Teaching Vocabulary

I can safely say that "the best way to teach vocabulary" does not exist as one specific technique, but as an accumulation of a variety of methods that supplement each other. These methods depend on the circumstances which include, "the objective and purpose of the vocabulary lesson . . ., the target language, available materials, the level and knowledge of the students, the teacher's and students' personality, the teaching approach, and above all the nature and the content of the vocabulary itself" (Brandl, 95). Using these factors as the foundation, we can then proceed to implement theories of language acquisition as well as research done in the classroom.

Because we know that language learning is a cognitive process and our we process/encode information via various ways, we apply a variety of language theories in the classroom. We also know that the mind utilizes dual coding which refers to both the verbal and imagery that our brains contain. Interestingly enough, we remember images better than words. Therefore, methods that involve introducing vocabulary through multimedia have proven to be more beneficial than simply learning words without corresponding images. As teachers we can present input in an interactive way keeping spatial contiguity and temporal contiguity in mind. Students learn better when the word and picture are presented next to one another on the page and when corresponding words and pictures are presented simultaneously rather than successively.

Also, besides making use of concepts such as the coherence principle, realia and TPR, our goal should be to promote deeper level of processing by "asking students to manipulate words, relate to other words and to their own experiences" (Brandl, 83). Ultimately, like many other methods of teaching, by employing a variety of engaging methods, we are able to better reach the students, and they will have a better chance of learning and retaining the information because we learn in various ways by accessing/implementing different parts of our minds.