HowtoImproveYourVocabularyWordscanmakeuslaugh,cry,gotowar,fallinlove.Itissaidthatwordsarethemostpowerfuldrugofmankind.Whetheryou’restillinschooloryouheadupacorporation,thebettercommandyouhaveofwords,thebetterchanceyouhaveofsayingexactlywhatyoumean,ofunderstandingwhatothersmean---andofgettingwhatyouwantintheworld.Englishistherichestlanguage---withthelargestvocabularyonearth.Over1,000,000words.Yet,theaverageadulthasavocabularyofonly30,000to60,000words.Imaginewhatwe’remissing!Herearefivepointersthathelpuslearnandrememberwholefamiliesofwords.Trytoguessthemeaningofthewordfromthewayit’susedYoucanoftengetatleastpartofaword’smeaning---justfromhowit’susedinasentence.That’swayit’ssoimportanttoreadasmuchasyoucan--differentkindsofthings:magazines;books,newspapersyoudon’tnormallyread.Themoreyouexposeyourselftonewwords,themorewordsyou’llpickupjustbyseeinghowthey’reused.Forinstance,sayyourunacrosstheword”manacle”:“ThemanacleshadbeenonJohn’swristsfor30years.Onlyonepersonhadakey---hiswife.”Youhaveagoodideaofwhat”manacles”are---justfromthecontextofthesentence.Butlet’sfindoutexactlywhatthewordmeansandwhereitcomesfrom.Theonlywaytodothis,andtobuildanextensivevocabularyfast,istogotothedictionary.(Howlucky,youcan---Shakespearecouldnot.Therewasn’tanEnglishdictionaryinhisday!)