How many words do you need to know? A summary of ESL Vocabulary Acquisition: Target and Approach by Andreea Cervatiuc, University of Calgary (Calgary, Canada) http://iteslj.org/Articles/Cervatiuc-VocabularyAcquisition.html

Scope of article Word frequency The article looks at the average receptive Research suggests that some words are more vocabulary size of adult native English speakers, frequent than others and, therefore, more useful and asks whether non-native speakers can acquire for second language learners. The percentage of a receptive vocabulary of similar size. words in a text made up of high frequency words is shown below. Receptive and productive vocabulary First we must distinguish between receptive and Top 'x' thousand most frequently % of words in a productive vocabulary. As a rule of thumb, the used words text receptive vocabulary is at least twice the size of 2000 79.7 the productive vocabulary. 3000 84 4000 86.7 How many words do educated native speakers 5000 88.6 know (receptive vocabulary)? The current consensus is somewhere between If you know the 2000 most frequent word families 13,000 and 20,000 word families, usually around of English, you can understand approximately 17,000 word families. (A word family means all 80% of the words in any text. Therefore, the goal the different parts of speech for one word. So the of an English learner should be to acquire these words work, working, worked are counted as one 2000 word families first, since this relatively small word family, as are economy, economist, number of words is recycled in any piece of economics, and economic.) writing and ensures the basis for reading comprehension. Can non-native speakers achieve this? This was once thought to be impossible. However, An earlier article recent research shows that exceptional adult (http://www.fltr.ucl.ac.be/fltr/germ/etan/bibs/voca second language learners are able to achieve b/cup.html) on the same topic says: vocabulary sizes similar to those of educated native speakers. A recent study (Cervatiuc, 2007) 'Liu Na and Nation (1985) have shown that we suggests that the average receptive vocabulary need a vocabulary of about 3000 words which size of university-educated non-native English provides coverage of at least 95% of a text before speakers ranges between 13,500 and 20,000 base we can efficiently learn from context with words Рi.e. similar to educated native speakers. unsimplified text. This is a large amount of startup vocabulary a learner needs, and this just to Research by Milton and Meara (1995) found that comprehend general texts.' adult learners of English as a second language Main conclusion could learn 2650 base words per year. The study Acquiring a native-like receptive vocabulary size involved 53 European exchange students at a in a second language as an adult learner is an British university. Most students were studying ambitious but achievable goal. management science and some were studying English language and literature teaching. References If you learned 2650 base words per year, you Cervatiuc, A. (2007). Highly Proficient Adult Non- Native English Speakers䴜 Perceptions of their would know 17,200 base words in 6.49 years. Second Language Vocabulary Learning Process. Unpublished PhD Dissertation. Calgary: University of The average person may not be able to do this. Calgary. The students in the Milton and Meara (1995) Liu Na and I.S.P. Nation. 1985. Factors affecting study were top students and exceptional learners, guessing vocabulary in context. RELC Journal 16, 1: 33-42. but it does suggests that building a native-like Milton, J., & Meara, P. (1995). How periods abroad vocabulary size in a second language as an adult affect vocabulary growth in a foreign language. ITL learner is an achievable goal. Review of Applied Linguistics, 107/108, p. 17-34.