Page 173 - English Vocabulary in use Elementary (3rd edition)

How to learn vocabulary

To learn a lot of vocabulary, you have to do different things.
1 Study each unit of the book carefully and do all the exercises. Check your answers with your teacher. Repeat
the units after a month, and then again after three months, and see how much you have learnt and how much
you have forgotten. Repeating work is very important.
2 Keep a vocabulary notebook. Students who regularly make notes in a separate notebook often do better in
tests and examinations than students who do not keep a notebook.
3 Use different ways of recording things in your notebook. For example, every time you see or hear an
interesting phrase, write it in your notebook, and write who said it or wrote it, and in what situation, as well
as what it means. Here are some examples:
ready: (person at the door of a theatre, to all the people waiting) ‘ Have your tickets ready, please!’ = have your
ticket in your hand
else: (person in a restaurant) ‘Would you like anything else?’ = more or in addition or different
rush hour: (person who is about to leave home for work) ‘I’m going early so that I miss the rush hour’ = the
times when there are lots of people travelling to work in the morning or when people are travelling home in the
evening
Making notes of the situations words are used in will help you to remember them and to use them at
the right moment.
4 Use diagrams and other visual aids to help you learn and remember words and phrases. Word bubbles are
very easy to draw and can help you remember the different meanings and uses of words. Here is an example
for the word play, which can be a verb or a noun:

play football, tennis, golf, etc. play the guitar, violin, piano, etc.

verb

PLAY

noun

theatre: a play by William Shakespeare

Charts can also help you to organise information about words. This student has made notes in her
vocabulary notebook about useful verbs and the nouns we use them with:
a taxi a cold dinner my homework
a message a mistake somebody a favour
take catch a criminal make do
violin lessons an my best (to)
a ball
appointment

172 English Vocabulary in Use Elementary