Guide to Studying Vocabulary University of Washington  English Language Programs
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Guide to Studying Vocabulary

General

To learn a word you need to 'know' several things:

  • the basic meaning(s)
  • the different word forms
  • the pronunciation
  • usage information (e.g,. formal or informal)
  • the grammar patterns associated with it
  • The collocates or words that can often accompany it

Let's take a look at the last two points 'grammar patterns' and 'collocates'

Grammar Patterns

If we want to use a word, we need to know something about the 'grammar' of the word. If it is a noun, we need to know if it is usually countable or uncountable. If it is a verb, we need to know if it is transitive (it takes a direct object) or intransitive (it never has a direct object).

It is also useful to know how the word can be typically used (grammatical patterns). For example, a verb may be used more often in the passive voice than in the active; or a verb may be typically followed by a 'that clause'/'noun clause'.

Collocates, Collocations or Partners

Language is not really a collection of individual words; it is more a collection of groups of words. If we want to use a word, it is helpful to know how it can 'fit in' with other words. If I want to use the noun mistake, I would need to know what verbs and what adjectives can accompany it so that I would write "make a big mistake" rather than "do a large mistake".

Here is another example. The adjectives intense, bitter and fierce can be typically used to describe the noun rivalry. However, the adjectives strong and forceful are not typically used. We can call these words collocates, collocations or simply partners.

An Example

Let's look at the word aware.

  • Aware means "having knowledge or understanding" (meaning).
  • Aware is an adjective (form).
  • The noun is awareness (form).
  • An 'opposite' is unaware (form)
  • Aware is rarely used before a noun. *"She is an aware person" (grammar pattern).
  • Aware is usually used after the verbs be or become (grammar pattern).
  • Aware is often followed by a that clause (noun clause) or by of + a noun phrase. (grammar pattern)
  • Some useful partners for aware are the adverbs fully, perfectly and well (collocates)

So, Where Can I Find This Information?

To get to know some partners and typical 'grammatical patterns' of the words it is useful to see a lot of examples. With the aid of computers it is now possible to search for examples of words/phrases among millions of words of text both written and spoken. The computers use what is known as concordancing programs. The data that is collected usually looks something like this. 

1 azz musicians became aware of themselves 
2 . Darwin himself was aware of the difficulty,
3  ancient Greeks were aware of the electrostat
4 sting were still not aware of the importance 
5  Holzman (1981) were aware of this possible

You can see that our word is in the middle and appears in blue. The grammatical patterns or useful partners appear in green. When you look at this information, it is important not to pay too much information to the meaning. What you you should do is look around the word to see the words that accompany it.

Vocabulary Explorer

The Vocabulary Explorer page for each of the levels is where you can see examples of the words in the course vocabulary lists. For each word on the list you will see around 10 examples. You can see a concordance display like the one above or see the complete sentences.

There is a link to an online dictionary, where you can find out information on the meanings and grammar of a particular word.

You can even do your own research on the word. The Collin's Cobuild link takes you to their concordance search page.

What Do I Do Now That I Know All This?

Once you have found out all this information, you will want to remember it. Here are some tips.

  • Do the interactive exercises on this site. Do the exercises regularly. Even if you have done the exercises before, come back and do them again.
  • Make a note card. Write the word, its different forms, its pronunciation, partners and grammar information on one side. On the other side write the meaning in English and a translation in your own language. Draw a picture to help you remember the word. You can test yourself by looking at the picture, the translation and the meaning in English to see if you can remember the word. Alternatively, you can look at the word in English and see if you can remember its meanings in your first language.
  • Practice using the words in your writing

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