Using the Academic Word List

7/28/2019 Using the Academic Word List

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Using the AcademicWord List


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Challenges of Teaching

Vocabulary

Students come knowing many commonly usedwords Know the simplest forms

Know the most frequently used meanings of multi-meaning

words

Students need content area vocabulary

Students also need all-purpose academic words Category labels

Words for thinking Abstract, hard to picture terms

Snow, C.A. (2007). Learning all-purpose vocabulary words. Harvard Graduate School of Education. Retrieved January 30, 2009 from

www.cal.org/create/downloads/CREATEwebcast_snow9-6-07.ppt


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Challenge: Students need

all-purpose

academic words, e.g. Words for thinking: hypothesize, evidence, criterion

Words for classifying: vehicle, utensil, process

Words for communication: emphasize, affirm,

negotiate

Words for expressing relationships: dominate,

correspond, locateSnow, C.A. (2007). Learning all-purpose vocabulary words. Harvard Graduate School of Education. Retrieved January 30, 2009 from

www.cal.org/create/downloads/CREATEwebcast_snow9-6-07.ppt


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What is the Academic Word

List?

List of 570 words with their families

Does not include first 2000 most commonly used English words

Result of Averil Coxheads MA work at the School of Linguistics and Applied LanguageStudies at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand

Find a copy at: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/wordlists.htm

Find lists with families: http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/sublists.html

Find list with hyperlinked definitions:http://simple.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Academic_word_list#Sublist_1

Find list with hyperlinked definitions to multiple (25-30) online dictionary definitions:http://elc.polyu.edu.hk/CiLL/eap/wordlists.htm

For detail on the development and evaluation of the AWL, see Coxhead, Averil (2000) ANew Academic Word List. TESOL Quarterly, 34(2): 213-238.
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/wordlists.htmhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/sublists.htmlhttp://simple.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Academic_word_listhttp://simple.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Academic_word_listhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/sublists.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/sublists.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/sublists.htmlhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/wordlists.htm


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Where did the words come from?

Academic corpus covering 28 subjects

Corpus had 3.5 million words from journal articles, bookchapters, course workbooks, laboratory manuals, and coursenotes

Words divided into 4 main subject headings: Arts, Commerce,Law and Science

These were further divided into seven sections each

Words additionally had to appear in at least half of the 28 subjectareas and be represented in all 4 main areas

94% of AWL words appeared in 20 or more subject areas ofcorpus


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What words were excluded?

First 2000 most commonly used English words

Latin forms et al, etc, ie, and ibid

Proper nouns

Words which occurred in fewer than 4 facultysections of the Academic Corpus or which

occurred in fewer than 15 of the 28 subject areas


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What are the first 2000?

In part, this is heavily influenced by The

General Service List (GSL) created by

Michael West in 1953

Words were selected based on frequency

and semantic value

To see: http://jbauman.com/gsl.html

Use of corpora continues to inform

vocabulary study
http://jbauman.com/gsl.htmlhttp://jbauman.com/gsl.html


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Use any text to teach AWL

http://www.nottingham.

ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/

awlhighlighter.htm

Enter text Choose word list

All words from this list

will appear in boldface

http://www.nottingham.

ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/

awlgapmaker.htm

Enter text Choose words list

All words from this list

will appear as a gap

and words appear as

list on bottom of page
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htmhttp://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlighter.htm


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How can this be applied to

classroom instruction?

Use articles, book passages, benchmark passages

Enter text into highlighter and choose AWL 1

Read text together, using context clues to

understand meaning

Enter text into gap maker

Without using highlighted text, can students enter

correct word from choices? For texts with AWL words already highlighted:

http://www.uefap.com/vocab/exercise/exercise.htm
http://www.uefap.com/vocab/exercise/exercise.htmhttp://www.uefap.com/vocab/exercise/exercise.htm


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Research-based Principles of

Vocabulary Instruction

Introduce and discuss words

Ensure affective engagement

Engage students in using the words

Ensure recurrent exposures

Celebrate successes Encourage experimentation


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How do we choose specific

words to teach directly?

Use information gleaned from AWL highlighter

Choose at random from AWL list

Introduce about 5 per week to focus on

Direct instruction on Monday Continue to focus on throughout week

Use frequently!

Whenever possible draw attention to the word in a

text Encourage students to use the words in context

Create a Word Wall to remind everyone


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How can a Word Wall contribute to

vocabulary instruction?

Must be visible to all students

Must grow organically as well as methodologically

Must be consistently referred to by teacher

For ideas on dealing with space issues:

http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-

bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625

To see a video of a teacher implementing thisstrategy:

http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewke

y=8b375a3269223e13dab5
http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/articles/index.pl?noframes;read=2625


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How do I build a Word Wall?

