the words I know best are the words that I know multiple definitions for, and know some of the nuances of using it. Next up are words I've seen over and over.

I think that questionnaire is a treasure trove for learners and teachers both.

wccrawford Wrote:As for the second, the words I know best are the words that I know multiple definitions for, and know some of the nuances of using it. Next up are words I've seen over and over.

It seems I mistakenly gave the meaning that both are odd. I didn't find the second one odd, I pointed it out because I thought it's important. Maybe it's obvious to most learners, as an example when I learn a word from Core6k it doesn't feel like I really learned it no matter how many times I review it unless I try to use it or read it somewhere else.

undead_saif Wrote:It seems I mistakenly gave the meaning that both are odd. I didn't find the second one odd, I pointed it out because I thought it's important. Maybe it's obvious to most learners, as an example when I learn a word from Core6k it doesn't feel like I really learned it no matter how many times I review it unless I try to use it or read it somewhere else.

Ah, I've found a way around that. If I can find a way to use a word I learned on iKnow (the origin of Core6k) in my daily life, even just in my head, that word will stick a lot better.

For instance, 従う. Now, I used it *wrong* when I was thinking about it, but I found myself thinking about it during the day while my girlfriend was following me through a theme park line. (Again, wrong usage!) Later, when I reviewed it again on iKnow, I noted that I had misused the word (because the English definition "follow" means other things) and now the word is stuck way better than most.

wccrawford Wrote:

undead_saif Wrote:...an example when I learn a word from Core6k it doesn't feel like I really learned it no matter how many times I review it unless I try to use it or read it somewhere else.

Ah, I've found a way around that. If I can find a way to use a word I learned on iKnow (the origin of Core6k) in my daily life, even just in my head, that word will stick a lot better.

For instance, 従う. Now, I used it *wrong* when I was thinking about it, but I found myself thinking about it during the day while my girlfriend was following me through a theme park line. (Again, wrong usage!) Later, when I reviewed it again on iKnow, I noted that I had misused the word (because the English definition "follow" means other things) and now the word is stuck way better than most.

Exactly!

jonjimbo2000 Wrote:Test of teachers' knowledge 2
Initially opposites like hot and cold should be learned:
(A) at the same time
(B) in quick succession
© as part of a bigger lexical set
(D) at widely separated times
ANSWER D

I disagree pretty strongly with this one, actually. Does anyone know what their reasoning on this is supposed to be?

@Haych I do. I learned the opposites left/right, up/down, and front/behind together and it was frustrating to memorize each pair correctly. Even after reviewing them a few times in Core6k deck and having to use them in conversation I still struggled with them that I had to make a sticky that is still stuck on my PC monitor that shows the three pairs!

I think the reason is when you learn a pair together you'll confuse them, but if you learn one and nail it, then add the second one you won't suddenly confuse the already memorized one.

I figured it was from risk of confusion... Pairs like that are definitely confusing at the beginning, and I remember having troubles knowing my 左 from my 右 in the beginning too. More recently, I learned 右折 or 左折 and I kept thinking 'which is which again??', but then the word 左右 popped up and forced me to memorize left->right sa->(yu)u. After that, the other two terms stuck. If 左右 hadn't popped up, I would have eventually put 右折 and 左折 on the same card because the idea of putting antonyms on the same card became part of my strategy at one point. Anytime I am struggling with two or more similar items these days, I put them on the same card and try to memorize the difference.

I think doing this right off the bat could be efficient. It probably wouldn't hurt at least, since it seems like something you're going to have to do eventually in any case.

I'd be more inclined to agree if they were talking about synonyms. I saw a deck someone had made which organized vocab around 'synonym sets'. I am not so sure if doing that would be helpful. Probably would be really easy to get them all muddled. I think for those, it would be best to learn them assuming they are different, then you can decide for yourself later if they actually are the same.

wccrawford Wrote:For instance, 従う. Now, I used it *wrong* when I was thinking about it, but I found myself thinking about it during the day while my girlfriend was following me through a theme park line. (Again, wrong usage!)

You didn't use it incorrectly... 従う has several meanings including 付いて行く.
http://dic.yahoo.co.jp/dsearch?enc=UTF-8...x=01816500

This is one reason I like to check multiple dictionaries or sentence databases, seeing a bunch of examples can give a better idea of the range of the word. That's not reasonable for every word, of course, but the more abstract the meaning of the current usage of a new word, the more likely I am to search high and low to find out the range of meaning, and if possible a more concrete meaning. It's just easier to remember that 従う means to follow/go with, but is more often meaning to follow/abide by in much the same metaphorical usage we have in English, although it's most often (in my experience) used as 従って meaning 'consequently' ... or 'it follows'. (which has its own entry in EDICT but isn't really a different word, it's a perfectly regular conjugation of 従う with a meaning that happens to be used almost exclusively in that conjugation.)

SomeCallMeChris Wrote:although it's most often (in my experience) used as 従って

Or perhaps したがって - in my experience, most て forms that get a separate entry (in every dictionary, not just EDICT) are usually spelled in kana.

Vempele Wrote:

SomeCallMeChris Wrote:although it's most often (in my experience) used as 従って

Or perhaps したがって - in my experience, most て forms that get a separate entry (in every dictionary, not just EDICT) are usually spelled in kana.

Maybe, but the example in the Shogakukan Progressive (yahoo) dictionary uses the kanji. I feel like I see both equally for this word, but I haven't really been paying close attention, and I had never thought about って-form words as a class at all. You may be right on either or both, but I always like to know the kanji anyway.

On further thought, though, I realized there is a reason for the separate entry; although 従う as a verb includes the same meaning as the 従って form, there are times when 従って is used at the beginning of a sentence to express a connection to the previous sentence. That's really conjunction-like behavior and not verb-like behavior, even if the derivation is obvious. Not that it's really that important w.r.t. actually understanding and using it.

Anyway, on the whole, my point wasn't really about したがって or 従う specifically, that was just an example I seized on because it had been mentioned. I was really trying to suggest that it's worth checking around for multiple examples when you see words used in an abstract way, because those words often have a range of meaning. My Anki card for 従う, at the risk of dwelling on this example, is 彼は 私に 従って 駅までやって 来た ('He followed me to the station') ; I simply find it easier to remember words if I have a concrete visual association like that sentence provides, even though I know it's a word more often used abstractly than concretely.