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SavannahYear 8
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EnglishPoetry: conventions and precise words30 min★★★ difficulty

Making a new word yours: from noticing to using

A word you can recognise is not yet a word you can use. This lesson gives you a four-stage route from meeting a word in reading to using it accurately in your own writing and speech - and how to avoid the two ways it goes wrong.

Lesson overview

What you'll learn in this lesson

Draw on new vocabulary and grammatical constructions from their reading and listening, and use these consciously in their writing and speech

Key learning points

  • • The four stages
  • • Nuance between near-synonyms
  • • Collocation: the trap dictionaries set
  • • The two failure modes

This lesson at a glance

  • 30 minutes
  • 19 parts to scroll through
  • 4 quick checks
  • Marked quiz at the end
  • Gentle pace: short sittings with pauses

Words to know

vocabularygrammaticalconstructionsreadinglistening

Scroll down — the lesson carries on below

Part 1 of 19 · Discover5%
1

Watch & discover

Part 1 of 19

Watch first

Making a new word yours: from noticing to using

An English teaching video on this topic from TED-Ed. Watch it, then scroll down for the lesson.

In a nutshell

Draw on new vocabulary and grammatical constructions from their reading and listening, and use these consciously in their writing and speech

2

What you already know

Part 2 of 19

Before we start

What you already know

You keep a note of new words from your reading.

Recap: Stealing better words from what you read
3

Key words

Part 3 of 19

Key words

Words you'll need today

Collocation
The words a word usually sits beside: 'heavy rain', not 'weighty rain'.
Nuance
A small difference in meaning between two near-synonyms.
Precision
Choosing the word that says exactly what you mean, not the biggest one.
Word family
Related forms: reluctant, reluctance, reluctantly.
Active vocabulary
Words you actually produce, rather than merely recognise.
4

Learning cycle

Part 4 of 19

Learning cycle 1 of 2

Four stages from meeting to using

A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.

5

Explore the idea

Part 5 of 19

Learn

The four stages

Meet it: note the whole sentence, not the bare word - context carries the meaning. Test it: write your own sentence about something real to you. Stretch it: use the word family - reluctant, reluctance, reluctantly. Use it out loud: say it in conversation or in a speech, because a word you have never said stays passive. Three or four words a week handled this way beats a list of thirty you only read.

6

Explore the idea

Part 6 of 19

Learn

Nuance between near-synonyms

Reluctant, hesitant and unwilling are not interchangeable. Reluctant carries duty you would rather avoid: 'a reluctant apology.' Hesitant is about pausing, usually from doubt: 'a hesitant knock at the door.' Unwilling is flat refusal: 'unwilling to move.' Picking between them is what precision means - and it is exactly what pushes a piece of writing up a band.

7

Quick check

Part 7 of 19

Quick check

'A reluctant apology' works because reluctant suggests...

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Quick check

Part 8 of 19

Quick check

Which phrase breaks collocation?

9

Reset break

Part 9 of 19

Pause

That's sitting 1 of 2 done

Stretch, get a drink, look out of the window. There is no timer and nothing is counting down — your place is saved, so you can come back in five minutes or tomorrow.

Stop here for now
10

Learning cycle

Part 10 of 19

Learning cycle 2 of 2

Nuance, collocation and the two failure modes

A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.

11

Explore the idea

Part 11 of 19

Learn

Collocation: the trap dictionaries set

A thesaurus will offer 'weighty' for 'heavy', but nobody writes 'weighty rain'. Words keep company: heavy rain, strong wind, deep silence, bitter cold. When you meet a new word, note the words either side of it as well. This is the fastest way to sound like someone who has read a lot rather than someone who has swallowed a thesaurus.

12

Explore the idea

Part 12 of 19

Learn

The two failure modes

Overreach: using a long word slightly wrongly ('the weather was inexorable'), which costs you more than the plain word would have. Overuse: one good word appearing five times on a page, which flattens the writing. Both come from the same cause - treating vocabulary as decoration. The test is always whether the word is more exact, not whether it is more impressive.

13

Quick check

Part 13 of 19

Quick check

Stage three, 'stretch it', means...

14

Quick check

Part 14 of 19

Quick check

Saying a new word out loud matters because...

15

Common mix-ups

Part 15 of 19

Common mix-ups

Things people often get wrong

  • A thesaurus gives you near-matches, not swaps - always check how the word is used.
  • Longer is not better; 'utilise' is rarely an improvement on 'use'.
  • Knowing a word's meaning is not the same as knowing where it goes in a sentence.
  • Repeating your best new word is as noticeable as using it wrongly.
16

Challenge round

Part 16 of 19

Game · Sort it

Which of these are true?

Drag each card into the right column. Tap a card first if dragging is fiddly.

True

Not true

17

Challenge round

Part 17 of 19

Game · Fill the gaps

Finish the sentences

Choose the word that belongs in each gap.

Both come from the same cause - treating ____ as decoration.

18

Mastery quiz

Part 18 of 19

Marked quiz

End of lesson quiz: Making a new word yours: from noticing to using

6 questions, marked with the reasoning shown. No timer.

  1. 1. 'Hesitant' most suggests...

  2. 2. Active vocabulary means words you...

  3. 3. The better test for a new word is whether it is...

  4. 4. 'Overreach' in vocabulary means...

  5. 5. Roughly how many words a week does this method suggest?

  6. 6. When noting a new word, you should also note...

19

Lesson round-up

Part 19 of 19

Lesson round-up

Ready when you are

Quiz score

Not sat

Games

Not played

Points this lesson

0

Best run

0 in a row

Luna: 0 out of 4 on the practice checks. Only if you feel up to it — one more?

Ask Luna

Do the work

Your written work for this lesson

This is the part you'd do in your book at school. Pick the pieces below, write here or on paper, and photograph anything you draw or work out.

Extract

The last bus

The bus shelter smelled of wet coats. Mira pressed her timetable flat against the glass, as though staring at the numbers might make the 9:42 appear. Rain tapped the roof in small, impatient fingers. Somewhere behind her, a shop shutter came down with a sound like a full stop.

She had been brave all day. She had been brave in the corridor, brave at lunch, brave when the register reached her name and nobody looked up. Being brave, she decided, was mostly a matter of keeping your face still.

Headlights swung around the corner and lit the puddles gold. Mira picked up her bag. Tomorrow she would say something. Tonight she would simply go home.

Original extract written for Good Learning Co.

Reading questions

  1. Find two words or phrases that show how Mira is feeling, and explain what each one suggests.
  2. How does the writer use the weather and the sounds to build the mood? Use a short quotation.
  3. Write the next paragraph in the same style, keeping the writer's short sentences at the moments that matter.

  • Reading response

    Reading

    Read the extract again, then write about how the writer makes you feel that way. Use a short quotation and explain your choice of words.

    2 paragraphs (PEE)

  • Extended writing

    Writing

    Write your piece in full, then redraft the opening so it hooks the reader.

    250–350 words

  • Reading log

    Reading

    Note the book, the pages you read and one thing you noticed about the writing.

    20 minutes' reading

Saved as you type.

Part 1 of 19 · Watch & discover

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