Literacy Spotlight
Improving Vocabulary
The best vocabulary choice won’t
necessarily be the longest word!
Ban Boring Words
You should always aim for your vocabulary
choices to be:
• Accurate
• Vivid
• Specific
Accurate
You need to ensure that you are
using the right word for the
given idea, context or situation.
This could mean jargon or
subject-specific terminology.
It also means that when you
are using a thesaurus you
should check that the word still
makes sense!
Example:
It was a dark night.
Using a thesaurus might give
you words such as ‘aphotic’ to
use instead.
Sounds impressive?
But, ‘aphotic’ means the dark
part of the ocean where
sunlight doesn’t reach.
Therefore, it wouldn’t make
sense to describe the night as
‘aphotic’.
Vivid
In descriptive writing, you
need to choose the word
that creates the clearest
picture for your reader.
Sometimes, an imaginative
comparison or imagery will
allow you to do this.
Example:
It was a dark night.
The word ‘dark’ tells us the
colour, but doesn’t tell us
much about the
atmosphere.
The simile ‘The night was as
black as coal’ might suggest
a dreary or gloomy
atmosphere and gives a
clearer picture to the
reader.
Specific
Make your writing clear by using the most
specific word that you can.
Which word describes this
image most specifically?
• An animal?
• An arthropod?
• A crustacean?
• A crab?
• A Sally Lightfoot crab?
How Do I Improve My Vocabulary
Choices?
• Create key vocabulary lists or grids for each of
your topics;
• Use a thesaurus to find alternatives for bland
word choices;
• Use a dictionary to check that your word
makes sense in the context that you are
writing in;
• Use imaginative comparisons (e.g. similes and
metaphors) when appropriate.
Starter 1
Create a word web
This is best for descriptive or imaginative writing
exercises.
Start with one word in the middle of your page. Use a
thesaurus to find as many alternatives for that word as
you can. Then, do the same for each of those words to
create a whole web!
NB: You could also do this with word association, rather
than synonyms.
Starter 2
Create a key vocabulary list for each topic
This would work for any subject and works
effectively as a revision tool or list of words that
will be important to understand before learning
about a topic.
It can be as simple as a list with definitions, or
you could categorise the list into sections.
Freerice.com
This is a great game to learn new vocabulary.
It would work best in tutor time or as a small-group
activity.
It does also have subject-specific vocabulary
quizzes.
http://freerice.com/