Useful tips for students on how to learn vocabulary

When you study a foreign language  you try to learn  words and their combinations - phrases, because memorizing  words only   makes no sense without context. One of the best ways to memorize things is to make a list of words and  phrases  that you want to remember. Always keep a book and whenever there are phrases which you need to remember, list them and make use of them whenever possible. By doing so you can make your own pocket dictionary and carry it with you and keep repeating them whenever and wherever you have an opportunity.

Never try to remember too many words and phrases at one time because this will create confusion and make it difficult to remember.

You should try to put realistic goals for yourself: Every individual has his own ability to do things, although there are some exceptional cases. Generally, on average a person can remember only 10 words that he learns at a time. Try to focus on phrases that are commonly used in day to day conversation, because this way the words and phrases are easily remembered.

One of the effective ways of learning words and phrases is reading and retelling short stories. Stories give the learners an opportunity to infer the meanings of words that they do not know. That is, stories help to develop their vocabulary by making connections between known and unknown words. So, the story context can easily encourage students to learn new words incidentally; it is an excellent way to enrich their vocabulary usage and make their learning tangible. Certain patterns and vocabulary items are frequently repeated in stories, this naturally allows learners to be exposed to the language in familiar contexts. Reading stories and retelling them are an excellent technique of developing vocabulary. Here is one short story for students with a beneficial moral lesson and words and phrases to remember:

 One night four college students were out partying late night and didn’t study for the test which was scheduled for the next day. In the morning, they thought of a plan. They made themselves look dirty with grease and dirt.

Then they went to the Dean and said they had gone out to a wedding last night and on their way back the tire of their car burst and they had to push the car all the way back. So they were in no condition to take the test.

The Dean thought for a minute and said they can have the re-test after 3 days. They thanked him and said they will be ready by that time.

On the third day, they appeared before the Dean. The Dean said that as this was a Special Condition Test, all four were required to sit in separate classrooms for the test. They all agreed as they had prepared well in the last 3 days.

The Test consisted of only 2 questions with the total of 100 Points:

1) Your Name? __________ (1 Points)

2) Which tire burst? __________ (99 Points)
Options – (a) Front Left (b) Front Right (c) Back Left (d) Back Right

Moral of the story: Take responsibility or you will learn.

Galiya Kulzhanbekova,

The Department of Foreign Languages