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Vocabulary consists of any grouping of knowledge at the individual word or concept level for meaning encoded in print, oral language, symbol system or explicit taxonomy vocabularies.
In terms of vocabulary in school settings we often refer to words students, “need to read increasingly demanding texts” (Lehr, Osborne, Heibert, 2004)
We know from research we learn vocabulary incrementally and multiple meanings make learning vocabulary difficult. This can range from partial word level knowledge and use, to conceptual understanding,and then comparing conceptions. Take the word force for example. I could understand how to define it in physics, use the concept of force in equations, or compare force to other domains such as politics.
Given that we expand vocabulary in increments it is no surprise research demonstrates vocabulary cuts across many dimensions of knowledge and not just words. For example Oral Language and Vocabulary and the Vocabulary and Comprehension all impact vocabulary acquisition.
Learning words, like words themselves relies on their interrelated nature. We often learn about words without reading or writing the words themselves. An article on birds may impact vocabulary learned earlier in an article about penguins, for example. We also know, based on this inter-related nature we must move from defining vocabulary to actively using the concepts in reading and writing (Graves, 1986) throughVocabulary and Word Play.
Part of this inter-related nature lives at the intersection of spelling, morphology,and meta-linguistics. By learning to spell words through word building activities students learn how to decode words whilde understanding meaning. In the early grades this means knowing about the morpeme -s or -ed whchi can make words plural or past tense. In later grades students may learn adding the suffix -tion turns a word into a noun. Anglin (1997) notes that in fifth grade students learn around 5,000 root words but 15,000 derivative meanings built using prefixes and suffixes.