What are the ten most effective vocabulary teaching activities?

Paul Nation, LALS, Victoria University of Wellington. New Zealand

Criteria

The best vocabulary teaching activities

1 are most certain to result in useful learning
2 do not require a lot of work from the teacher
3 provide balance in a well-designed program
4 are simple and efficient
5 can be used over and over again.

The ten activities

Extensive reading from suitable texts

Listening to stories
Learning from word cards
Intensive reading of suitable texts (see Tom Cobb’s website Read with resources)
Quick explanations by the teacher
A speed reading course
4/3/2
Pair and small group activities involving generation
Linked skill activities
Working through well-designed vocabulary exercises

What are the four most important jobs that a vocabulary teacher needs to do?

1 Plan and provide a well-balanced course (Nation, 2007)

2 Train the learners in the four most useful vocabulary strategies
3 Test the learners
4 Teach vocabulary

The four strands

1 Meaning-focused input (learning through listening and reading)

2 Meaning-focused output (learning through speaking and writing)
3 Language-focused learning (deliberate study)
4 Fluency development (in listening, speaking, reading and writing)

Vocabulary strategies

1 Guessing from context

2 Learning from word cards
3 Using word parts
4 Dictionary use
Vocabulary Exercises

True/False
Check the sentence that is true.
1 __ a. Being tall is a characteristic of many trees.
__ b. The snow was quite warm.

Reword the sentences without changing the meaning

I strongly dislike jazz. (stand)
Beer makes me feel sick. (revolt)
I don't really care for tea. (keen)

Fill the blanks

A list of words is provided, followed by 10 sentences with a blank space where a word
needs to be inserted. There are more words than blank spaces.

Pair and small group activities

Retelling
Problem-solving
Role play
Ranking
Classifying
Say it!

Resources

Paul Nation’s website http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/paul-nation/nation.aspx

(Vocabulary Resource Booklet, publications, speed reading course, Vocabulary Size Test)

Tom Cobb’s website http://www.lextutor.ca (Tests, Read with resources, Concordancer)

Nation, I.S.P. (1991). Managing group discussion: problem-solving tasks. Guidelines, 13,
1: 1-10.
Nation, I.S.P. (2007) The four strands. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching 1,
1: 1-12.
Nation, P. & Malarcher, C. (2007). Reading for Speed and Fluency, Books 1, 2, 3 & 4
Seoul: Compass Publishing.
Nation, P. (2009). 4000 Essential English Words. Books 1-6. Seoul: Compass Publishing.