The above "flash card" (more officially a graphic organizer) is typical of elementary school classrooms. A word is not learned in isolation but in relationship to other words. Here the relationships are minimal:
- Synonym, a word that in some contexts can replace the vocabulary word without changing the meaning.
- Antonym, s word that in some contexts can replace the vocabulary word making the meaning the opposite of the original meaning.
As we advance through school, additional relationships are added:
- Heteronym, a word with the same spelling but a different pronunciation and meaning than the vocabulary word (wind - the wind blows, to wind a clock).
- Homonym, a word with the same pronunciation as the vocabulary word but different spelling and meaning (toe, tow)
- Derivatives, a word that through established rules (often prefixes and suffixes) that are derived from the vocabulary word (evolve, evolution)
Eventually we add relationships shown in the Bible Sense Lexicon:
- Hyponym is a word that is more specific than the vocabulary word e.g. fish is a hyponym of aquatic animal
- Hypernym is a word that is more general than the vocabulary word e.g. animal is a hypernym of aquatic animal
- Coordinate terms share a hypernym e.g. fish and crocodile.
- a troponym is a manner of doing the vocabulary word e.g. walking, staggering
Some other interesting relationships:
- meronym is a constituent part of the vocabulary word e,g, finger is a meronym of hand
- holonym is the whole of which the vocabulary is a constituent part e.g. finer is a holonym of fingernail
One way to learn vocabulary is to make a collection of words that have these relationships with each other and practice until you can place each word in the correct relationships. Original language only - no cheating and classifying the English glosses.
