NAWL Builder 2.1

NAWL Builder:

This application is designed to assist both learners and teachers in utilizing the New Academic Word List (NAWL), one of the fundamental lists of academic vocabulary words for second language learners of English. The list is open source and is utilized with permission from the authors.

The app provides straightforward tools for downloading, emailing, and organizing the NAWL. It also includes science-based study aids to facilitate efficient learning of the words, maintain detailed progress records, and the option to email progress updates to yourself or a teacher.

The original definitions are presented in simple English, and the app offers pronunciation of each word by a professional voice talent who is a native North American English speaker.

About the NAWL:

The first version of the New Academic Word List (NAWL 1.0), authored by Dr. Charles Browne and Dr. Brent Culligan, is now complete and accessible via the following link: www.newgeneralservicelist.org. The list is organized alphabetically, including inflected forms, and Standard Frequency Indices (Carroll, Davies, & Richman, 1971; Carroll, 1971).

Word Count in the NAWL:

The NAWL consists of 963 words derived from an academic corpus containing around 288 million words.

Corpus Components:

The primary component of the corpus is the Cambridge English Corpus, which encompasses academic journals, non-fiction, student essays, and academic discourse. The corpus contains text from academic books and journals from the UK and US covering diverse disciplines and topics.

The remaining corpus sections were compiled from various sources including the Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English (MICASE) and the British Academic Spoken English (BASE) corpus for spoken English segments. There is also a textbook section sourced from published textbooks encompassing many best-selling titles.

An in-depth analysis was conducted on the final corpus using methodologies outlined in Carroll, Davies, and Richman (1971) to derive dispersion index (D), an adjusted frequency estimation per million words (U), and Standard Frequency Index (SFI).

About Intelligent Flashcards:

The app features an Intelligent Wordlist Maker and an Intelligent Flashcard system to aid in effective vocabulary acquisition. The Wordlist Maker helps select unfamiliar words for inclusion in the flashcard system based on frequency bands. This approach allows for gradual addition of words as needed, aligning with individual learning preferences.

Utilizing spaced-repetition techniques, the Intelligent Flashcard system systematically assists users in reviewing words multiple times over a month. This method prioritizes challenging words for extended practice.

References:

Carroll, J. B. (1971). Statistical analysis of the corpus. In The American Heritage Word Frequency Book (pp. xxi – xl). Boston: Houghton Mifflin.