Vocabulary is most often acquired incidentally, either at home, school, or within the community, but here are some of the ways in which we can increase our children’s vocabulary.
Vocabulary, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, refers to “all the words known and used by a particular person” or “all the words that exist in a particular language or subject”, yet very few people sit up and take notice of the importance of vocabulary within our lives and take it for granted.
When we communicate, we use and manipulate words. This manipulation is imperative as it helps to ensure that our messages are conveyed accurately and appropriately when conversing with others and quite simply helps us get our message across. The building blocks of our messages? Vocabulary, plain and simple in either oral or written formats. Stahl (2005) accurately describes “vocabulary knowledge is knowledge; the knowledge of a word not only implies a definition but also implies how that word fits into the world.” The questions that come to the fore are how is vocabulary acquired and what can we do to increase it?
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