INTENSIVE READING & VOCABULARY STUDY JOURNAL

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Zoe Laureen Green
5 years ago
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INTENSIVE READING & VOCABULARY STUDY JOURNAL 1. What article or collection of abstracts have you chosen? Please give details such as the name of the journal, volume and issue numbers, URL, etc.

What's the text coverage of your known words? 3. Find Web VP. Copy the original text into it and submit. What percentage of words is from K1? From K2? From K1 + K2? From the AWL? Off-List?

1 INTENSIVE READING & VOCABULARY STUDY JOURNAL 1. What article or collection of abstracts have you chosen? Please give details such as the name of the journal, volume and issue numbers, URL, etc. WP document made and saved? Number of words? 2. Created another WP document and copied all the unknown words into it? How many words? What percentage of the total number of words? What's the text coverage of your known words? 3. Find Web VP. Copy the original text into it and submit. What percentage of words is from K1? From K2? From K1 + K2? From the AWL? Off-List? If possible print out the text in color. Don't close the Web VP window A O-L 4. If you printed out the text in colour, work with the paper. If not, work onscreen. First, look at the K1 (most important 1000 words) in blue. Do you know what they mean? Are you surprised that some of these are K1 words? If there are any that you don't know, write them down and leave a space for the Japanese translation. These are ULTRA-HIGH priority for learning! 5. IN A NEW BROWSER WINDOW, go to and paste the original text into the window. Click Go. Hover the mouse over the words you wrote down just now. If the translations are correct, write them down in the box above. Try to remember some of them as you write. Don't close this window. 6. Now focus on the K2 (2nd most important 1000 words) in green. If there are any that you don't know, write them down and add Japanese translations (using rikai.com). These are also very high priority for learning! THE PORTFOLIO PRINCIPLE: Everything you do counts towards your final grade iff you keep a record. So print out documents, and also take screenshots and print them, too. If you keep a learning diary in a notebook (e.g. "May 21st: I studied AWL Sublist " "May 23rd: downloaded and watched xxxxxx presentation" "May 26th: read yyyy document ") this also will count towards your grade.

2 7. Copy the unknown words text into Web VP. What percentage of words is from K1? From K2? From K1 + K2? From the AWL? Off-List? FOR MOST PEOPLE, WE WOULD EXPECT THE PERCENTAGES OF AWL AND OFF-LIST WORDS TO BE HIGH. SOME OF THE OFF-LIST WORDS WILL BE SPECIALIST WORDS IN YOUR FIELD, SOME WILL BE RATHER LESS COMMON NON-SPECIALIST WORDS. THE MAIN PURPOSE OF THIS EXERCISE IS TO LEARN THE WORDS THAT YOU ARE LIKELY TO MEET AGAIN, TO SAVE EFFORT LATER. THE AWL WORDS WILL ALMOST CERTAINLY BE OF USE AND THESE SHOULD BE YOUR MAIN FOCUS. FOR OFF-LIST WORDS YOU WILL NEED TO DECIDE LATER WHICH OF THESE ARE SPECIALIST WORDS (YOU NEED TO LEARN THESE!) AND WHICH ARE NON-SPECIALIST (FOR THESE YOU NEED TO DECIDE WHICH ARE IMPORTANT). 8. If you printed out the text in colour, work with the printout. If you didn't, repeat Step 3. Now focus on the AWL words (yellow). Write down the words you don't know below. If there is not enough space, make a separate list and keep it with these papers and just write a few words in this box. Again, use rikai.com to find translations of the words you have written down. 9. The AWL is arranged in sublists. Visit and download the sublists, and print them out. Look through the list of AWL words you wrote down earlier. Find those words in the sublists and mark them off. Then reorder the list you made in 8 according to sublist (make this list on a separate piece of paper). How many words from each of the sublists? Sublist 1 Sublist 5 Sublist 9 Sublist 2 Sublist 6 Sublist 10 Sublist 3 Sublist 7 Sublist 4 Sublist 8 page 2

10. Look at the original text in the rikai.com window. Start reading the text without moving the pointer over the words. You will probably have remembered some of the unknown words by now.

