A few months ago I read the amusing and thought provoking novel ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ by Bonnie Garmus and was fascinated by the fact her dog, ‘Six-Thirty’ understands 981 words. This got me thinking about my Border Collie, Flo and how extensive her vocabulary is! I briefly considered creating a list of familiar words, but fortunately I returned to reality, leaving this frivolous, fictitious chore for another day!
As Head of Dukes Tutoring and a current 11+ English / VR tutor I am fascinated by words. Why say ‘happy’ when you can say ‘ecstatic’, ‘euphoric’ or ‘elated’? When describing someone who is excessively chatty or talkative, consider using the adjective ‘loquacious’ and then consider the antonym – ‘laconic.’
In The Railway Children by E. Nesbit, Peter is chastised by Bobbie for talking “like a book” when he described the red-jerseyed boy in the train tunnel as “an unresisting prey to any passing express.” The character was using both simile and metaphor, clearly enjoying selecting words for impact. Interestingly, the average 10 year old has an approximate vocabulary of 20,000 – 30,000 words and therefore, with so many possible options, why are the same tired and exhausted words often overused?
We know how important reading is for developing creativity and imagination, expanding vocabulary and taking us out of our comfort zone, learning new words, not only the meaning, but how to use them in context. Many years ago, a Y5 student came across the word ‘ostentatious’ and felt incredibly mature using it in her own writing. Initially, the word was used incorrectly, but it was a cause for celebration as she was developing her active vocabulary. Her teacher noticed at school, her parents praised her, and this spurred her on, to the next new word – ‘brine.’ More challenging to use in an everyday context, however, this was not a barrier, and the student grew more excited and motivated by words, the sound of them, the feel of them and almost the taste of them, considering shades of meaning and ultimately, the nuance.
Everlyn Waugh said, “One forgets words as one forgets names. One’s vocabulary needs constant fertilising, or it will die.”
Developing a love of words and gaining pleasure from extending your active vocabulary is important as is revision and consolidation. When teaching, so much fun can be had from word puzzles, hunting for hidden words, unscrambling anagrams, identifying idioms, considering synonyms, antonyms and learning to distinguish between homophones, homonyms and homographs. Learning to identify the word class can also be a huge help to students when having to choose the correct word – is it a noun? a verb? an adjective? adverb? Are we looking for a positive word or one with negative connotations? Does the root give us any clues? I often ask students to put a word into context and make up a mini ‘story’ which enables them to see if their idea works and is a viable choice.
Encouraging word play and having fun with words can start at any age. Have a look at some of the easy family friendly suggestions for KS1 and KS2 students below:
- Encourage lots of reading and investigate a wide range of genres – fantasy, science fiction, historical, mystery, action, animal, school, anime, graphic novels or non-fiction texts linked to your favourite subjects. Children’s newspapers such as The Week Junior or First News are excellent. Talk about them together, share favourite excerpts and discuss new, interesting or unusual words.
- Select a wordless book without a text such as Waves by Suzy Lee or Professional Crocodile by Giovanna Zoboli and have fun creating your own text. How will the characters interact? What are their voices like? Can you describe the setting and create an appropriate atmosphere? What sort of language will they use?
- Start a personal vocabulary book, set it out like a dictionary in alphabetical order and record your favourite new words. Write the word, spelling it correctly with a definition that you understand and then challenge yourself to use it when writing creatively.
- Play word themed board games with classics such as Scrabble, Boggle, Bananagrams, Articulate for Kids, Rummikub Word as well as online games such as Wordle and Word Connections. Word puzzles such as dingbats, rebus puzzles, cross words, word scrambles and quiz themed books can provide great entertainment too.
- Don’t forget about free games that you can play anywhere such as the Word Association game. Think of a starting word e.g. ‘blue’. The next player thinks of a word linked to ‘blue’ e.g. ‘sky’ and the game continues e.g. aeroplane . . . holiday . . . Italy . . . pizza etc. You can make it harder by adding in a rule where you cannot continue the same topic theme so if a player said ‘aeroplane’ after ‘sky’, you couldn’t continue with a transport theme and say ‘ferry’ but have to alter the next theme to keep players on their toes! Look at adverts whilst sitting on the tube – how many words can you make from the letters in THE LION KING? You can play anywhere – it is not only free, but great fun!
- Create an imaginary language. You can use a book, fantasy map or place as a stimulus. Think about the rules. Will you focus on key words and expressions? ‘Hello’, ‘Please’, ‘Thank You’ or go into more detail e.g. taking off the last letter of a word, changing a vowel to a consonant, considering verbs or differences between singular or plural words.
- Select a topic and in a minute write as many words as you can linked to a theme e.g. space, the circus, under the sea, school. This is great for idea generation and extremely helpful in an exam context for story planning, ensuring you have specific technical and topic based examples.
- Have fun with newspaper headlines. Create alliterative titles, play around with puns and enjoy experimenting with the humour of language.
As a teacher, I know how important a strong vocabulary foundation is and how this empowers students to be articulate, to communicate clearly and choose words with precision, understanding inference and the nuances of language better. An enriched vocabulary aids student’s emotional intelligence, helps with empathy and considering different character perspectives. It also encourages perseverance, the need to be inquisitive, to be resilient and resourceful, to use what you know in order to come to a solution. To summarise: vocabulary is in fact an incredible secret power which helps in no end of situations.
At Dukes Tutoring we have a wonderful team of experienced tutors who are able to support your child, empowering them to be the best they can be, developing their secret vocabulary power, whether starting their educational journey or needing specific support working towards entrance exams. We can help with technique, strategy, narrowing curriculum gaps and extending, whilst developing a love of language, literature and wordplay.
The dog ‘Six-Thirty’ in Lessons in Chemistry knew 981 words. How many do you actively recall and use on a frequent basis? How strong is your secret power?
