Acquiring Vocabulary through a Context-Based Approach

Abstract

Developing students’ strategies for learning unfamiliar words is a prime challenge of English reading people. The shortcomings of this approach are well known. Much dictionary work can mar all interest in reading and even interfere with comprehension because readers become less aware of the context which gives them meaning. It also leads to very slow and ineffective reading. Surmising vocabulary from context is the usual way to con the meaning of new words. Honey field stresses the impetus of context by remarking that even with a functional vocabulary of the 3,000 most frequently occurring items in English; readers will still not know approximately 20 per cent of the items they come across in a un simplified text.