3 10. Look at the original text in the rikai.com window. Start reading the text without moving the pointer over the words. You will probably have remembered some of the unknown words by now. Write down some of the K1/K2 and AWL words that you haven't yet remembered, get their translations with the pointer, and write them down here (any kind of word). If you want to write many words, use a separate sheet of paper, and just write a few words in this box. BY NOW, AFTER LOOKING AT YOUR UNKNOWN WORDS, ARRANGING THEM IN LISTS AND WRITING THEM DOWN, YOU WILL PROBABLY HAVE REMEMBERED OR HALF-REMEMBERED MANY OF THE K1/K2 & AWL WORDS. IN A TYPICAL CASE, THIS WILL TAKE YOUR COVERAGE UP TO MORE THAN 80%. AT ABOVE 80% IT MAY BECOME POSSIBLE TO UNDERSTAND THE BASIC MEANING OF THE TEXT. NOW IS A GOOD TIME TO PRINT OUT THE TEXT AND GET A GENERAL IMPRESSION OF YOUR COVERAGE. 11. With the WP document of the original text, select all and make a very wide margin. Print the document. Try to read a few paragraphs. How difficult is it? Do you feel you know more of the words than you did before? Underline the words you don't know. Some of these are off-list words that you haven't studied yet. Don't worry about them. Others are words that you have just studied but you have forgotten. For these words write the word in the margin with Japanese translation(s). What words did you write down? Write them down here, too. Try to write down the Japanese translations from memory. If you prefer, you can write the sentence or phrase instead of the word only. Use a separate sheet of paper if you wish to write more than space allows. page 3

4 FOR DEEP UNDERSTANDING AND EASY READING, 95% COVERAGE IS DESIRABLE. TO APPROACH 95%, YOU NEED TO DEAL WITH THE OFF-LIST WORDS. FOR TECHNICAL OR SPECIALIST WORDS, YOU NEED TO KNOW ALL OF THEM. FOR 3K~ WORDS YOU NEED TO DECIDE WHETHER YOU WANT TO LEARN THEM OR NOT. 12. Look at the off-list words (red). For each word, decide whether it is specialized (technical) or general but uncommon. Put all the specialized words into a list. For non-specialized words, if you know them ignore them. If you don't know them, decide whether you should learn them or not. Put the words you want to learn into an "Off-List General" list. (Use another sheet if necessary.) Take a few minutes to try to learn some of the words. (You could make word cards or write the word 3 or 4 times on a piece of paper. If you do this, say the word aloud as you write it to increase the stimulus.) page 4

5 13. Have another look at the printout of the whole text with wide margins. Read through the article. Are there any words you don't understand? If they are off-list words, write the word and translation in the margin. If they are K1/K2 or AWL words, look at the translation you wrote before and try to remember the words. What words did you need to check? Write them here, and then try to write their translations from memory. Don't forget to keep these sheets and any other sheets you made, to include in your portfolio! page 5

14. Now let's test our AWL knowledge. Visit http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~alzsh3/acvocab/awlgapmaker.htm Paste in a few paragraphs of your text. Choose the options "1" and "List", then click "Submit".

6 14. Now let's test our AWL knowledge. Visit Paste in a few paragraphs of your text. Choose the options "1" and "List", then click "Submit". Can you fill in the gaps? Print and make 2 or 3 copies. One is for you to do now. One is to give to me at the end of the course (I'll use it with next year's students). One copy is for you to make your own final test. Keep this one until test time at the end of the semester. You can repeat this exercise at, for example, levels 2, 5, 7 and 10, for extra practice. Alternatively, you could first do your whole text at sublist 1 for intensive practice at this level. Write down in this space what levels you used, what words you had difficulty with. If you wish, you can also write down some phrases using the AWL words that you want to learn. How did you do? Was this a hard exercise? If you didn't like it, you can change your approach next time. But I hope that this has helped you to understand the importance of vocabulary, and the possibility and usefulness of taking an analytical approach to learning English. page 6

CUT! EARLIER AT LEAST

CUT! EARLIER AT LEAST Tips for IB Film - Be organised! - Show. Don t tell. - Start Strong. - Film on interesting locations, not on school or compounds only. - Adults portraying adults. - Overthink your shots in preproduction.