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Check out this page, which provides tips for learning, memorizing and using new vocabulary. It's a non-academic source but offers quite useful tips!

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By Noel van Vliet

Aaahhhh, learning vocabulary!

It must be the sexiest element of learning a language.

And perhaps the most controversial.

It's not for nothing that polyglots call it the Kim Kardashian of the language-learning community.

(Actually, I made that up. ;-))

To add fuel to the discussion, and most importantly, to bring you fantastically useful advice on learning vocabulary in your target language, I asked a bunch of experts, authors, translators and bloggers the following question:

If there was one method for learning vocabulary that you'd recommend to the world, which one would it be?

The response was nothing short of overwhelming.

Almost 40 replies flooded my inbox - creating a bomb of extremely balanced advice and giving you the opportunity to judge for yourself how to best go about learning more words in your target language.

The number of hours I put in to create this resource for you is near the number of replies but it was worth every second of it. There are really some golden nuggets down the page!

So, without further ado, let's get comfortable and dive in!

The participants are alphabetically ordered by their first name. You can simply start scrolling from the top or go straight to your favorite language-learning expert by using the list of quick bookmarks below.

Aaron Knight - Albert Wolfe - André Klein - Anne Merritt
Anthony Metivier - Ben Whately - Benny Lewis - Camille Chevalier-Karfis
Catherine Wentworth - Corrine McKay - David Mansaray - Donovan Lee Mcgrath
Flora Petersen - Idahosa Ness - James Heisig - John Fotheringham
Kerstin Hammes - Kevin Chen - Lizzie Fane - Lucas Kern
Lutz Marten - Lynn McBride - Mark Thomson - Martin Benjamin - Olle Linge
Óscar Pellus - Pat Wyman - Professor Jabba - Samuel Gendreau
Simon Ager - Stuart Jay-Ray - Susana Wald - Susanna Zaraysky
Tim Bewer - Tomasz P. Szynalski - Wiktor Kostrzewski - William Linney - Yangyang

Too much to read? Download a free summary that will allow you to quickly find the vocabulary method you like the most. Includes free report that shows you how to dramatically improve your speaking skills in your target language.

Never learn a single word by itself. Learn groups of words that "travel" together.

For example, instead of memorizing the word "flock", memorize the phrase "a flock of sheep". Instead of remembering the verb "occur", remember the phrase "if any problems occur".

When you remember phrases instead of single words, you ensure that you know how to actually use the word in at least one sentence.

Albert Wolfe
Albert Wolfe is the author of various books. Among them: Chinese 24/7: Everyday Strategies for Speaking and Understanding Mandarin. He also teaches English at the Peizheng College in Guangzhou, China and runs the blog Laowai Chinese.

It's true that vocabulary is the concept that gets the most attention by language learners.

My theory is that it's the concept / element we most easily relate to because it's the one thing we can remember doing (and indeed are still doing) for our first language.

But very few people remember much about learning the pronunciation or grammar of their first language, for example.

So if I had to give one vocabulary learning tip, it would be:

There's just no way around memorizing a bunch of words. So put the words where you'll see them as often as possible: on a wall, in a notebook you carry around, on your computer desktop, etc. That way you can get in more review "reps" and memorize them more easily.

André Klein

There are many methods for learning vocabulary, and every learner should experiment with a variety of approaches to see what comes most naturally. The most important part is not fall into a grind, but to find a method one is comfortable with.

For some people, using flashcards will work best, while for others writing down new words or using a vocabulary trainer app will do the trick.

My personal favorite however is learning languages through creative storytelling.

By reading engaging stories (aimed at the student's level) language learners can begin to build emotional and sensory contexts around new vocabulary.

Instead of just studying isolated words by rote, new vocabulary can be memorized quicker and deeper because it is linked to characters, places and relationships, just like in real life.

To find out more about this approach, take a look at my article Your Brain On Storytelling: Foreign Language Learning Through Stories.

If there's one tip I have for learning vocabulary, it's to study it in context. We don't communicate using individual words, we communicate with phrases and sentences.

Language students, especially independent learners, will often flick through vocabulary flashcards or flashcard apps to learn new words.

These cards are a great tool, but they're not enough on their own. A student could learn hundreds of new vocabulary items, but none of that matters if they don't know how to apply those words in different contexts.

When you learn a new word, look at its place in the sentence, and look at the words that typically appear with it. Look for patterns.

Is the context usually formal or casual?

Written or spoken?

Is the word typically used for one topic only?

If it's a word you don't know, look at context clues to try and deduce meaning.

Building your context deduction skills is an invaluable asset in a language learner. Once you've learned the word, try and use it in a few sentences.

When I was a child learning French, my teachers were strict about never giving one-word answers. It was an exercise in politeness as well as sentence-building.

It was never "No", but instead "No, I don't like bananas" or "No, I haven't seen that movie yet."

Back then, it felt rigid and unnecessarily mechanical. Now, I can understand and appreciate what those teachers were doing. Now, when I speak French, I don't have to think twice about applying vocabulary, because using it in context is now second nature.

Ask a native speaker what the word is, keep talking to them for practice, an opportunity to use the word will come up and you'll have forgotten it, and then when you get reminded of it, the embarrassment will burn the word into your memory!

