English Vocabulary Profile

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Cambridge English Exams

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Researchers involved in the English Profile Programme are developing an innovative and unique methodology for describing the English language using corpus research techinques. Previous language profiles have been produced by language specialists largely using their insight as expert users and teachers of the language. However English Profile's methodology is empirical, based on data provided by real learners of English, which means that it provides concrete evidence of what learners throughout the world can do at each level of the CEFR.

English Profile's Reference Level Descriptions (RLDs) will serve as a framework to classify, systematise and compare learner production of the English language.  Thanks to its basis in empirical research, it can be referenced with far greater certainty than anything preceding it.

If you would like to support this work, you can provide learner data to add to our corpus.  To do this, please visit our Language Research website.

Subcategories

GrammarThe English Grammar Profile (EGP) is a sister resource to the English Vocabulary Profile, and has been put together by Anne O'Keeffe (Limerick University) and Geraldine Mark, the co-authors, along with Ron Carter and Mike McCarthy, of English Grammar Today (Cambridge University Press). Mark and O'Keeffe investigated the extensive data in the Cambridge Learner Corpus to establish when learners begin to get to grips with different linguistic structures. 

A series of insights from their research will be posted on this page, each one putting the spotlight on an interesting aspect of learner grammar development. Please note that all of the learner examples come from the Cambridge Learner Corpus, a 55-million word electronic collection of written learner data. The examination and the candidate’s first language are given in brackets after each learner example.

See the latest Grammar Spotlight entry below. Scroll right down to the bottom of this page to browse through previous entries.


 

wowWith its 120th word, Word of the Week has now come to an end. We hope you enjoyed this free feature and that it has given you an insight into the thinking and research behind the English Vocabulary Profile.

All 120 are still available to read in our archive, below. Each Word of the Week in the archive is followed by a link to the full entry for that word on the English Vocabulary Profile. To view the entries, you will need to subscribe to the EVP: to subscribe for free click here.

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