Unit 2: LEXIS
The term Lexis described by the TKT book (Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., &Williams, M. 2011) says that it refers to separate words or sets of words understood as one piece in a language. They have meaning. That meaning can be denotative that most of the time, we find in dictionaries entries. That is the real idea or thing we have of the object. Also, there is a figurative or connotative meaning.
People use that meaning when they want to represent some ideas in the real world. Additionally, people replace or compare something with others, similar to the previous one. For example, the Denotative meaning of the root, according to The Dictionary of Oxford, is the part of plants that is located underground and supports it. Meanwhile, someone’s root refers to the background of that person. Then, that term has a connotative meaning.
Both meanings play an important role when people use them in context. The situation makes meaning to words when people communicate. For example: " He is younger than she." We understand that he is less age than she, just knowing the meaning of "younger."
We already know that affixes change the meaning of words. Additionally, compound nouns change their meaning, too. Cui, L., Cong, F., Hyönä, J. (2018) state two or more words can create a compound noun. The meaning of those compounds is different from the one that each word has separately, for example, cowboy, nightmare, horseman. We can see the base noun joins another that modifies the meaning of the whole word. Then, we cannot say that the first word refers to a boy with a cow shape or a similar meaning to the other two words.
Aarts, B. (2017) defines some words that, most of the time, they go together. The right term is chunks, which are words learned as a one-piece. The first one is idioms that are something like fixed expression but cannot be changed. Additionally, their meaning is cognitive and different from each of the definitions of each word, separately. For example, the ball is in your court. Also, he explains about collocation which, is often together like set the table. Also, another chunk is fixed expressions that cannot be changed, for example, "be as silent."
Some words have similar meanings (synonyms) and others that apposite (antonyms). Also, we can join words in a lexical set, where the group of words is in the same topic area. Or we can put terms in their word family, for example, work, worker, workshop. Some other kinds of words that have relationships are homophones, homonyms, false friends, and varieties of English. Kolanchery, G. (2014) states that homophones have the same sound but different meanings and spelling. Homonyms have two denotation meanings that their interpretation depends on the context. False friends confuse speakers of other languages because they look similar to some terms in their native language. Finally, varieties of English have the same effect on both natives and foreign speakers because of words used to refer to one thing.
To sum up this information, it is important to ask ourselves what did we learn in this unit?
We learned that lexis refers to vocabulary. Words and sets of words have three meanings, which are denotative, connotative, and in context. Those meanings play an essential role in communication to avoid misunderstandings. Also, learners of a language should be conscious of idioms, collocations, fixed expressions. That is because their meanings are kind of difficult to interpret. Other features to consider are homophones, homonyms, false friends, compound nouns, and varieties of English. That is because their meanings are different from the ones they can guess.
Also, as teachers, we should take into consideration some points to improve our oral lesson so, there are some suggestion we can apply like:
Ø Asking students to have a notebook or folder specifically for vocabulary. Those records will help them to recall their meanings and use them in the right way. They can join words into lexical words and word families. For example, if students want to recall a word, they will use their notebooks instead of asking to the teacher.
Ø Learning words using authentic material and context make students learn vocabulary better than isolation. For example, telling stories helps students to get a wide range of vocabulary
Bibliography:
Aarts, B. (2017, March 29). Grammatical form. Retrieved October 23, 2020, from https://grammarianism.wordpress.com/tag/grammatical-form/
Cui, L., Hyönä, J. (2018, February 16). Effects of Grammatical Structure of Compound Words on Word Recognition in Chinese. Retrieved October 23, 2020, from https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00258/full
Kolanchery, G. (2014). lexis & vocabulary. 10.13140/rg.2.1.3770.2567. kolanchery, dr. (2014). lexis & vocabulary. 10.13140/rg.2.1.3770.2567.
Oxford University. (2018). Root: Definition of Root by Oxford Dictionary on Lexico.com also meaning of Root. Retrieved October 23, 2020, from https://www.lexico.com/definition/root
Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., &Williams, M. (2011). The TKT Course Modules 1,2 and 3 (Second) Cambridge: Cambridge Univertity Press. https://doig,org/10.1017/CBO9781139062398.003
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