General Vocabulary

General Vocabulary

Sometimes it is difficult to decide what words to study for a general English vocabulary.  Many people will go to the lists of the most commonly used English words.  This is a mistake.  Native English speakers use a much different vocabulary than English learners. 

So how do we find a general vocabulary?  

Let's take a look at the groups of words to make it easier.  The common groups are nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and grammatical words.  Read below to see my recommendations for finding general words in each group. 

Nouns

In this group you will need words that help you live daily life.  Here are some ideas:

1.      things you use around the house 

2.      places you frequently visit (and infrequent but important places ie; police station) 

3.      basic foods you buy in the store 

4.      clothing 

5.      family words (relationships) 

6.      numbers, time, weather 

7.      body parts and other health related words

8.      work words (words depend on the type of work you do) 

9.      transportation words 

10.  recreation words 

You will have to make your own list considering your lifestyle. This will be easier to memorize and perfect for you. 

Verbs

This is a fun group of words to work on.  To begin with, use the categories above (nouns) to start your list of verbs.  Then brainstorm in your own language... what actions do you do a lot and tell others about?  Find these words in English (note: sometimes this is difficult, when it gets difficult, leave it for later study).

Adjectives and Adverbs

By now you can relax a little.  You already have a good general English vocabulary, and can say many things.  Find adjectives on some of the common lists of the 100 most common words in English.  

Sure, I said earlier that native speakers use a different vocabulary than English learners.  Now, however, you are starting to prepare yourself for more difficult lists.  

English speakers often think differently than speakers of other languages.  Study the list of adjectives and start to see how English speakers express themselves.  

Adverbs can be studied the same way.  

Grammatical Words

There are other sites on grammar that can give you lists of these kinds of words.  Here I will mention a few.  Joining words like: then, and, but and so are great to begin with.  Prepositions are also very important.  You may like to visit this site for more ideas.  

If you have moer ideas for finding a general English vocabulary, go to my contact me page, here, tell me about it. I will be sure to add good ideas to this page.   

Can Unicef Change a Life?

Verb List

1.  Fall behind     to fail to remain level with a group of people that is moving forwards; or to fail to do something fast enough or by a particular time 

2.  Give away       to give something to someone without asking for payment 

3.  Hand in         to give something to someone in authority

4.  Indulge in      to allow yourself to do or have something that you enjoy

5.  Jump at         to eagerly accept a chance to do or have something  Example paragraph:

The future does not look good for Aliyah.  After the war in his country, his parents were both dead, and his town handed him over to an orphanage.  They gave away all his things, and this made Aliyah more sad than ever.  He used to indulge in playing with his father's radio for hours at a time, but now even that is gone.  He used to jump at the chance to study and learn how to read but now he is so sad that he is not even interested in that.  He is falling behind in his studies at the orphanage.  There is one small hope for him.  He might have foster parents soon.  Unicef is trying to find foster parents for him, and he is starting to become excited about it.  He really wants to hear good news from Unicef.