While it's true that flashcard studying in the app Anki, very useful mnemonics given on Memrise.com, and lots of reading in more advanced stages can be effective and how I acquire most of my vocabulary, the first example is the one method that has burned the word into my mind for good every time.
Get out and practice with people!

Camille Chevalier-Karfis

I am a big fan of "smart" flashcards.

On one side, write the English word, just as a backup, and to test yourself. On the other side, write the word, then the word in a short sentence.

Make the sentence close to "home" - use real people / facts in your life, it will help your brain remember it better.

Then write everything there is about that word, in singular and plural with articles, synonyms, notes of pronunciation (specially liaisons or glidings), flags (like "j'attends" doesn't mean "I attend" - je vais à un concert), anything you can think of.

I also think that for beginner and intermediate students at least, working with audio is essential since French is not pronounced the way it is written.

A student who learns French to one day speak it (not only to read or to pass exams) should train to understand "street French", French like it's spoken today, and understand the modern glidings and "eaten up" words (words that are so much glided that they totally disappear in spoken French, like the "ne" of je ne veux pas.)

The audio you learn with should be using modern French, but at a level you can grasp: not too fast, yet doing the glidings, and using simple yet useful vocabulary and constructions.

Trying to describe the world around me regularly in the language I'm learning. This exposes gaps in my vocabulary and gives me ample opportunities for active recall.

For example, I may try to describe what a man crossing the street is wearing. And then I'll ask myself:

Do I know the name for all his items of clothing in my target language?

Do I know all of the colors?

If there's a woman pushing a pram, do I know the word for "pram" in my foreign language?

When I'm exposed to something I don't know I write it down and look it up later.

The possibilities for this method are endless. And it's one of my favorite ways for learning and practicing vocabulary because I can do it at any time of the day and all I need is something to write down new words to look up later.

Lucas Kern
Lucas Kern is the founder of Leicht-Deutsch-Lernen.com, where he offers several products to help you learn German while having fun.

I have encountered many vocabulary-building methods and I think a lot of them are great and very effective to a certain point.

And many of them seem to work in the beginning but then most language learners come to a point that is really hard to overcome. And I think that is the main problem.

You can use the best learning materials and the best methods but if you are not motivated anymore - no method will work.

So I think a good vocabulary-building method is a method that keeps you motivated.

I create German vocabulary lessons myself and I try to focus on fun as a main factor to keep people motivated.

The ideal way of acquiring vocabulary at a rapid pace is to see the vocabulary in a context that can be understood (comprehensible input).

However, this isn't enough for most adult learners for two reasons.

1. It's hard to find suitable immersion material before you reach a level where native material becomes comprehensible.

2. Most learners find it hard to spend enough time to make relying on reading and listening only a viable strategy.

Enter: Spaced repetition software.

SRS allows you to retain a large number of words without spending too much time.

This increases our passive understanding of the language a lot and allows us to gradually increase the amount of the target language we can absorb and therefore also increasing the efficiency of our immersion effort.

So, in essence, I think reading and listening in combination with SRS is the best way to expand vocabulary.

Then, gradually, once we have understood the words, they can be activated and increase our ability to use the target language to express ourselves in speaking and writing.

You may be familiar with a post I wrote on the subject in the past.

Simply put, the method I would recommend the most is to learn through context. I'm especially drawn towards Luca's method. (See suggested post above.)

My answer would be - for myself, I use any technique I can to extend the time I can keep vocabulary in my short-term memory so that I can use it and understand it and so that it can settle in my long-term memory.

In saying that , I personally use association, colors / emotions and the Major Method in combination to extend the short-term memory shelf-life of new vocab.

Music activates more parts of the brain than language does. So when you listen to a song or advertising jingle, you are more likely to recall the words from the song or jingle than if you just read them or heard them spoken.

Find songs where the words are not sung very fast so that you can hear each word distinctly. Mana for Spanish learners, is a good choice.

Find music that you like and that you can easily decipher and learn the lyrics of the songs. You can find song lyrics easily online at www.lyrics.com and other websites.

Here is my vocabulary building tip, which I used to learn Thai, and am still using today to continue to improve.

I write all my new vocabulary words on a piece of paper that I always keep in my pocket. I pull it out when I have any free time - waiting in line at the store, riding a bus, standing in an elevator, etc. - and use it to practice.

When I feel I am remembering the word well enough I write it in a notebook. I then use this notebook to review words, going through, usually, two or three pages each day.

When I come upon a word that I have forgotten, I put it on the list in my pocket again.

1. Natural input

2. SRS (if you're an introvert)

Personally, I think remembering words with sentences or paragraphs is good way to learn vocabulary.

What a mammoth of a post!

A HUGE thanks to all contributors! Without you this wouldn't have been possible, of course.

Thanks to you, my readers, as well. If you consider this post as helpful as I do, please share it with your friends.

That's it! You've reached the end of the post. There's just one little thing left to ask:

If there was one method for learning vocabulary that you'd recommend to the world, which one would it be?

Let me know in the comments below.

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38 Language-Learning Experts Reveal their Favorite Method for Learning Vocabulary

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By Noel van Vliet Aaahhhh, learning vocabulary! It must be the sexiest element of learning a language. And perhaps the most controversial. It's not for nothing that polyglots call it the Kim Kardashian of the language-learning community. (Actually, I made that up.