TermFinder
creating online termbanks of technical terms for early university study
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/japl.v3i2.219Keywords:
Linguistics, P101-410Abstract
The TermFinder project is a new kind of collaboration between academic specialists/teachers and applied linguists/terminographers in creating specialized online termbanks for pedagogical purposes. Although there are technical glossaries on the internet, their ad hoc definitions do not target the needs of novices in the discipline, or those with limited English. Specialized terminology remains a substantial barrier for tertiary students grappling with the foundation concepts, overshadowed by the recent emphasis on generic skills. TermFinder termbanks are customized for designated courses, and informed by a computerized corpus of lecture materials and reading texts used by the lecturer. The terminographer uses the corpus to identify the key terms by frequency and to source natural examples of their usage: their grammar as well as their technical sense(s) and connections with other terms in the discipline. The methodology is new for terminography (ie the description of terminology), though well established in general lexicography. This corpus-informed terminography is also pedagogically-informed, in that the selection and definitions of terms are reviewed in consultation with disciplinary teaching staff. It ensures that (a) necessary lower frequency terms are included; and (b) the definitions drafted by the terminographer are conceptually adequate for the level of student. Pilot testing of the statistics termbank confirms its pedagogical value. TermFinder pages contain verbal, audio and graphic elements to develop students’ understanding of disciplinary concepts through multiple cognitive channels.
References
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Atkins, B., Clear, J. and Ostler, N. (1992) Corpus design criteria. Journal of Literary and Linguistic Computing 7(1): 1–16.
Baker, M. (1988) Subtechnical vocabulary and the ESP teacher: an analysis of some rhetorical items in medical journal articles. Reading in a Foreign Language 4(2): 91–105.
Bernstein, B. (1973/2003) Applied Studies towards a Sociology of Language: class, codes and control. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Biber, D. (1990) Methodological issues regarding corpus-based analyses of linguistic variation. Literary and Linguistic Computing 5: 257–269.
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S. and Finegan, E. (1999) Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. London: Longman.
Blackwell A. and Engelhardt Y. (nd) A metataxonomy for diagram research. Online at www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~afb21/publications/yuri-chapter (Accessed 30 January 2007).
Bowker, L. and Pearson, J. (2002) Working with Specialized Language: a practical guide to using corpora. London: Routledge.
Bramki, D. and Williams, R. C. (1984) Lexical familiarization in economics text, and its pedagogic implications in reading comprehension. Reading in a Foreign Language 2(1): 169–181.
Chi, M. T. H. and Ohlsson, S. (2001) Complex declarative learning. In Holyoak, K. J. and Morrison, R. G. (eds) The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Christie, F. (2002) The development of abstraction in adolescents in subject English. In M. Schleppengrill and C. Colombi (eds) Developing Advanced Literacy in First and Second Languages: meaning with power 45–66. Mahwah MJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Chung, T. M. (2003) A corpus comparison approach for terminology extraction. Terminology 9(2): 221–246.
Chung, T. M. and Nation, P. (2003) Technical vocabulary in specialised texts. Reading in a Foreign Language 15(2): October. Online.
Chung, T. M. and Nation, P. (2004) Identifying technical vocabulary. System 32: 251–263.
Cleveland, W. S. (1993) Visualizing Data. Murray Hill, New Jersey: AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Cobb, T. M. and Horst, M. E. (2001) Reading academic English: carrying learners across the lexical threshold. In J. Flowerdew and M. Peacock (eds) The English for Academic Purposes Curriculum. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Collins Cobuild English Language Dictionary (1987) Glasgow: Collins.
Corson, D. (1985) The Lexical Bar. Oxford: Pergamon.
Coxhead, A. (2000) A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly 34(2): 213–238.
Craik, F. I. M. and Lockheart, R. S. (1972) Levels of processing: a framework for memory research. Journal of Verbal and Learning Behavior 11: 671–684.
Craik, F. I. M. and Tulving, E. (1975) Depth of processing and the retention of words in episodic memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: general 104: 268–294.
Ellis, N. (1994) Vocabulary acquisition: the implicit ins and outs of explicit cognitive mediation. In N. Ellis (ed.) Implicit and Explicit Learning of Languages. London: Harcourt & Brace.
Faber, P., Arauz, P., Velasco, J. and Reimerink, A. (2007) Linking images and words: the description of specialized concepts. International Journal of Lexicography 20(1): 39–65.
Farrell, P. (1990) Vocabulary in ESP: a lexical analysis of the English of electronics and a study of semi-technical vocabulary. CLCS Occasional Paper No. 25 Trinity College.
Flowerdew, J. (1992) Definitions in science lectures. Applied Linguistics 13: 202–221.
Friendly, M. (2000) Gallery of data visualization: the best and worst of statistical graphics. Online at http://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/Gallery/ (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Hill, D. (1988) Misleading illustrations. Research in Science Education 18(1).
Hirsh, D. and Nation, P. (1992) What vocabulary size is needed to read unsimplified texts for pleasure? Reading in a Foreign Language 8: 689–696.
