General Vocabulary

What you will find

This unit sits in the Vocabulary and Word Study strand of English language. It mixes everyday topic words with harder, exam-style lists. The flashcard decks are the largest group, and the quizzes and mind maps back them up.

• Tricky words: the deck on confusing words and false friends pairs look-alikes such as Adopt and Adapt, Adverse and Averse, and Bare and Bear.
• Describing people: Personality Adjectives runs from Clever and Friendly to Arrogant, Bossy and Broad-minded, while DESCRIBING PEOPLE adds hair and face words with pronunciation.
• Richer verbs: Ways of Shining separates shine, glow and beam, with an example sentence for each.

Where to start

If you are new to the page, begin with a topic you already half know, such as Family members, Colours in English or Farm animals. Then move on to Personality Adjectives or Vocabulary, which gives short sentences for words like brawl and clutter.

For more demanding work, there are decks and quizzes tied to exams named in the listings, including SAT, SHSAT, SSAT, TOEFL, IELTS and FCE.

Using quizzes and maps together

1. Skim a mind map such as Phrasal Verbs, Collocations or Crime Vocabulary to see how the words group together.
2. Work through the matching flashcard deck until the meanings feel familiar.
3. Take a quiz, for example Ways of shining or the compound adjectives quiz, and note what you missed.
4. Go back to the cards for those words only.

Tips for teachers

Teachers can use the slide sets, such as Body parts and Basic Verbs, to introduce a topic. A quiz like Classroom Objects or School subjects then makes a quick check afterwards.

Choose one topic today, open a deck, and see how many words you already know.