Word of the Week
With 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: respect
The word respect is a noun and a verb. Learners appear to know the noun meanings ADMIRATION and POLITENESS at B1, along with the related verb meaning ADMIRE. The phrases in this respect/ in many respects and the formal phrase with respect to are known at B2 level. Other Word family members shown in the panel for this entry are the adjectives respectable and respected. For the C levels, further Word family members are being added, including irrespective and disrespect. Take a look at the entry for disrespect in the new Preview version of the letters DJK, where you will be able to see the extended Word family panel. The C level additions are shown in italics.To view the full entry for respect on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.
Word of the week: door
When is a door not a door? The answer to the classic joke is: when it’s ajar! But take a look at the entry for this word, taken from the new English Vocabulary Profile Preview version for letters DJK, which covers all six levels of the CEFR. Although the word door is known at A1 level, the idiom behind closed doors, meaning ‘in private’, is given C2. Even then, it is unlikely that many learners at that level would actually use it themselves – the learner example from a Russian speaker shows true mastery of the language. However, behind closed doors is a frequent idiom in today’s English, and one that seems useful for high-level learners to at least be aware of. Decisions on the inclusion of idioms have been made on the basis of current corpus frequency and this idiom features in both the Cambridge International Corpus and the Cambridge Learner Corpus. Incidentally, it is possible to search for other idioms using the drop-down category menu within Advanced Search.To view the full entry for door on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.
Word of the week: quiet
The entry for the word quiet includes three meanings for the adjective, two of which are at A2 and one at B1, while the noun is listed at B2. In our resource, it is possible to click on any word contained in an entry to find out what CEFR level that word is given. So for example in the A2 senses NOT NOISY and NOT BUSY, you will be able to click on the highlighted collocates keep or peaceful to find out their own CEFR level. This is partly why we have attempted to keep the vocabulary used in the dictionary examples within B2 level. When the C1 and C2 levels are added, their dictionary examples will contain words at the higher levels and some words may occur in dictionary examples that are not included in the English Vocabulary Profile (formerly known as the English Profile Wordlists). If this is the case, clicking on the word will take you to a Cambridge Dictionaries Online entry.To view the full entry for quiet on the English Vocabulary Profile, please click here.
