{"id":939,"date":"2020-03-09T00:00:17","date_gmt":"2020-03-09T00:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/?p=939"},"modified":"2021-03-30T06:01:55","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T06:01:55","slug":"how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/","title":{"rendered":"How Not to Teach Vocabulary (According to Science)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_80 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-grey ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<div class=\"ez-toc-title-container\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<span class=\"ez-toc-title-toggle\"><a href=\"#\" class=\"ez-toc-pull-right ez-toc-btn ez-toc-btn-xs ez-toc-btn-default ez-toc-toggle\" aria-label=\"Toggle Table of Content\"><span class=\"ez-toc-js-icon-con\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 eztoc-toggle-hide-by-default' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#Why_Similar_Sounds_Interfere_with_Memorization\" >Why Similar Sounds Interfere with Memorization<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#Words_That_Have_Related_Meanings\" >Words That Have Related Meanings<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#What_If_We_Need_To_Teach_Related_Words\" >What If We Need To Teach Related Words?<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#%F0%9F%93%8C_Takeaways\" >\ud83d\udccc Takeaways<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<p>Imagine you\u2019re in a Japanese class and your teacher is reading some vocabulary: \u201cAnd the next word is \u201cky\u016b-ry\u014d,\u201d which means \u2018salary.\u2019 Don\u2019t get it confused with \u201cky\u014d-ry\u016b,\u2019 which means \u201cdinosaur.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, you\u2019re probably already confused.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044842\/kyoryu-kyuryo-confusion.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"624\" height=\"325\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-941\" srcset=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044842\/kyoryu-kyuryo-confusion.png 624w, https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044842\/kyoryu-kyuryo-confusion-300x156.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 624px) 100vw, 624px\" \/><br \/>\nAnd it wouldn\u2019t be your fault! Research shows that learning similarly-sounding words is confusing. And words that sound similar and have similar meanings are even more confusing. (I\u2019m looking at you, \u201cTuesday\u201d and \u201cThursday.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>But why is this confusing? And how should we teach vocabulary words that seem similar?<\/p>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Why_Similar_Sounds_Interfere_with_Memorization\"><\/span>Why Similar Sounds Interfere with Memorization<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p>We absorb new knowledge by connecting it to the knowledge that we already have. For example, if you already knew the word  \u201cky\u016b-ry\u014d\u201d (salary), then learning \u201cky\u014d-ry\u016b\u201d (dinosaur) would not have been very difficult.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044851\/kyoryu-kyuryo-happy.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"516\" height=\"244\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-942\" srcset=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044851\/kyoryu-kyuryo-happy.png 516w, https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044851\/kyoryu-kyuryo-happy-300x142.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 516px) 100vw, 516px\" \/><br \/>\nHowever, if both words are new to you, the connection between them prevents you from making connections to words that you already know.<\/p>\n<p>So, when we\u2019re introducing new words to students, it\u2019s important to not introduce them to other words that look and sound similar. For example, we might be tempted to teach students a bunch of phrasal verbs involving the same verb (e.g. \u201chang out,\u201d \u201chang up,\u201d \u201chang tight\u201d) or pairs of <a href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/2020\/02\/17\/boring-bored-adjective-participle\/\">participle adjectives<\/a> (e.g. \u201cboring\u201d and \u201cbored\u201d), but that\u2019ll only make them harder to remember!<\/p>\n<p>What about words that are related in meaning but don\u2019t sound similar?<\/p>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Words_That_Have_Related_Meanings\"><\/span>Words That Have Related Meanings<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p>In language classes, we often teach related words together. This seems like an obvious choice. But does this actually help students?<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s generally more effective for students to learn words in meaningful contexts than in lists of related words.  Oxford\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/books.google.com.tw\/books?id=KEsrDwAAQBAJ&amp;lpg=PT223&amp;dq=does%20teaching%20related%20words%20make%20them%20harder%20to%20learn&amp;pg=PT54#v=onepage&amp;q=%22in%20normal%20language%20use,%20we%20do%20not%20typically%20use%20vocabulary%20in%20lexical%20sets%20or%20bring%20opposites%20or%20synonyms%20together.%22&amp;f=false\"><em>How Vocabulary is Learned<\/em><\/a> suggests letting adult students learn vocabulary as they encounter them.<\/p>\n<p>That doesn\u2019t mean we need to teach totally random words. After all, related words naturally occur within the same conversation or text. They just don\u2019t occur in the way that typical vocabulary lists present them.<\/p>\n<p>For example, if you try to think of words related to a library, you\u2019d most likely think, \u201cbooks,\u201d \u201cbookshelves,\u201d \u201clibrary card,\u201d \u201creading,\u201d \u201clibrarian.\u201d They\u2019re mostly nouns.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, when we talk about a library in real life, we use a greater variety of words: \u201cA boy who was reading a book in the library today couldn\u2019t stop laughing. Everyone glared at him. Finally, the librarian said, \u2018Quiet! This is a library!