Learning a new language is learning
about language elements (such as vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation) and skills
(such as speaking, listening, reading and writing). Discussing about language
elements, vocabulary is probably as one of the central problems, yet it is a
fundamental requirement to mastery a language or minimally builds a
communication at least. Moreover, vocabulary is a component of language that
maintains all of information about meaning and using word in language.
Vocabulary building is really
important in any language learning especially for the second language learners.
This opinion is supported by Schmitt: “One
of the keys in learning a foreign language is mastery the second language’s
vocabulary“.[1]
Several of people regard that vocabulary is another name of word. Nevertheless,
there is a big diversity of word and vocabulary. It’s true that vocabulary is
the word itself but in terms of their meanings, both have a number of
distinctions. The following are main word categories and their classification
that may be worth considering in finding the right materials in teaching
vocabulary and examining the list of vocabulary for the first word counts.[2]
The word vocabulary entered the
English lexicon in the 1530s derived from the Latin word ‘vocabularium,’ meaning ‘a list of words.’ It gained its modern
meaning, the total of all words known by a person, in the 1700s. If the term is
used to mean a list of words, there are several types of vocabulary. These can
be divided, as with grammatical classes, into adjectives, nouns and verbs. They
could also be assorted, as with the different fields of semantics, into
categories as diverse as emotions, colors, animals and human body parts.[3]
Barnhart points out two definitions of
vocabulary. Firstly, stock of words used by person, class of people,
profession, etc. Second, vocabulary is a collection or list of words, ordinarily
in alphabetical order and defined.[4]
In addition, there are several definitions which linguists have constructed
related to the sense of vocabulary. As follow:
a)
Vocabulary is total number
of words which (with rules for combining them) make up a language.[5]
b)
Vocabulary is the word
having meaning when heard or seen even though not produced by the individual
himself to communicate with other.[6]
c)
Vocabulary can be defined,
roughly, as the words we teach in the foreign language.[7]
d)
Any collection of signs or
symbols constituting a means or system of nonverbal communication: vocabulary
of a computer.[8]
Based on the several theories of
linguists about vocabulary, research defines that vocabulary is one of necessary
elements in language organized as a collection of words in list arranged by
alphabetical that refers to something or someone and have a meaning.
2). Types of vocabulary
Vocabulary, in fact, has a great number of ways to be recognized
or memorized by learners. For the aim of teaching and learning activities,
there are two varieties of vocabulary: The active vocabulary (productive) and
the passive vocabulary (receptive) vocabulary. The active vocabulary refers to
the words which can be called in the long-term memory and use appropriately in
writing and speech and the passive vocabulary refers to the words or lexical
items which can only be recognized and comprehended in the context of reading
and listening materials.[9]
Schail declares three types of vocabulary that every person has.[10]
They are active vocabulary, reserve vocabulary and passive vocabulary:
a)
Active Vocabulary
Active vocabulary is the words that we
use in speaking and writing probably runs 5.000 up to 10.000 words. Ingo Plag initiates
that the active vocabulary obviously consists of words that have been known
better than those that constitute passive vocabulary.[11]
The same distinction holds for native speakers, who also actively use only a
subset of the words they are familiar with. Another instance of graded
knowledge of words is the fact that, even as native speakers, they frequently
only know what have been heard or read certain word before, but do not know the
meaning.
Corson (1995) states that an active
vocabulary covers all those words people need to use and have no reservations
about using to communicate with others on an everyday basis. Furthermore, the rate
of people's active vocabulary is a unique reflection of their sociocultural
position and the range of unconnected practices engaged in. On the other words,
it depends on people who frequently make contact with the specialist meaning
systems of professions or of other special knowledge categories as a part of
everyday existence, over a lifetime. Then, Corson (1983) calls the active
vocabulary as a “motivated” vocabulary. It consists of all the words we need to
use and feel no reluctance in using in our everyday life. Moreover Crothers
& Suppes (1967) asserts that learning a word for productive use requires
more learning than for receptive use.[12]
b)
Reserve Vocabulary
This type is the words been cognizant but rarely used in
ordinary speech. We utilize them in a writing skill when we have time to consider,
or search for a synonym.
c)
Passive Vocabulary
The words that are recognized vaguely,
but people oftentimes do not have assurance of the meaning and just know that those
have been seen before. A learner's passive vocabulary is the words that they
understand but don't use yet. This can be compared with active vocabularies,
which are words that learners understand and use in speaking or writing. The
active and passive vocabulary of a learner changes constantly. They start using
words, try new meanings, forget words, abandon words that have no use, revise
words, etc.[13]
Corson (1983) defines that a passive vocabulary includes the active of
vocabulary and it also includes the learners’ ‘unmotivated’ vocabulary.[14]
The unmotivated vocabulary can be assorted into two types. The first type is the
words which are only partly understood and are not well known enough to use actively.
Another one is the words which aren’t needed in daily communication.
