Introduction
Some years ago I wrote a book called Grammar Practice Activities. I wrote it because, like many other language teachers, I was aware of the importance of teaching grammar, but frustrated by the lack of interesting and communicative grammar activities in my coursebooks. The book was well-received, frequently reprinted, and more recently updated in a new edition.1 But grammar is, though perhaps the most written-about aspect of language teaching and learning, by no means the most important. That place is reserved for its vocabulary, which is the main carrier of meanings. As David Wilkins puts it: ‘While without grammar little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed.’2 As with grammar, interesting and learning-rich activities are needed to help learners acquire, practise and deepen their knowledge of the lexical items of a language. And as with grammar, it seemed to me that teachers would be glad of a resource offering a variety of such activities to supplement the material provided by their coursebooks: hence Vocabulary Activities.
The book provides a varied set of vocabulary activities, most of which can be used with whatever vocabulary items you are currently teaching: ones that have come up in a text, for example, or ones connected to a theme or topic you wish to engage with in the classroom. Most of the activities are therefore ‘generic’ rather than limited to a particular set of items. So where there are sample texts or lists of items in a Box, these usually function as examples and illustrations.
The activities are varied also in the kinds of classes or student populations they address: for ages ranging from young children to adults, and levels from beginner to advanced. Many can be adapted for use with a range of different kinds of classes.
The first section is headed Guidelines and provides some useful background information and practical tips relating to the teaching of vocabulary in general and the design and use of the activities in this book in particular. The second and major section, Activities, consists of the vocabulary activities themselves, organized under the headings: Vocabulary expansion; Vocabulary review; Advanced vocabulary study; Vocabulary testing; Mainly for fun.