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LangLit 
An International Peer-Reviewed Open Access Journal
 
 
Vol. 1 Issue - 1
 
 
75
 
 
 
Aug, 2014 
information is committed to long-term memory and remembered. It means that for words to 
be stored in long-term memory, they must be included in various kinds of exercises and 
tasks. 
The problems which ESP teachers face is how much and which vocabulary should be 
taught/learned, how to teach it effectively and what it means to know a word. These 
questions indicate the needs of students in acquiring lexical competence and the role of the 
teacher in leading them to achieve this goal.
How much and which vocabulary? 
 
The amount of vocabulary appropriate for students following ESP courses which will 
enable them to read scientific texts and communicate in their target setting should include at 
least the core 2,000-3,000 words (or word families) which provide the basis of about 80% of 
the words likely to be encountered (Carter, 1988). According to this author, there are two 
types of “core vocabulary”: “core vocabulary” which is “neutral by not indicating degrees of 
intensity or formality”, and “subject-specific core vocabulary”, which is “only expressive of 
a particular field”. 
Nation (2001) provides a list of four categories of vocabulary that may occur in 
academic texts:
1.
High-frequency words which include function words (e.g. prepositions: in, for, on; 
articles: a/an, the), and content words (nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs). These 
words usually account for almost 80% of the running words in the text. The standard 
list of these high-frequency words is the General Service List of English Words 
(West, 1953). In spite of its age, it is still considered the best list (Nation, 1990). 
Usually 2,000 word families are a suitable limit for high-frequency words for learners 
going to study in English (Nation and Hwang, 1995). 
2.
Academic words (sub-technical words) are the ones that frequently appear in 
academic texts regardless of subject areas, but are not common in non-academic 
materials, e.g. phase, factor, method, function, significant. They make up about 9% of 
the running words in academic texts. The best list of these words is the Academic 
Word List (Coxhead, 1998) which consists of 570 word families which are found in a 
wide range of academic texts in various disciplines. 
3.
Technical words, also called specialized vocabulary, are commonly seen in a 
particular subject area, and they are different in different subject areas. This category 
covers about 5% of the running words in academic texts. The teaching of a large 
number of specialized vocabulary takes place in the context of learning the 
specialized subject matter. 
4.
Low-frequency words are the largest category of words that range from the words 
that English learners come across with moderate frequency to the words that English 
speakers rarely use.
Medical students should know all these categories, particularly high-frequency words, 
academic words and technical words, and they usually acknowledge the importance of 
vocabulary, in particular the specialist words used in the medical area. Teaching and learning 
the technical words should be aimed at training students in the use of strategies which will 
help them understand and remember the words. Some of these strategies will be presented in 
the next section of this paper. Before these strategies are presented, it is advisable to be aware 
what to “know” a word means. According to Wallace (1982) to “know” a word means the 
ability to: 
a)
recognize it in its spoken or written form; 

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