Increasing Your Vocabulary

Increasing your vocabulary may sound like a “roll your eyes” suggestion. After all, you’ve been reading and writing English (or whatever your native language) for many years. By the time most of us reach the point where we feel called to write, we usually feel fairly comfortable in our knowledge of numerous words and their meanings.

But let’s be honest. There are many terms that still escape our grasp and understanding.

Years ago, my husband and I used to play the dictionary game with friends. It was an early (and less expensive) version of a Parker Brothers game where each person is given a word and they must write down what they believe to be the definition. Undoubtedly, it would not be a commonplace expression.

The various explanations of the words’ meanings as written by the game’s participants would send our group into uproarious laughter. The creativity was endless and quite funny.

Most of our friends were fairly well-read individuals. No one had flunked out of school. All were quite successful in their professions. Yet time after time, we all became stymied by the actual definitions of words in the English language—our language since birth.

If you still have an old hardback dictionary on your book shelf—you may need to blow the dust off the binding—glance at the thousands of words in that weighty volume. It is truly astonishing. This alone should be a gentle tap on the shoulder that we all could use a bit of vocabulary brushing up.

Nearly a year ago, I saw a prompt on the Merriam-Webster website to sign up for “Word of the Day.” Intrigued, I decided to join. It has been an adventure, learning new expressions that I am challenged to discover and perhaps use in my writing. I always feel a sense of joy when I find it’s a word with which I’m already familiar. But frankly, those I already know are fewer than the ones I’m either learning for the first time or for which I’m getting a much-needed refresher.

Let’s face it—none of us will know everything about our language. It can only help our writing to expand our knowledge.

I’d encourage you to sign up for the Word of the Day online. Or play the dictionary game with friends. Or get the Balderdash game of words.

Reading numerous works of fiction and non-fiction can be a great vocabulary builder. But going one step further with such tools as these can multiply your knowledge, and help your writing along the way.

Carry on.

Vocabulary image courtesy of Stuart Miles, from freedigitalphotos.net

Elaine Marie Cooper has two new E-Books that just released: War’s Respite (Prequel novella) and Love’s Kindling. Love’s Kindling will soon release in paperback. They are the first two books in the Dawn of America Series set in Revolutionary War Connecticut. Cooper is the award-winning author of Fields of the Fatherless and Bethany’s Calendar. Her 2016 release (Saratoga Letters) was finalist in Historical Romance in both the Selah Awards and Next Generation Indie Book Awards. She penned the three-book Deer Run Saga and has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. You can visit her website/ blog at www.elainemariecooper.com