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Without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed
(Wilkins, 1972)
Issues of definition
1. Lexis or vocabulary?
The term lexis has a wider scope than vocabulary. It conveys a wider and at the same
time more specific meaning: the more formal study of how words operate in certain
regular patterns, as well as issues connected with how words are best learnt.
2. What does it mean to know a word?
To know a word, learners need to learn its:
spelling
pronunciation
meaning
use
derivatives
register
collocations
connotations
Sense relations provide a way of grouping words together in sets and a fairly
efficient way of recording vocabulary.
Some relationships (e.g. opposites) are easy to remember and some words can
be learned in pairs.
2. What are word families and how are they useful in teaching?
A word family comprises the base word plus its inflexions and its most common
derivatives. Derivatives are formed by affixation (the addition of prefixes or suffixes).
They provide a framework for learners to see the relationships between words.
Phonology, the written form and meaning all need to be considered when
discussing compounds in class.
Thornbury (2002) makes the point that students regularly make mis-collocations
and that this sort of error constitutes a large proportion of their mistakes and
contributes most to the foreign quality of their English
Students tend to over-use items which are too formal or not formal enough, or
lift inappropriate words from a dictionary.
Being unsure of the connotations of some words may cause problems for the
learners.
Lexis is the core or heart of language but in language teaching has always been the
Cinderella (Lewis, 1993)
There is evidence that our brains store language in the form of chunks and
phrases.
We should encourage our learners to use what Nattinger & DeCarrico (1992) call
lexical phrases right from the start.
2. Phrasal constraints
This term was also coined by Nattinger & DeCarrico. Phrasal constraints are similar
to polywords, except that they allow variability- it is possible to slot different
elements into gaps (e.g. Its all lmy/their/Daves fault!).
A more convenient term, which includes both polywords and phrasal constraints, might
be multi-word items (or multi-word phrases)
3. Prefabricated utterances
These might be defined as stretches of spoken language (or written sentences)
which do not necessarily need to be taken apart and analysed before (or after)they
are used.
4. Idiomatic items
Lewis suggests that the most effective way to understand language is to think in
terms of a spectrum of idiomaticity (p98), with, at one end, language which is
literal, transparent, and comprehensible as the sum of its parts, and at the other
end, language which is metaphorical, opaque, and not related to an understanding
of the sum of its parts.
They can give learners the confidence to develop fluency, establish their turn
to talk and so on.
Bibliography:
Lewis, M (1993) The Lexical Approach LTP
Nattinger, J and DeCarrico, J (1992) Lexical Phrases and Language Teaching OUP
Thornbury, S. (2002) How to Teach Vocabulary, Longman
Wilkins, D (1972) Linguistics in Language Teaching Edward Arnold
Further reading:
McCarthy, M., Schmitt, N. (1998) Vocabulary, CUP