Topic

Academic Vocabulary & Collocations

Build precise academic vocabulary and natural collocations; use corpora and tools to select, vary and control register and stance.

Best for university students, pre-sessional learners, and anyone studying through English. Browse freely. Login is only needed for selected later-stage lesson activities.
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Academic Vocabulary & Collocations

Use this short introduction to get a feel for the section before choosing your next step.

Lesson pathway

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Choose one of the lesson entry points below. These are designed to move you from orientation into guided practice and then independent work.

Core academic lexis vs discipline terms

Differentiate general academic phrases from field-specific terminology; avoid jargon creep.

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Objectives & Key Language

Define outcomes; activate prior knowledge; curate key lexis/functions with examples.

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Collocation patterns

High-value patterns: verbā€“noun, adjectiveā€“noun, nounā€“preposition, verbā€“preposition; typical pairings.

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Guided Practice

Model target language/skills with scaffolds; short controlled tasks with feedback.

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Independent Practice & Reflection

Freer application to authentic tasks; quick reflection and improvement actions.

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Lexical bundles & phraseframes

Use common academic bundles (e.g., it is evident that) to organise stance and cohesion.

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Assessment & Next Steps

Check achievement with a short performance/quiz; record gaps and plan next steps.

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Corpora & tools

Query corpora (e.g., COCA/Academic, BAWE) or tools (SkELL, Sketch Engine) to test frequency and naturalness.

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Paraphrasing with collocations

Rephrase ideas while preserving meaning; maintain preferred collocational patterns.

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Register, stance & hedging

Control formality, precision and caution (hedges/boosters) for appropriate academic tone.

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Naturalness & overuse checks

Avoid awkward combinations; vary synonyms responsibly; check for over-reliance on a few items.

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Practice & spaced review

Design drills and spaced-repetition sets from readings/feedback; track gains in productive use.

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