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ART I
TOEFL VOCABULARY
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BASICS
CHAPTER 1 All About TOEFL Vocabulary
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chapter 1
3
All About TOEFL
Vocabulary
OVERVIEW
• Vocabulary on the TOEFL
• Strategies for learning and remembering new words
• Summing it up
VOCABULARY ON THE TOEFL
TOEFL vobabulary questions ask you to identify the meanings of words and phrases
that appear in the reading passages. The words and phrases that are tested are
important to understanding the entire passage, and, for the most part, you will have
to figure out their meanings. On the TOEFL iBT, however, if there are technical or
unusual words in the passage, you will see the definition presented in a box.
STRATEGIES FOR LEARNING AND REMEMBERING NEW
WORDS
Read
Reading is probably the single best way to improve your vocabulary. When you’re
preparing for the TOEFL, read materials that contain the words that you are
most likely to encounter.
Use a Dictionary and Thesaurus

entries. Don’t rush right out to buy one to stash in your bookcase, however, because the
OED now contains about 60 million words in 20 volumes. If shelf space is an issue and
you simply can’t live without an OED, however, online and CD-ROM versions are
available from www.oed.com.
Dictionaries have been created just for adults, college students, high school students,
and elementary school students, too. The following list includes the bestselling general
dictionaries and the Web addresses for the online versions, when available:
•
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Houghton Mifflin Co.:
www.bartleby.com/61)
•
Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Merriam-Webster, Inc.: www.m-w.com/
dictionary.htm)
•
Merriam-Webster’s Pocket Dictionary (Merriam-Webster, Inc.)
•
The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford University Press, Inc.)
•
The Random House College Dictionary (Random House, Inc.)
•
Webster’s New World College Dictionary (Hungry Minds, Inc.)
Which dictionary should you purchase and use? Since more than 30,000 dictionaries are
currently offered for sale online, you’ve got some shopping to do. Here’s what you need:
•
A dictionary that contains all the words that you are likely to encounter on
standardized tests. This will most likely be the same dictionary that you can use
in college, in your personal life, and in your professional life.
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Let’s look a little closer at the entry:
•
Notice the pronunciation comes right after the entry word. It’s in parentheses—
(kan’de).
•
The part of speech is indicated by the n. It’s an abbreviation for “noun.” Look at the
third entry. The vt: right before the 3. shows that the word can be used as a
transitive verb (a verb that must be followed by a direct object). The vi: at the end
of the fifth entry shows that the word can also be used as an intransitive verb (a verb
that does not need a direct object to make sense in a sentence).
•
The pl. at the beginning of the entry shows how you can make the word plural (more
than one). Here, the singular “candy” becomes the plural “candies.”
spelling,
pronunciation
part of speech
plural
definitions
etymology
(word history)
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