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Ambar Videa #24

Ángel Rodríguez #7

Kenneth Suazo #3

Claudia Mendoza #15

Vocabulary and ESP

Same Goals

Level of Proficiency

The context

Amount of time

What vocabulary do ESP learners need?

Include special purpose, specialized, technical ,sub - technical, and semi - technical vocabulary. In essence, such terms usually refer to the vocabulary of a particular area of study or professional use.

What is Vocabulary for English for SpecificPurposes?

size of this specialized vocabulary is not fully established.

Understanding and using this special purposes vocabulary shows that these learners belong to a particular group.

Teachers and learners need to know that precious classroom time is directly related to their language needs.

Vocabulary in ESP is important for several reasons:

Why is ESP vocabulary important?

The other approach conceptualizes all language as being for specific purposes.

One approach posits that English has a common core of words all learners should know.

Two fundamental perspectives:

Conceptualizing Vocabulary and ESP

Consulting experts and technical dictionaries.

Using a scale.

Corpus-based studies.

How to Identify Specialized Vocabulary?

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80%

Consulting Technical Dictionaries

Consulting Experts

NEXT

Support, part, protects

Words which minimally related to the subject area.

Step 2

Between, amount, early

Words with meanings that have no specific connection to the subject area.

Step 1

BACK

Fascia, pedicle

Words that are related closely to the technical subject area.

Step 4

Neck, heart, breathing.

Words that are more closely related to the subject area.

Step 3

NEXT

Corpus-based allows for larger-scole investigation of words in context.

A Common Core Approach: AWL

Six of the ten most frequent words in the Wang et al. list also occur in the AWL, for example, data, significant, analyze, respond, factor, and method. The other four in the medical word list top ten are cell, muscular, protein, and clinic.

Wang et al.’s (2008) medical word list was compiled using the GSL as a common core, but not the AWL. A consequence of this approach is overlap between the AWL and the medical word list.

Specialized Medical Vocabulary

Ward’s final list contains 299 word types and covers 16.4 percent of a corpus of engineering textbooks. The top ten words from Ward’s list are system, shown, equation, example, value, design, used, section, flow, and given.

An example of early specialization for vocabulary learning is Ward’s (2009) development of an English word list of basic engineering to support lower proficiency undergraduates.

Early specialization: Ward’s English list of basic engineering words

Key or difficult concepts in a lecture might well be expressed through metaphor. Students who are not able to follow the metaphors are likely to misunderstand the lecture or not understand the key points at all. Boers (1997) finds that exposure to health, fitness, and fighting metaphors affects the language used by one hundred business and economics university students in a problem - solving activity. Cultural differences can affect metaphor use.

Metaphor as an Example of Specialized Vocabulary

-One of the most -As a result of -On the other hand. -Something like that.

Lexical boundless

-Interest rates -Cash flow -Wall street -Stock market -Market Share

Two - word phrases, Nelson

Three - word phrases, Nelson

-A lot of -One of the -The end of -In order to -We need to

Looking Beyond the Single Word at Lexical Patterning in ESP

Specialized vocabulary evolves and renews itself according to changing interests within communities of practice.

What to do with everyday words that take on a particular meaning in a specialized context.

What are Some Challenges for Vocabulary in ESP ?

Nation's Four Strands:

Meaning - focussed output

Language - focussed learning

Fluency development

Meaning - focussed input

Bringing Special Vocabulary into the Classroom

In Summary...

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