Choosing Your Words Carefully: by Caroline Krantz

Choosing your words carefully
By Caroline Krantz
Co-author of Navigate
March 25th 2015
Choosing your words carefully

Webinar outline
Webinar outline
How many words do
learners need?
Which words, in what
order?
The Oxford 3000 and
other helpful tools
Vocabulary selection in
Navigate
Your Questions
Professional Development
How many words in English?
Roughly how many words are

there in English?
a) 400,000
b) 600,000
c) over a million
How many words do native speakers know?
On average, an educated, adult native speaker has a

vocabulary of about _________ word families.
a) 20,000
b) 30,000
c) 40,000
How many words does a learner need?
What is the minimum number of

words students need to know, to get
by in English?
a) 1,000 words
b) 3,000 words
c) 5,000 words
Why 3000 words?
Why 3000
words?
Coverage of most frequent words

Most frequent words
Coverage
Total
(from British National Corpus)
1st 1,000 words
81.1%
2nd 1,000 words
8.1%
2000 = 89.2% (81.1% + 8.1%)
3rd 1,000 words
4.4%
3000 = 93.6% (89.2 + 4.4%)

Source: I.S.P. Nation Learning Vocabulary in Another
Language 2013
If learners know the top 1000 most frequent words, they will understand 81.1%
of what they read and hear.
If they know the 2000 most frequent words, theyll understand 89.2%.
If they know the 3000 most frequent words, theyll understand 93.6%
Coverage of most frequent words

Most frequent words
% cumulative coverage of words
(taken from British National Corpus)
1st 1,000 words
81.1%
2nd 1,000 words
89.2%
3rd 1,000 words
93.6%
4th 1,000 words
95.4%
5th 1,000 words
96.4%
6th 1,000 words
97.1%
7th 1,000 words
97.5%
Source: I.S.P. Nation Learning Vocabulary in
Another Language 2013
Coverage of frequent words
coverage of words
100.00%
95.00%
90.00%
85.00%
80.00%
75.00%
70.00%
coverage of words
1st 1000 words

81.14%
2nd 1000 words

89.24%
3rd 1000 words

93.60%
4th 1000 words

95.37%
5th 1000 words

96.41%
6th 1000 words

97.08%
Which 3000 words?
Which words do they need?
10
The Oxford 3000
The Oxford 3000

List of 3000 keywords
11
How was the Oxford 3000 created?
Frequency
Three selection criteria:
Frequency
Range
Centrality
12
Oxford 3000 Selection Criteria

1: Frequency
1 British National Corpus

100 million words from a range of written and spoken sources:
e.g. newspapers, magazines, fiction, non-fiction, real-life conversations, TV and
radio programmes.
2 The Oxford Corpus Collection

2.5 billion words taken from World Wide Web,
e.g. emails, blogs and social media. Not just British English.
13
Oxford 3000 - Selection Criteria

1: Frequency
Word
FREQUENCY
14
???
Number of times it appears

in corpus
5976498
???
3557210
???
3017772
And
2621951
To
2551312
2154024
In
1900782
That
1193673
Have
1129193
It
1054848
897073
For
856455
Oxford 3000 - Selection Criteria

2: Range
RANGE
15
TV
spoken
arts
world affairs
science
fiction
leisure
commerce
Oxford 3000 - selection criteria

3: Centrality
CENTRALITY
words which are low frequency but important
cannot be expressed in another way

words identified by a panel of 70 experts
16
Oxford 3000 - selection criteria
3: Centrality
Centrality
domestic objects & activities: container, ink, lid, rubbish, shower
emotions: ashamed, grateful, jealous, lonely, pity, suspicious
food/drink/cooking: cheese, chocolate, juice, menu, rice, sour, spoon
function words: hers, nowhere, ours, ourselves, theirs
human physiology: female, fever, hungry, swell, toilet, unconscious
human relationships: apologize, boyfriend, forgive, goodbye, insult, punish
the physical world: boil, liquid, melt, shallow, transparent, vertical, width
17
Oxford 3000
A qualitative and quantitative wordlist
Frequency
Range
(quantitative: numbers and computer data)
Centrality
(qualitative: advice from panel of 70 experts)
18
Key, or not key?
Which three of the following are not keywords?

degree
delay deliberate delighted
deliver dormant drowsy deny
depart departure
depend duty
19
Key, or not key?
degree delay deliberate delighted

deliver dormant drowsy
deny
duty depart departure depend
20
Recap

In what order do we teach them?
21
Checking Level
English Vocabulary Profile (EVP)
22
Checking Level
English Vocabulary Profile
23
Polysemy
POLYSEMY
24
POLYSEMY
POLYSEMY
=
words with
multiple meanings
25
Words with multiple meanings
KEY
26
Meanings of key
27
Meanings of Key
noun
MOST IMPORTANT THING e.g. key to success
ON A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT e.g. piano key
ANSWERS e.g. check your answers in the key
TOOL FOR LOCK e.g. car keys
ON MAP (an explanation of symbols)
MUSIC e.g. a tune in the key of E flat
ON COMPUTER e.g. press the return key
verb
~ sth (in) TYPE ON A KEYBOARD e.g. key in your password

DAMAGE A CAR WITH A KEY
adj.
28
VITAL, ESSENTIAL e.g. a key player in a team, a key role.
Meanings of key
noun
ON MAP (an explanation of symbols)
MUSIC e.g. a tune in the key of E flat
verb

DAMAGE A CAR WITH A KEY
adj.
29

Meanings of Key
Meanings of Key
noun
verb
adj.
30

Checking level of multiple meanings
31
Stop and reflect .

