The Importance of Vocabulary Development

How will you communicate if you do not have any words? I believe it is not possible, right? Actually, it is not.?This is why vocabulary development is important.

According to Steven Stahl (2005) “Vocabulary knowledge is knowledge; the knowledge of a word not only implies a definition but also implies how that word fits into the world.”?This means that vocabulary is a building block in communication, either written or oral. Vocabulary development positively influences all four skills of language as it helps you to express yourself more clearly and precisely. Fortunately, there are so many ways one can learn vocabulary and many factors that influence one’s vocabulary development.

Before my grandma introduced reading to me, I mostly learned new words from watching television shows. My mother never missed the evening news on TV3, one of the television stations in Ghana. I admired the news anchors’ fluency in the English language and wrote any word I had not heard before in my book. When my grandma added the weekly reading, I developed another vocabulary builder.?

Most often, we acquire vocabulary incidentally. This can happen in the home, school, event, or church, amongst others. The major ways through which we acquire vocabulary are listening to people and reading. What are some of the steps we need to follow to build new vocabulary?

First, we need to encounter new words. We meet these new words when we read books, listen to audiobooks, podcasts, Ted Talks, etc. When I was reading Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye in the first quarter of 2023, I met over twenty new words.

The next thing is to find the meaning of these new words and the ways in which they are used. It is important to look these words up in the dictionary and understand their various usages.?Just memorizing the meaning of words does not mean you know words.

The next important step is to use these new words in your speech and writing. This is where the actual learning takes place. Learning by doing is the best way. When we use these words appropriately in our real-world experiences, they become easy to decipher and get stored in the deep consciousness of our brains.?

The stock of our vocabulary contributes immensely to how we compose our writing and speech.?

In my final year in the university, we were to submit a project work to our department. We were put into groups of four to work on any research topic of our choice. In my group, there were two members who were very articulate. They suggested beautiful vocabulary to use in the write-up which made the work interesting and captivating. I asked them what their secret was and the answers I received were very simple. One said he liked reading from varied sources and the other said he often listened to talk shows on the radio and television. They learned numerous words and endeavoured to use them in their compositions.?

Also, with enough vocabulary, you easily understand whatever you hear or read. You do not need to run to the dictionary every second to find the meaning of words when you are reading or listening. Your vocabulary increases your comprehension ability. This in turn enhances your ability to think more logically.?

Moreso, it boosts your power of persuasion. Your ability to persuade people to buy your ideas lies in the words you use. Imagine being a marketer who sells products. The probability of getting customers is highly dependent on how you convince people using words.?

The importance of vocabulary cannot be downplayed in effective communication.?This is why we need to intentionally build our vocabulary.