{"id":6891,"date":"2014-11-18T23:32:32","date_gmt":"2014-11-18T23:32:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eltchat.org\/wordpress\/?p=6891"},"modified":"2014-11-18T23:32:32","modified_gmt":"2014-11-18T23:32:32","slug":"how-to-activate-passive-vocabulary-with-advanced-students-eltchat-summary-29102014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/2014\/11\/18\/how-to-activate-passive-vocabulary-with-advanced-students-eltchat-summary-29102014\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Activate Passive Vocabulary With Advanced Students #ELTchat Summary 29\/10\/2014"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/h1>\n

Angelos Bollas TEFL<\/a><\/span><\/span> Leave a comment<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/header>\n

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\"eltchat\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

#ELTchat<\/a>\u00a0is a group of ELT professionals discussing topics of interest every Wednesday at 12pm or 9pm on rotation. Every Saturday, one of the moderators puts up a blog post on the\u00a0#ELTchat Blog<\/a>\u00a0asking teachers who follow\u00a0#ELTchat<\/a>\u00a0to propose some topics for the next charts. #ELTchat<\/a> followers can go to that post and suggest topics in the comments under the blog post. On Sunday evening, the moderators review the topics and create an online poll.\u00a0#ELTchat<\/a>\u00a0followers are then invited to vote on the topics until Wednesday morning (eltchat.org<\/a>)<\/p>\n

This week\u2019s topic, was \u201cHow to activate passive vocabulary with advanced students.\u201d Click here<\/a> for the transcript of the discussion.<\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n

Definitions.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

As always, we started by defining passive vocabulary<\/em>. These are some of the definitions provided:<\/p>\n

-Vocabulary that learners can recognise but not use; \u2018items\u2019 with which learners do not struggle receptively (so they now the meanings, uses, etc.) but cannot use productively. (@angelos_bollas<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Those items that you understand but can\u2019t recall for production; vocabulary is there \u2013 you have encountered it when reading and listening but don\u2019t use it in writing, speaking (@HanaTicha<\/a>)<\/p>\n

@Marisa_C<\/a> informed us that vocabulary that can be mentally processed (even if this is limited to recognition) is not passive. So, she suggested the use of an alternative distinction: receptive vs. productive vocabulary.<\/p>\n

Contributors to the discussion seemed to like this distinction and examined the ways through which they can help learners\u2019 transition from receptive to productive vocabulary.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How do we select which vocabulary needs activating and who decides? (@Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/strong><\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

After agreeing to an acceptable definition\/distinction, the discussion focused on deciding which vocabulary is to be activated and who makes the decision. There was an agreement among #eltchat<\/a> members that activation of passive\/receptive vocabulary is much easier in ESP\/EAP settings. What about General English classes, though?<\/p>\n

-The needs of the learner but also frequency rates (@HanaTicha<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Need for corpus use. (@Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Depends on its \u201cusefulness\u201d in real life. We can use \u2018difficult words,\u2019 but what if they are not really used? (@sunnicron<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Every time a learner struggles to recall a word, there is need for activation (@angelos_bollas<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Depends on learners\u2019 interests (@patrickelt<\/a>); when there is a real, genuine need for a word, then the learners are likely to \u2018activate\u2019 it. (@StudyBundles<\/a>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How do we activate?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

During the last 30 minutes, my newsfeed was full of great ideas on helping students learning, memorising, recognising, and recalling lexical items. I have included a selection of the contributors\u2019 ideas, here:<\/p>\n

-Lots of group work, exposure to texts for discussion (@rapple18<\/a>)<\/p>\n

@Marisa_C<\/a> brought in the theory of encounters and @rapple18<\/a> confirmed that students need at least six encounters with targeted words in order to acquire them.<\/p>\n

-Methodical recording of vocabulary (@HadaLitim<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Through meaningful exposure to vocabulary (@cherrymp<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Idiom charades: Students mime all individual words then whole idiom (Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Emphasis in writing; written texts tend to be more lexically rich (@sunnicron<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Lots of reading and listening exposure as a springboard for writing\/speaking (@rapple18<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Setting up personalised, \u2018real life\u2019 situations where the target vocabulary is required to complete the task. (@StudyBundles<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Recycling in a number of different ways and contexts (@MarjorieRosenbe<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Delayed copying and producing: students look and then take their eyes off the text and either say or write what the saw a few seconds ago. (@HanaTicha<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Ranking\/priority activities: involve students in decision making using selected items (@Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Providing suggested lexis for task completion (@angelos_bollas<\/a>) and using a checklist that students have to tick as each word is used (@StudyBundles<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Dictogloss: a great activity for recall and use (of words and grammar, too) (@Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Old, classic but still highly effective is the flashcard collection, or the more contemporary Quizlet. (@HadaLitim<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Mind maps, lexical sets, categories, word families (@fionaljp<\/a>)<\/p>\n

-Students can create own sentences using target lexis (@Marisa_C<\/a>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Useful links provided by #eltchat<\/a> contributors<\/strong><\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.academia.edu\/4348866\/From_Passive_to_Active_Control_of_Science_Vocabulary<\/a><\/p>\n

This is an earlier version of a paper that appeared as M.A. Bravo, G.N. Cervetti, E.H. Hiebert, &<\/span>P. D. Pearson (2006). From passive to active control of science vocabluary. In D.W. Rowe et al.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>(Eds.),\u00a0<\/span>56th Yearbook of the National Reading Conference<\/div>\n
pp. 264-275). Oak Creek, WI: NRC.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
http:\/\/freerice.com\/#\/english-vocabulary\/4646<\/a><\/div>\n
This is an online game that helps learners recycle\/recall vocabulary (vocabulary is used without context, but still it is helpful)<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
http:\/\/scottthornbury.wordpress.com\/2013\/06\/02\/v-is-for-vocabulary-teaching\/<\/a><\/div>\n
Scott Thornbury\u2019s blog.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
http:\/\/fraze.it\/<\/a><\/div>\n
Another online tool<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
http:\/\/oupeltglobalblog.com\/2011\/04\/15\/what-do-idioms-look-like\/<\/a><\/div>\n
English Language Teaching Global Blog by Oxford University Press.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

November 18, 2014 by Angelos Bollas TEFL Leave a comment   #ELTchat\u00a0is a group of ELT professionals discussing topics of interest every Wednesday at 12pm or 9pm on rotation. Every Saturday, one of the moderators puts up a blog post on the\u00a0#ELTchat Blog\u00a0asking teachers who follow\u00a0#ELTchat\u00a0to propose some topics for the next charts. #ELTchat followers…
Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-summary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6891\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eltchat.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}