Choose a format that works for you

Half sheets of scrap paper

Chart paper White or chalk board

Add words daily. Refer to the words wheneverpossible. Add words that are directly taught

or which come up in discussion of text.


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How can the students use the

Word Wall?

Students will look to the wall when teacher

draws attention to a word

Students will remember where the word is,

and use the wall as a reminder for recall and

for spelling

Students can take the burden off the teacher

by being responsible for adding that dayswords


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Can students study on their

own?

Note cards

Computer note cards

Vocabulary notebooks

Foldables

A way of presenting information that is funand creative

For ideas see:http://www.lauracandler.com/reading/VocabFoldDir.pdf


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Knowledge Rating Scale

Word Know It Well Have Seen orHeard It Have No Clue


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Knowledge Rating Scale

Word

Know It

Well

Have Seen

or Heard It

Have

NoClue

What It Means


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How can students learn and remember the meaning of the words?

Look up the meanings of the words in the dictionary

Link the words to previous knowledge

Make a spider diagram for each word

For example, a spider diagram forconcept could look like this:


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What about dictionaries?

Dictionaries are of course useful, but direct

instruction on how to use is imperative

Have students work in small groups to find

meanings

Try having dictionary races to decrease

amount of time spent looking up words


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Which Dictionary?

Lower Levels

The Oxford Students Dictionary

The Longman Active Study Dictionary

The Macmillan Essential Dictionary

The Oxford Wordpower Dictionary

More advanced levels

The Longman Contemporary English Dictionary

The Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary

The Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners

The Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary

Many dictionaries have study skills pages, CD-ROM and on-lineresources for students.


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Dictionaries on the Web

Macmillan

www.macmillandictionaries.comOxford University Press

www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/o

ald7/?cc=tr

Longman

www.longman.com/dictionaries/internation

al.htmlCambridge University Press

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/
http://www.macmillandictionaries.com/http://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://dictionary.cambridge.org/http://dictionary.cambridge.org/http://dictionary.cambridge.org/http://dictionary.cambridge.org/http://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://www.longman.com/dictionaries/international.htmlhttp://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=trhttp://www.macmillandictionaries.com/


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Using a Vocabulary Profiler

lextutor.ca

Allows us to see what level the words in a

text are

Can help inform vocabulary instruction


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How to use lextutor.ca

Use Internet Explorer as a browser

Go to http://lextutor.ca/

In the second column, click on Vocabprofile

Click on VP English v. 2.9

Highlight everything in textbox

Paste your copied text into box (Control + V)

Below textbox on right side, click submit_window Scroll down to see the color coded text
http://lextutor.ca/http://www.lextutor.ca/vphttp://www.lextutor.ca/vp/enghttp://www.lextutor.ca/vp/enghttp://www.lextutor.ca/vphttp://lextutor.ca/


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Resources

Waring, R. & Nation, P. (n.d.) Vocabulary size, text coverage and word lists.Retrieved January 30, 2009 fromhttp://www.fltr.ucl.ac.be/fltr/germ/etan/bibs/vocab/cup.html

Vicotoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. (September 3, 2007). TheAcademic Word List. Retrieved January 30, 2009 fromhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/links.html

McCullah, W. (2003-2007). Word surfing: Recommended vocabulary tests andexercises. Retrieved January 30, 2009 fromhttp://www.wordsurfing.co.uk/17.html

UEFAP. (n.d.) Vocabulary in EAP: Selecting vocabulary to learn. RetrievedJanuary 30, 2009 from http://www.uefap.com/vocab/vocfram.htm

English Corner (n.d.) English grammar exercises. Retrieved January 30, 2009from

http://www.angelfire.com/wi3/englishcorner/vocabulary/vocabulary.html#cloze For product information: http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-

telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02
http://www.fltr.ucl.ac.be/fltr/germ/etan/bibs/vocab/cup.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/links.htmlhttp://www.wordsurfing.co.uk/17.htmlhttp://www.uefap.com/vocab/vocfram.htmhttp://www.angelfire.com/wi3/englishcorner/vocabulary/vocabulary.htmlhttp://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://elt.heinle.com/cgi-telt/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M80&discipline_number=301&subject_code=VAI02http://www.angelfire.com/wi3/englishcorner/vocabulary/vocabulary.htmlhttp://www.uefap.com/vocab/vocfram.htmhttp://www.wordsurfing.co.uk/17.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/links.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/links.htmlhttp://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/Averil-Coxhead/awl/links.htmlhttp://www.fltr.ucl.ac.be/fltr/germ/etan/bibs/vocab/cup.html

Documents

Using the Academic Word List