Learning new words in another language is essential to all language learners and it’s very important to know which words are the most useful. Usefulness relates to the context of your learning and the tasks you need to complete in the language, such as taking language exams, studying for university entrance exams, or writing academic essays at university. Academic writing is different from everyday writing because academic words are used to describe complex ideas, and these words occur mostly in textbooks.

The most frequent 2,000 words in the English language account for around 75%–80% of a textbook, depending on the level of technical vocabulary in the book.

The Academic Word List (AWL), developed by Averil Coxhead from Massey University in New Zealand accounts for a further 10% of the words in articles or textbooks. They occur across a wide range of academic subject areas, such as Biology, History, Marketing, and Commercial Law, but do not occur in the most frequent 2,000 words of English. This means that together the first 2,000 words and the AWL are the key to successful study. The Academic Word List is incorporated into the Oxford Student’s Dictionary to help learners using English to study other subjects.

Words often occur with other words in patterns called ‘collocations’, using two or more words that go together frequently. Native speakers use collocations naturally in their writing, but non-native speakers do not find this easy.

Here are some examples of collocations used to describe economic trends:

An amount can be down/up (at) or be/remain unchanged (at).

Something can stand at or reach a figure or amount.
A share can gain or lose an amount.
Markets, shares, profits, etc. suffer when there are economic problems.
When amounts are going up they climb, increase or rise. When they go up suddenly, they jump, rocket, shoot up or soar.
When amounts are going down they decline, drop or fall. When they go down suddenly, they crash, plummet, plunge or slump.
For English language learners undertaking senior school or university study, the Academic Word List gives good support. The AWL has 570 word families. Word families are usually made up of regular patterns. For example, conceivable can have in- added to the front of it to become the word that means the opposite; inconceivable. Below is an example from this dictionary of the word family conceive.

conceive verb
concept noun
conceivable adj. (opposite: inconceivable)
conceptual adj.

Useful Links

Oxford Student’s Dictionary
The Academic Word List
Inside reading: the Academic Word List in Context