A friend of mine told me that he believes that young people in his country have a reduced vocabulary, that is, their knowledge of their language is limited. Do "reduced vocabulary" or "low vocabulary" describe this situation or is there a better term?
Learn English – Can we use either “Reduced vocabulary” or “Low Vocabulary” to describe “limited vocabulary”
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People from the country of England are English. People from the country of Scotland are Scottish. People from the United Kingdom (also referred to as [Great] Britain, though technically that is the name of the island England is on) are British.
The UK is the set of countries under British rule. This includes Scotland and England. Thus, someone Scottish is also British but not English.
Some Brits take their national identity within the UK quite seriously, and may find it insulting to be called English if they're not from England.
I become hesitated to call whoever from the island or the northern part of Ireland, English
This is wise. They (most likely) aren't English. They may identify as Irish (this one is your best bet), British, or both. It's complicated; Northern Ireland is particularly sensitive to the Irish / English / British distinctions, for historical reasons.
You need to do the following things:
- Create a strong context for the language you are teaching. Make it meaningful and important for them before you teach it.
- Make sure your students get controlled and also free practice of the target language.
- Build your syllabus around functions, and - as you have already mentioned - skills for independent and future learning. You only have 16 40-minute lessons lessons - don't try and teach a comprehensive grammar syllabus - it's a waste of time in this time frame. Give them 16 functions/situations and the grammar/vocab needed to be able to carry them out/negotiate them.
- Train yourself up with non-intrusive correction techniques - hand signals, gesture, echoing, mouth movements. Never bother to correct stuff if your students aren't going to repeat it.
- Don't tell your students things, ask them questions.
- Make your classroom a rehearsal room for real life.
- Your 11 hours of teaching amount to a puny input. The greatest and most important thing you can do in this time frame is to give your students an enduring enthusiasm for the language and for learning and to make them positive about what they can do, and what they could achieve. It is proven by research that it's virtually impossible to stop a motivated and enthusiastic student from learning language. Make sure this is what they are when you leave. You'll have set them up for life.
[You will of course want to plan your syllabus before you start. However, when you actually meet your students, you'll need to do a fresh needs analysis based on their strengths, weaknesses and learning aims during your fist couple of lessons. You'll then need to adjust your syllabus accordingly].
Good luck!
Best Answer
As with any language, English has a number of ways to express certain ideas to make them sound better. In fact the word for this -- euphemism -- literally means "words that sounds pleasant" in the original Greek.
Reduced is one of those euphemisms that you can use in place of other adjectives, depending on context. For example, "reduced stature" instead of "short", or "reduced income" instead of "poor". The reason this sounds nice is because "reduced" implies that the reduction is an act of some nameless external agent, and not the fault of any particular person.
Limited can also be a euphemism, because it implies either a temporary state, which can be improved, or, again, an external limitation imposed by some agent.
Both "reduced vocabulary" and "limited vocabulary" are good, if euphemistic, expressions for the situation you describe. "Low vocabulary" is also fine, although I think "low vocabulary level" is more accurate.