In what order do we teach them?
How did we choose our words carefully in

Navigate?
32
Vocabulary selection in Navigate

Understanding the next bit of English
How does todays teaching make

tomorrows text easier?
Paul Nation: Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing
Our real job is to help learners

understand the next bit of English they
read or hear.
Catherine Walter, series adviser for Navigate
33
Vocabulary syllabus
34
Texts - carefully-graded language

To understand a text without a dictionary
learners need to understand 95 - 98%
of the words. (Hu and Nation 2000)
35
Texts - exploiting vocabulary in texts

Focus on high-frequency vocabulary,
helping students to understand tomorrows text.
36
Grammar exercises
37
[add cover photo

Of WB]
The Workbook
Mopping up the Oxford 3000
38
Vocab Syllabus lexical sets
Texts - careful grading

- vocab exercises based on
the text
Grammar exercises
Workbook
39
Writing Navigate
A glimpse behind the scenes: justifying our vocab choices
Extract from B1 manuscript
40
Writing Navigate
A glimpse behind the scenes: demonstrating level
extract from Navigate B1 manuscript
41
Writing Navigate
A glimpse behind the scenes: ticking off words
42
Writing Navigate
A glimpse behind the scenes: detailed record-keeping!
43
Beyond the Oxford 3000
Is the Oxford
3000 really all
learners need?
44

Idiomatic language
put your foot in it
at the crack of dawn
hit it off
not sleep a wink
come up with an idea
Idiomatic language
know your stuff
bored stiff
soak up the atmosphere
get your moneys worth
step out of your comfort zone

Some idioms from Navigate B2
45

New words
hand-held device
tech-savvy
wireless
eco-friendly
copy sb in / Cc sb (email)
go viral
live-streaming
smart
to hack
high-tech
hang out
zone out
Some new words in Navigate B2
46
B3

Word formation
adjective suffixes
-able, -al, - ant, - ive
prefixes
semi-, bi-, self-, multi-
opportunities to
expand vocabulary
compound nouns
pedestrian area, parking space
47
noun suffixes
-ence, -ity, -tion, -dom
compound adjectives
tight-fitting, high-tech, run-down
Extracts from Navigate
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
Any questions?
56

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Choosing your words carefully

Choosing your words carefully

How many words in English?

Roughly how many words are

How many words do native speakers know?

On average, an educated, adult native speaker has a

How many words does a learner need?

What is the minimum number of

Why 3000 words?

Coverage of most frequent words

(from British National Corpus)

1st 1,000 words

2nd 1,000 words

2000 = 89.2% (81.1% + 8.1%)

3rd 1,000 words

3000 = 93.6% (89.2 + 4.4%)

Coverage of most frequent words

% cumulative coverage of words

(taken from British National Corpus)

1st 1,000 words

2nd 1,000 words

3rd 1,000 words

4th 1,000 words

5th 1,000 words

6th 1,000 words

7th 1,000 words

Coverage of frequent words

1st 1000 words

2nd 1000 words

3rd 1000 words

4th 1000 words

5th 1000 words

6th 1000 words

Which 3000 words?

How many words does a learner need?

Which words do they need?

The Oxford 3000

The Oxford 3000

How was the Oxford 3000 created?

Three selection criteria:

Oxford 3000 Selection Criteria

1 British National Corpus

2 The Oxford Corpus Collection

Oxford 3000 - Selection Criteria

Number of times it appears

Oxford 3000 - Selection Criteria

Oxford 3000 - selection criteria

cannot be expressed in another way

Oxford 3000 - selection criteria

Key, or not key?

Which three of the following are not keywords?

Key, or not key?

degree delay deliberate delighted

How many words does a learner need?

In what order do we teach them?

Words with multiple meanings

~ sth (in) TYPE ON A KEYBOARD e.g. key in your password

VITAL, ESSENTIAL e.g. a key player in a team, a key role.

~ sth (in) TYPE ON A KEYBOARD e.g. key in your password

VITAL, ESSENTIAL e.g. a key player in a team, a key role.

Words with multiple meanings

~ sth (in) TYPE ON A KEYBOARD e.g. key in your password

VITAL, ESSENTIAL e.g. a key player in a team, a key role.