A presentation on how to use a corpus to create a dictionary for educational purposes, especially English for Specific Purposes (ESP).

1. Corpus-based digital dictionary
construction for ESP.
By Julio Palma
Universidad del Zulia
Núcleo Costa Oriental del Lago (Cabimas)

2. Overview
• Learning Objective
• Steps for making a dictionary
• Strategies for learning specialized words.
• Q&A

3. Learning Objective
By the end of the lesson students will be able to
design a dictionary entry considering all the
elements of a dictionary format.
Class description
Flickr Photo/Berkely Lab cc
Learners: University students
Modality: Hybrid or Blended Learning
English level: low Intermediate
Language skills: Reading and writing
Equipment: Computers with internet,
Sketch engine software (teacher), Google+
Duration: 2 weeks.

4. Steps for making a dictionary
Part 1: Preparation of material by the teacher
http://www.sketchengine.co.uk/

7. Create a specialized corpus
• What is a corpus?
A corpus is any body of text collected with
the aim of analyzing its features.
(Landau, 2002:273)

17. Word Sketch for Waste

18. Word Sketch for Waste

19. Solid waste
Hazardous waste
Industrial waste
Waste incinerator
Waste disposal
Waste pond

20. Part 3: Teacher creates an e-booklet for guidance
and word list creation.
This booklet is
delivered
online to
students

21. What is in a dictionary layout?
Word entry in
English
Translation
into Spanish
Definition of the word in English
(Source should be credited via link or reference)
Example sentence
( A sentence where the entry is used in context)
Part of the
Speech tag
Associated
word
Picture

22. Strategies for learning new words
Slides are
shown in
the
classroom
Words are
taken
from the
booklet

23. Strategies for learning new words
Words are
taken
from the
booklet

24. Students make
presentations
using a
dictionary
format
Presentations
are published
in the class
website

25. Suitable for other careers vocabulary

26. Other possible strategies / ideas
Word
maps
Theme
Vocabulary
Semantic
fields
Writing
on topics

27. What remains to be done?
Rubric integration
Peer-
Evaluation
Word
Networking
Explore other
term extractors

28. More than 50 tools to explore!
http://recremisi.blogspot.com/

29. Thank you!
Q & A