Best way to learn vocabulary?

[boomah]

Dear language learners,

In your experience learning a foreign language, what have the most effective methods for picking up and retaining new vocabulary?

Thank you.

[TakeruK]

Do you mean informally learning a language (i.e. self-taught) or learning it as part of school?

 

I haven't learned any languages informally but in Canada we were required to take French courses to a certain level and then I continued it all the way to Grade 12. I found that the way I learned new vocabulary (and incorporated it into my French usage) the best was to just memorize a short list of new words every week and use them in daily exercises. In high school, each week, our teacher would give us about 10-20 words and we would write sentences with them, and use them in our worksheets for that week. We were also encouraged (but not required as part of the class) to write extra sentences with these words to remember them. In addition, we always had a French-English dictionary so that at any time in class we wanted to use a word we didn't know in French, we would pause to look it up. Eventually when you look up a word often enough, you remember it for next time!

 

Anyways, this was how it worked for me! I am a kind of learner that learns best from repeatedly practicing the same skill over and over again, whether it's remembering a word, or how to solve an equation etc.

[maelia8]

I like to listen to recorded conversations using new vocabulary - for me, learning the term in a vacuum doesn't help much, I have to hear or see it used in its normal context. I also really like the Anki flashcard software, since it lets me ascribe any picture or word or mnemonic device to the vocabulary and   learn it with that association, rather than somebody else's association out of a textbook.

[xolo]

OMG, this is a boring activity.  If you are committed to the language then you are committed to its culture.  If you really want to acquire educated speech, then you must read voluminously in the language.   Learning it in-country is a great way to develop a native feel for the language, but you will be learning colloquial speech.  (nothing wrong with that, either).  When I was studying to become a court interpreter I really developed a pretty good legal vocabulary, in which beforehand I wasn't really good in any language.  So there are vocational areas you can study.  

Edited June 28, 2014 by eyepod