Humble, P. (1988) The use of authentic, constructed and ‘controlled’ examples in foreign language dictionaries. In T. Fontenelle, P. Hiligsmann, A. Michiels, A. Moulin and S. Theissen (eds) Euralex 1998 Proceedings. Louvain: University of Louvain.
Hwang, K. and Nation, P. (1994) VocabProfile. (Vocabulary analysis software.) Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand: English Language Institute.
Jewitt, C., Kress, G., Ogborn, J. and Tsatsarelis, C. (2000) Multimodal teaching and learning: beyond language. Teaching Education 11: 3.
Jewitt, C., Kress, G., Ogborn, J. and Tsatsarelis, C. (2001) Multimodal teaching and learning: the rhetorics of the science classroom. London: Continuum.
Johnson, S. (1998) Skills, Socrates and the Sophists: learning from history. British Journal of Educational Studies 46(2): 201–213.
Kittredge, J. and Lehrberger, J. (eds) (1982) Sublanguage: studies of language in restricted domains. New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Kress, G. and Van Leeuwen, T. (2001) Multimodal Discourse: the modes and media of contemporary communication. London: Arnold.
Lambrou, A. (1979) Definitions in undergraduate science text books. Unpublished MA Thesis. Sudan: University of Khartoum.
Landau, S. (2001) Dictionaries: the art and craft of lexicography. (Second edition.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Laufer, B. and Hulstijn, J. (2001) Incidental vocabulary acquisition in a second language: the construct of task-induced involvement. Applied Linguistics 22(1): 1–26.
Lemke, J. (1998) Multiplying meaning: visual and verbal semiotics. In J. Martin and R. Veel (eds) Reading Science. London: Routledge.
Lowe, R. and Schnotz, W. (eds) (2006) Learning with Animation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lowry, R. (2007) Concepts and Applications of Inferential Statistics. Online at http://faculty. vassar.edu/lowry/webtext.html (Accessed 25 May 2007).
McEnery, A. and Wilson, D. (1996) Corpus Linguistics. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press.
McNeill, D. with Chilvers, M. (2006) Modern Statistics: a graphical introduction. Sydney, Pearson Education.
Meyer, I. and Mackintosh, K. (1996) The corpus from a terminographer’s viewpoint. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 1(2): 257–285.
Nation, P. (1990) Teaching and Learning Vocabulary. New York: Newbury House.
Nation, P. (2001) Learning Vocabulary in Another Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Nation, P. and Waring, R. (1997) Vocabulary size, text coverage and word lists. In N. Schmitt and M. McCarthy (eds) Vocabulary: description, acquisition and pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Oh, J., Lee, J., Lee, K. and Choi, K. (2000) Japanese term extraction using dictionary hierarchy and a machine translation system. Terminology 6: 287–311.
Poole, M. (1976) Social Class and Language Utilization at the Tertiary Level. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press.
Prinsloo, D. and Gouws, R. (2000) The use of examples in polyfunctional dictionaries. Lexikos 10 (AFRILEX-reeks/series 10: 2000): 138–156.
Sager, J. C. (1990) A Practical Course in Terminology Processing. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
Scott, M. (2001) Comparing corpora and identifying key words, collocations and frequency distributions through the Wordsmith tools. In M. Ghadessy, A. Henry and R. L. Roseberry (eds) Small Corpus Studies and ELT: theory and practice 47–67. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Selman, J. (2005) Dictionary of Food Science and Technology. Oxford: Blackwell. Publishing.
Sinclair, J. (1991a) Corpus, Concordance, Collocation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Sinclair, J. (1991b) Shared knowledge. In J. Alatis (ed.) Linguistics and Language Pedagogy: the state of the art. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.
Sinclair, J. (1997) Corpus evidence in language description. In A. Wichmann, S. Fligelstone, T. McEnery and G. Knowles (eds) Teaching and Language Corpora. London: Longman.
Sökmen, A. J. (1997) Current trends in teaching second language vocabulary. In N. Schmitt and M. McCarthy (eds) Vocabulary: description, acquisition and pedagogy 237–257. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
STEPS (2004) Statistical Education through Problem Solving. The STEPS Consortium. Online at http://www.stats.gla.ac.uk/steps/ (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Stuart-Smith, V. (1998) Constructing an argument in psychology: rhetorical structure theory and the analysis of student writing. In C. N. Candlin and G. Plum (eds) Researching Academic Literacies. Vol. 1. Framing Student Literacy: cross cultural aspects of communication skills in Australian universities 31–146. Sydney: NCELTR.
SurfStat (2007) Surfstat.australia: an online text in introductory statistics. Online at http:// www.anu.edu.au/nceph/surfstat/surfstat-home/surfstat.html (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Sutarsyah, C., Nation, P. and Kennedy, G. (1994) How useful is EAP vocabulary for ESP? A corpus based study. RELC Journal 25(2): 34–50.
Swales, J. (1990) Genre Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sweller, J. (2002) Visualisation and instructional design. In Proceedings of the International Workshop on Dynamic Visualizations and Learning (Tübingen, Germany, 18–19 July) Tübingen, Knowledge Media Center.
