Word of the Week

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.

Word of the week: course

Most students come across the noun course at the beginning of their learning – of course! The meaning CLASSES and the phrase just used here are both at A1, while the phrase of course not has been listed at A2. Deciding on the level of this phrase has not been straightforward. As it is largely spoken, there is as yet no suitable learner data to support the A2 decision – the Cambridge Learner Corpus example for of course not is at B2 – but other sources indicate that A2 is where this phrase should be placed, ie at one level above of course. It has been used successfully in listening scripts for the Cambridge English Key exam and features in some elementary coursebooks.
 
To view the full entry for course on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.

Word of the week: of

The entry for the preposition of is a long one. Apart from its four A1 meanings and the phrase of course at A1, several further meanings and phrases are listed from A2 up to B2, and there will be another meaning RELATING TO added at C1. When you search for a specific word in the English Vocabulary Profile, the core results give all instances of entries where that word occurs, so in addition to the meanings and phrases in the of entry itself, you will also find over 100 other listings, such as take account of something, all of a sudden, get rid of something, in the middle of nowhere and so on. Clicking on any one of these phrases will take you to the specific entry.
 
To view the full entry for of on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.

Word of the week: track

There are several meanings for the noun track up to B2 level, with two – PATH and RACE – at B1. The verb will be added at C2. For the noun meaning of MUSIC, as in tracks on an album, the level is currently given as B2, but it is likely that many learners will know this meaning at an earlier stage if they are into music! The corpus team within the English Profile Programme are keen to collect more data from learners around the world in order to verify questionable results such as this. The Cambridge English Profile Corpus will complement the Cambridge Learner Corpus of exam answers with writing produced in non-exam contexts, and it will also contain spoken learner data. If you and your students would like to take part in the Data Collection process, please visit the relevant section of this website to find out more.
 
To view the full entry for track on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.

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