Nation (2001) states that passive
vocabulary knowledge is involved perceiving the form of a word while listening
or reading and retrieving its meaning. Productive vocabulary knowledge, on the
other hand, means to express a meaning through speaking or writing and recall
and produce the appropriate spoken or written word form.[15]
Corson rolls out that it includes the words stored in verbal memory that people
partially understand, nevertheless not well enough for active use. These are
words that people meet less often and they may be low frequency words in the
language as a whole.[16]
3). Teaching vocabulary
In a teaching process, teacher
transforms his knowledge to the learners until they can receive and absorb the
material as well as possible. It is supported by Gagne’s (1974): “Instruction or teaching is a set of events
which effect learners in such a way that learning is facilitated”.[17]
Moreover, Kasbolah (1998) construes that teaching is showing or helping someone
to learn how to do something, providing with knowledge causing to know or
understand.[18]
Thus, teaching vocabulary is the teacher’s effort to provide students
vocabulary material, to ensure their understanding, and to improve their
knowledge of vocabulary in use in the context of teaching and learning behavior
between learners and environmental which includes teacher, teaching aids, and
so forth in order to achieve the determined goal.
Moras
(2001) utters that there are several aspects of lexis that need to be taken
into account when teaching vocabulary. For instance, Moras (2001) gives the
list of several aspects of lexis when teaching vocabulary based on the work of
Gairns and Redman (1986):
(a) Boundaries between conceptual meanings:
knowing not only what the words refer to, but also where the boundaries are
that separate it from words of related meaning (e.g. cup, mug, and bowl).
(b) Polysemy: distinguishing
between the various meaning of a single word form with several and closely
related meanings (head: of a person, of a pin, of an organisation).
(c) Homonymy: distinguishing
between the various meaning of a single word form which has several meanings
which are not closely related (e.g. a file: used to put papers in or a tool).
(d) Homophony: understanding words
that have the same pronunciation but different spellings and meanings (e.g. flour,
flower).
(e) Synonymy: distinguishing
between the different shades of meaning that synonymous words have (e.g.
extend, increase, expand)
(f) Affective meaning: distinguishing
between the attitudinal and emotional factors (denotation and connotation),
which depend on the speakers attitude or the situation and socio-cultural
associations of lexical items.
(g) Style, register, dialect: Being
able to distinguish between different levels of formality, the effect of
different contexts and topics, as well as differences in geographical
variation.
(h) Translation: awareness of certain
differences and similarities between the native and the foreign language (e.g.
false cognates).
(i) Chunks of language:
multi-word verbs, idioms, strong and weak collocations, lexical phrases.
(j) Grammar of vocabulary: learning
the rules that enable students to build up different forms of the word or even
different words from that word (e.g. sleep, slept, sleeping; able, unable;
disability).
[1] Norbert
Schmitt. Vocabulary in Language Teaching.
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000) p.19
[3] wiseGEEK. http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-the-different-types-of-vocabulary.htm, retrieved on 8th of October
2012 at 05.22 a.m.
[4] Cynthia A. Barnhart. The Facts on File Student’s Dictionary of American English. (USA:
Facts on File, Inc., 2008) p. 697
[5]
AS Hornby. Oxford Advance Learner’s Dictionary of
Current English (twenty-fifth impression). (London: Oxford University Press
printed in Great Britain by Hazzel Watson & Viney Limited, 1987). p. 959
[6] L. R. Goode. Dictionary of Education. (New York: Mebrown Tall Book Co., 1959).
p. 642
[7]
Ur Penny. A Course in Language Teaching: Practice and
Theory. (United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 1991)
[8] Dictionary.com. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/vocabulary , retrieved on 6th of October
2012 at 05.36 p.m.
[9]
G. Ellish and B. Sinclair. Learning to Learn English A Course in
Language Training (sixth printing). (United Kingdom: Cambridge University
Press, 1997) p.28
[11]Ingo
Plag. Word-Formation in English. (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press,
2003). p.46
[12] I.S.P
Nation. Teaching & Learning
Vocabulary. (Massachusetts, USA: McNaughton & Gunn, 1990). p. 94
[13] Teaching English. http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/knowledge-database/passive-vocabulary , retrieved on 11th
of October 2012 at 06.17 am.
[14] Nation., p. 6
[15] Zhong Zhiying. A Comparative Study of Passive and Active
Vocabulary Knowledge of Prince of Songkla University and South China
Agricultural University EFL Learners. (Bangkok: Songkla University, 2005)
p. 122 (based on thesis online
http://human.pn.psu.ac.th/ojs/index.php/eJHUSO/article/viewFile/21/31 , retrieved on 11th
of October 2012 at 06.44 p.m.).
[16] David
Corson. Using English Words. (Norwell, Massachusetts: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, 1995). p.46
[17] Kasiani Kasbolah. A Study the Technique Used in Introducing
New Vocabulary for Beginner Level of Planet Kids English Course. (Malang:
Department of English Education, 1998) p. 9
[19]Solange Moras. Teaching Vocabulary to Advanced Students: A
Lexical Approach.
http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/teachingvocabulary.html, retrieved on 30th of
October 2012 at 09.33 a.m.
