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| A good vocabulary can help you communicate better in everyday life and express yourself in the best way possible. |
10 Ways to Enhance Your Vocabulary
A good vocabulary can help you communicate better in everyday life and express yourself in the best way possible. The better your vocabulary is, the more precise you can be about what you are saying or writing.
Why expand your knowledge and use of words? You'll be able to communicate (speak and write) more clearly and concisely, people will understand you more easily, and you will increase the perception (and reality) that you are an intelligent person. Besides, learning new words is a fun activity -- and one you can even do with the people around you. Challenge a friend, family member, or roommate to learn new words with you.
A good vocabulary can help you communicate better in everyday life and express yourself in the best way possible. The better your vocabulary is, the more precise you can be about what you are saying or writing. Regardless of whether you are studying English at school, enjoying your summer vacation or you're not even a student, at all, these 10 methods are your secure path to growth and enrichment in the English vocabulary department.
1. Read Every Day:
Once you’re out of school, word drills and assigned reading become things of the past. While these were tools for building your vocabulary repertoire while you were young, it doesn’t mean you should abandon reading. Try to read a well-written and edited essay, magazine article, book or news article every day. The more you read -- especially novels and literary works, but also magazines and newspapers -- the more words you'll be exposed to. As you read and uncover new words, use a combination of attempting to derive meaning from the context of the sentence as well as from looking up the definition in a dictionary.
2. Keep a Personal Dictionary:
Remember those early elementary school days when you had your first classes of English and each new word learned had to be documented either in a separate notebook or at the back of your current one? Well, this is actually one of the most efficient ways to learn new vocabulary and track your overall progress. Buy a new notebook or create a new memo on your phone where you will regularly update a word list of all the new English vocabulary you have mastered thus far.
3. Learn New Words Every Day:
How often do you come across words that are unfamiliar as you read? Don’t just gloss over them; take the time to look them up, and if you don’t have the time right then, write them down and look them up later. To improve your vocabulary quickly, make an effort to learn at least 3 to 5 new words every single day. There are plenty of ways to do this, such as a Word of the Day calendar or email list, or simply picking a word from a thesaurus or dictionary.
4. Learn from Context:
Research shows that the vast majority of words are learned from context. Learning in context of situations and sentences has huge benefits for all three aspects of vocabulary acquisition, learning, recall and retention. Vocabulary should always be learnt in context not in isolation.
There are many ways of introducing context into the vocabulary learning, the simplest being to learn vocabulary in sentences.Beyond sentences, one can experiment with learning words with stories, songs or just everyday situations. For instance, rather than learning weather related words on their own, look up a weather forecast online, and try to imagine a conversation about weather next week, and how it will affect the picnic one has been looking forward to so much.
5. Visualize New Words:
Another research shows that visualization is a great way to remember new words and their meanings. A good example of this is the word stratovolcano, which is a high, pointed mountain with a violent explosion. One way to remember this meaning is the fact that the prefix “strato” sounds like “straight-oh,” which may make you think of a straight ruler or a “straight-o-volcano,” which describes the word’s definition.
6. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat:
They say repetition is the mother of learning. It is – plain and simple. The way the human brain works is it actually utilizes repetition patterns to strengthen the meaning and usage of everything new that we learn. While it is crucial that you constantly learn new vocabulary, it is pertinent that you revise each and every new word to make the most out of your learning experience and always keep your head in the game.
7. Edit Your Own Writing:
After you finish writing, be your own editor and go though the piece with a fine-toothed comb to identify overused and nondescript words with something more precise or colorful. Editing is an important process for spotting writing errors, but it’s also great for improving the tone, style, and clarity of your writing. It might help to read the sentences aloud, then note any lack of precision. Search through your memory for more descriptive words, or consult a thesaurus if you need to. As you replace words, remember that using a large number of complex words won’t necessarily clarify the meaning, and it may just make your writing more pompous. Ask yourself, “Do I know a better word to use instead?” You may replace “use” with “acquire” or “obtain,” or “do” with “perform.”
8. Engage in Conversations:
Your true mastery shines when you are able to use new vocabulary in a real-life setting. Engage in conversations. While doing so, try to include those new words where appropriate as a sign of confidence and for additional practice. Simply talking with other people can help you learn discover new words. As with reading, once you hear a new word, remember to jot it down so that you can study it later -- and then slowly add the new word to your vocabulary.
9. Make Use of Games and Apps:
This is probably the most frequent method of learning new vocabulary and mastering new languages among the learners of today. Most language learning apps, such as Duolingo, Memrise or QuizUp are vocabulary-centric and utilize repetition and behavioral patterns to aid your learning process and help maximize your time and effort. They're easily accessible and usually don't have any time restraints so you can basically learn only when you want to. This is highly important because you don't need any extra motivation to learn; you're just using your phone as you normally would while also learning something new. Playing board games such as Scrabble and Crosswords helps do the trick, as well.
10. Stay Motivated:
10. Stay Motivated:
The last one on the list is something most learners fail at, leading them to either lose the motivation to learn new words or even quit the learning process in its entirety. To avoid doing so, set a particular new word count as your daily or monthly goal. This is actually the backbone of learning anything new, especially when it comes to languages.
In order for you to improve your vocabulary as much as you can, you need to cultivate the curiosity to learn new words every day.It's the inner motivation that can fast track your progress and get you way past your goals at any given day.
Some Vocabulary Tools/Websites:
Here are some useful (if slightly random) tools for helping improve your vocabulary:
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