How to improve vocabulary?
Strategies to Increase Vocabulary
Importance of Vocabulary:
Having a good vocabulary is extremely important, not only from an academic perspective but in general as well. A good vocabulary helps you write engaging content and improves your comprehension skills. However, most of us find vocabulary building quite an exhausting and challenging task. This is mainly because we think of vocabulary building as rote learning of thousands of words. That strategy is not only very time-consuming but also ineffective in the long run. Following are some of the simple and easy ways you can follow to build your vocabulary:
1) Read a lot!
One of the easiest and most effective ways to learn vocabulary is to read a lot. Identify what captivates your interest and start reading about that. It can be anything – for example, you can read up on sports, fashion, finance, politics, global affairs, and the list goes on! Not only will you enhance your knowledge of that particular topic, but you also learn how the writer has used different words. You will understand the contextual meaning and therefore will remember how those words are being used.
2) Practice using new words.
Once you have learned some new words, you need to start using them. There are different ways you can use those words. For example, you can use them in conversation. When you are talking to your friends and family members, you should use some of those new words. Even better would be to use those new words when talking to your teachers. That way your professor will be able to identify if you are using that word correctly and in case you are not, the professor will be able to correct you. In addition to that, you can use those new words in your writing assignments.
3) Subscribe to “word of the day” feeds
Make good use of your smartphone and subscribe to some of the ‘word of the day’ apps. A lot of those apps are for free. All you need to do is to subscribe to them and you will be daily getting a new word to learn. It will hardly take a minute or two but doing that consistently will help improve your vocabulary bank.
4) Play Word Games
Another fun way to improve your vocabulary is to play word games. There are different word games you can play including scrabble and crossword puzzles. You can play those games on your smartphone. The good thing about playing those games on a smartphone is that you can start from a beginners’ level and as you keep on building vocabulary you will move to advanced levels. So that’s an interesting way to improve your vocabulary.
5) Flashcards
You can use flashcards as well to improve your vocabulary. With the help of digital apps, it has become easier to prepare and organize these flashcards. However, make sure you don’t try to learn too many new words in a day. Make realistic goals. You can start by learning one new word every day and as you improve you can aim for two and so on. Aiming to learn dozens of new words every day is not realistic and will only demotivate you.
6) Consistency is the KEY!
Whichever strategy you follow is completely up to YOU! What is important is that you identify what suits you best and then follow that strategy consistently. Just don’t give up and always remember – Great Things Take Time!