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In this story, we\u2019ve introduced the nouns (book, library, librarian), but also verbs (read, laugh, glare) and an adjective (quiet). <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/43104538\">Research<\/a> has shown that teaching context-based words like these is more helpful than teaching random words or controlled lists of words.<\/p>\n<p>But what do we do when we need to teach controlled lists of words?<\/p>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"What_If_We_Need_To_Teach_Related_Words\"><\/span>What If We Need To Teach Related Words?<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p>A <a href=\"http:\/\/vli-journal.org\/issues\/02.1\/issue02.1.02.pdf\">study<\/a> found that the word sets that people found difficult to remember often included names of objects that had similar shapes. When we learn new words, similarities in appearance interfere with our visual memory. So we\u2019ll want to teach these words in separate contexts.<\/p>\n<p>For example, we might struggle to remember the names of various small birds. But we won\u2019t have trouble learning the name of a bird that is commonly found in parks (\u201cpigeon\u201d) along with other words related to parks (\u201cbench,\u201d \u201cplay,\u201d and \u201cfountain.\u201d)<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044911\/learning-vocab-same-shape.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"623\" height=\"404\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-943\" srcset=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044911\/learning-vocab-same-shape.png 623w, https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044911\/learning-vocab-same-shape-300x195.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 623px) 100vw, 623px\" \/><br \/>\nSo we can teach each of these words in their own meaningful context. This applies even when we\u2019re teaching simple words like \u201chot\u201d and \u201ccold.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/books.google.com.tw\/books?id=KEsrDwAAQBAJ&amp;lpg=PA1&amp;pg=PT223#v=onepage&amp;q&amp;f=false\"><em>How Vocabulary is Learned<\/em><\/a> suggests teaching such words \"in sentences that help distinguish between their meanings.\u201d So when teaching the word set, \u201chot + cold,\u201d avoid sentences like:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It is hot.<\/li>\n<li>He had a cold drink.<\/li>\n<li>I feel cold.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These sentences would still make sense if you switched the words: \u201cIt is cold,\u201d \u201cHe had a hot drink,\u201d and \u201cI feel hot.\u201d Instead, teach using sentences like:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Summer is hot.<\/li>\n<li>Winter is cold.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"%F0%9F%93%8C_Takeaways\"><\/span>\ud83d\udccc Takeaways<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p>Congrats on getting to the end of this blog post! If you\u2019re confused, it\u2019s not your fault. We\u2019ve just introduced a bunch of really similar information\u2026 sorry!<\/p>\n<p>So to help you remember the key points, here they are again:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Don\u2019t introduce words because they have similar sounds. For instance, if \u201cstrength\u201d is a vocabulary word, don\u2019t introduce \u201cstretch\u201d to the student as well.<\/li>\n<li>In general, let context decide what words to teach.<\/li>\n<li>When you need related words, teach them using meaningful context (\u201cpark\u201d \u2192 \u201cpigeon\u201d \u201cbench\u201d \u201cplay\u201d \u201cwater fountain\u201d).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Happy tutoring!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Imagine you\u2019re in a Japanese class and your teacher is reading some vocabulary: \u201cAnd the next word is \u201cky\u016b-ry\u014d,\u201d which means \u2018salary.\u2019 Don\u2019t get it confused with \u201cky\u014d-ry\u016b,\u2019 which means \u201cdinosaur.\u201d Unfortunately, you\u2019re probably already...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":137,"featured_media":940,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"unified_meta_tagline_field":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vocab-expressions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Not to Teach Vocabulary (According to Science) | Engoo Tutor&#039;s Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Not to Teach Vocabulary (According to Science) | Engoo Tutor&#039;s Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Imagine you\u2019re in a Japanese class and your teacher is reading some vocabulary: \u201cAnd the next word is \u201cky\u016b-ry\u014d,\u201d which...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Engoo Tutor&#039;s Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-03-09T00:00:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-03-30T06:01:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044833\/how-not-to-teach-vocab-cover.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"603\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Frances Chan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Frances Chan\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Frances Chan\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/b38f1af3553ca82c328f4669ce4f44c7\"},\"headline\":\"How Not to Teach Vocabulary (According to Science)\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-03-09T00:00:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-03-30T06:01:55+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/\"},\"wordCount\":765,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tutor.engoo.com\/blog\/vocab-expressions\/how-not-to-teach-vocabulary-according-to-science\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/assets.blog.engoo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2020\/02\/27044833\/how-not-to-teach-vocab-cover.png\",\"articleSection\":[\"Vocab &amp; 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