Recently, I gave a verbalise at an EAP conference at St Andrews University almost encouraging EAP students to acquire vocabulary independently. I argued that rather than trying to learn students all the vocab items they demand to know inward course of educational activity (arguably an impossible task), it’s to a greater extent than effective to learn them about vocabulary. By that I mean, teaching almost some of the fundamental features of English linguistic communication (academic) vocabulary that volition assist students to meliorate sympathise the words they come upwards across inward their studies; to know what to expect out for in addition to how to notice out to a greater extent than (using dictionaries, etc.).
I mentioned several features of vocabulary that teachers powerfulness focus on inward course of educational activity including lexicogrammatical features (e.g. countable in addition to uncountable nouns), give-and-take formation, collocation, dependent prepositions, register in addition to connotation. The characteristic that people seemed less familiar with, in addition to which several people asked me about, was colligation. I’ll fess upwards instantly that despite having been involved inward dictionaries in addition to vocab teaching for many years, it’s a relatively novel term to me too. That’s non to tell I wasn’t familiar amongst the full general concept, but I didn’t accept a overnice swell term for it.
So where collocation is the inclination of lexical items to seem together, colligation is the vogue of words to seem together amongst item grammatical structures or forms. Probably the most obvious instance that appears inward coursebooks is where item words are typically followed past times a verb inward an infinitive or gerund form; decide to do, bask doing, vogue to do, avoid doing, etc. But it tin also include, for example, the agency that for sure words tend to live on used inward negative constructions;
There seems to live on no need for authorities regulation.
Established universities accept traditionally not felt the need to marketplace their services.
It’s the sort of data that learner’s lexicon typically highlight inward instance sentences, either past times bolding the fundamental elements or sometimes using a ‘frame’;
[+ to infinitive] I can’t afford to purchase a house.
[+ that] The Prime Minister has announced that populace spending volition live on increased side past times side year.
(Examples from Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)
I shout out back it’s an under-exploited expanse inward the classroom. Beyond an occasional activeness on the next gerund/infinitive thing, I suspect colligation issues to a greater extent than oft than non acquire picked upwards inward feedback (when students accept come upwards up amongst an awkward colligation inward their writing) rather than beingness highlighted proactively.
As amongst the other features, I’m non a fan of presenting students amongst long lists of colligations, but raising awareness of the agency that item words behavior grammatically every bit they crop upwards is, I think, a fundamental purpose of helping students to notice patterns in addition to to hopefully usage vocabulary to a greater extent than fluently in addition to effectively.
* Hunston, S. (2001) Colligation, lexis, pattern, in addition to text
0 Response to "Teaching Nearly Vocabulary: Colligation"
Post a Comment