The Progressive Teacher Vol 03 Issue 05

learning
Vocabulary, a challenge
for students-in context
Waning vocabulary among students is one of the key concerns raised
by language teachers during all my interactions with them. The fading
skill has been a unanimous motif in all the deliberations I have had with
teachers to understand performance of students in languages.
– Prakhar Ghildiyal
Since it is voiced by so
many teachers, this sounds
like a real time problem
which teachers acknowledge. On
further pondering and discussion
with teachers what surfaced
was the direct linkage of the
reading habit with the dwindling
vocabulary among students.
I have always been interested in
words and have always felt that
they lend a hand in garnishing
your imagination. Words have
always had a similar effect on
me like Madeleine (cake) had
on Marcel Proust in Search
of Lost Time. It acts as a
stimulus to contrast involuntary
memory with voluntary memory.
Presumably this is a closer way
of learning and responding to
knowledge when we refer to
meaningful learning. It connects
through various schemes of facts
or information thus helping
us arrive at new knowledge
through previously acquired
knowledge with lesser impetus on
memorizing or rote learning of
information.
No sooner had the warm liquid
mixed with the crumbs touched
my palate than a shudder ran
through me and I stopped intent
upon the extraordinary thing
that was happening to me. An
exquisite pleasure had invaded
my senses, something isolated,
detached, with no suggestion
of its origin. And at once the
vicissitudes of life had become
indifferent to me, its disasters
innocuous, its brevity illusory –
this new sensation having had
on me the effect which love has
of filling me with a precious
essence; or rather this essence
was not in me it was me. ...
Whence did it come? What did
it mean? How could I seize and
apprehend it? ... And suddenly
the memory revealed itself. The
taste was that of the little piece
of madeleine which on Sunday
mornings at Combray (because
on those mornings I did not go
out before mass), when I went
to say good morning to her in
her bedroom, my aunt Léonie
used to give me, dipping it first
in her own cup of tea or tisane.
The sight of the little madeleine
had recalled nothing to my mind
before I tasted it. And all from
my cup of tea.
—Marcel Proust,
In Search of Lost Time
Somehow I have always found
words close to my heart as in
many cases I remember where
and under what circumstances
I learnt certain words. A few
examples to cite from my
memory:
• Dilapidated: I read this word
when I was in grade 5 or 7
in a short story in school.
Although I don’t remember
the story but the word still
evokes an image of cob webs
and dampness in my mind.
• Ahmak (fool/silly): Heard it
from one of my uncles who
tagged me with this name
whenever I did something
stupid. It was out of sheer
love for me.
• Austerity: Read it in a
magazine in an article which
was talking about Austerity
measures in some ecological
context.
• Egalitarian: My cousin made
a recommendation of this
word in an essay in place of
equality.
There are many more but I
am citing these cases in order to
think aloud and look at possible
levers which helped me know
a few.
‘Like everything metaphysical
the harmony between thought
and reality is to be found in
the grammar of the language’.
Ludwig Wittgenstein
A recent practice which I find
self defeating is to see learners
presented with a list of a
few words which they cram
up to augment their existing
vocabulary. No doubt you
come across so many thwarted
performances in vocabulary in
a context as a skill. It is for this
reason most of the things in the
world have suddenly become
awesome. From a glass of
lemonade to a good performance
of an actor to a good book-
Everything is just awesome! I
am sure it is not our inability to
acknowledge and perceive the
18 The Progressive Teacher Nov/Dec 2016