Temmermann, R. (2002) Towards New Ways of Terminology Description: the sociocognitive approach. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Thurstun, J. and Candlin, C. (1997) Exploring Academic English: a workbook for student essay writing. Sydney: NCELTR.
Tufte, E. (1984) The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. Cheshire, Connecticut: Graphics Press.
Unsworth, J. (2006) Towards a metalanguage for multiliteracies education. English Teaching: practice and critique 5(1).
Vitayapirak, J. (2001) A Corpus-based Approach to ESP Lexicography: the case study of English for Thai computer science students. Unpublished PhD thesis, Macquarie University.
Vitayapirak, J. and Pornchalermpong, P. (2006) Dictionary of Food Engineering (English– Thai). Bangkok: Food Information Network Inc.
Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
West, M. (1953) A General Service List of English Words. London: Longman, Green and Co.
Widdowson, H. (1991) The description and prescription of language. In J. Alatis (ed.) Linguistics and Language Pedagogy: the state of the art. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.
Widdowson, H. (2000) On the limitations of linguistics applied. Applied Linguistics 21(1): 3–25.
Wordsmith tool. Online at www.lexically.net/wordsmith
Xue, G. and Nation, I. S. P. (1984) A university word list. Language Learning and Communication 3: 215–229.
Atkins, B., Clear, J. and Ostler, N. (1992) Corpus design criteria. Journal of Literary and Linguistic Computing 7(1): 1–16.
Baker, M. (1988) Subtechnical vocabulary and the ESP teacher: an analysis of some rhetorical items in medical journal articles. Reading in a Foreign Language 4(2): 91–105.
Bernstein, B. (1973/2003) Applied Studies towards a Sociology of Language: class, codes and control. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Biber, D. (1990) Methodological issues regarding corpus-based analyses of linguistic variation. Literary and Linguistic Computing 5: 257–269.
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S. and Finegan, E. (1999) Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. London: Longman.
Blackwell A. and Engelhardt Y. (nd) A metataxonomy for diagram research. Online at www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~afb21/publications/yuri-chapter (Accessed 30 January 2007).
Bowker, L. and Pearson, J. (2002) Working with Specialized Language: a practical guide to using corpora. London: Routledge.
Bramki, D. and Williams, R. C. (1984) Lexical familiarization in economics text, and its pedagogic implications in reading comprehension. Reading in a Foreign Language 2(1): 169–181.
Chi, M. T. H. and Ohlsson, S. (2001) Complex declarative learning. In Holyoak, K. J. and Morrison, R. G. (eds) The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Christie, F. (2002) The development of abstraction in adolescents in subject English. In M. Schleppengrill and C. Colombi (eds) Developing Advanced Literacy in First and Second Languages: meaning with power 45–66. Mahwah MJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Chung, T. M. (2003) A corpus comparison approach for terminology extraction. Terminology 9(2): 221–246.
Chung, T. M. and Nation, P. (2003) Technical vocabulary in specialised texts. Reading in a Foreign Language 15(2): October. Online.
Chung, T. M. and Nation, P. (2004) Identifying technical vocabulary. System 32: 251–263.
Cleveland, W. S. (1993) Visualizing Data. Murray Hill, New Jersey: AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Cobb, T. M. and Horst, M. E. (2001) Reading academic English: carrying learners across the lexical threshold. In J. Flowerdew and M. Peacock (eds) The English for Academic Purposes Curriculum. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Collins Cobuild English Language Dictionary (1987) Glasgow: Collins.
Corson, D. (1985) The Lexical Bar. Oxford: Pergamon.
Coxhead, A. (2000) A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly 34(2): 213–238.
Craik, F. I. M. and Lockheart, R. S. (1972) Levels of processing: a framework for memory research. Journal of Verbal and Learning Behavior 11: 671–684.
Craik, F. I. M. and Tulving, E. (1975) Depth of processing and the retention of words in episodic memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: general 104: 268–294.
Ellis, N. (1994) Vocabulary acquisition: the implicit ins and outs of explicit cognitive mediation. In N. Ellis (ed.) Implicit and Explicit Learning of Languages. London: Harcourt & Brace.
Faber, P., Arauz, P., Velasco, J. and Reimerink, A. (2007) Linking images and words: the description of specialized concepts. International Journal of Lexicography 20(1): 39–65.
Farrell, P. (1990) Vocabulary in ESP: a lexical analysis of the English of electronics and a study of semi-technical vocabulary. CLCS Occasional Paper No. 25 Trinity College.
Flowerdew, J. (1992) Definitions in science lectures. Applied Linguistics 13: 202–221.
Friendly, M. (2000) Gallery of data visualization: the best and worst of statistical graphics. Online at http://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/Gallery/ (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Hill, D. (1988) Misleading illustrations. Research in Science Education 18(1).
Hirsh, D. and Nation, P. (1992) What vocabulary size is needed to read unsimplified texts for pleasure? Reading in a Foreign Language 8: 689–696.
Humble, P. (1988) The use of authentic, constructed and ‘controlled’ examples in foreign language dictionaries. In T. Fontenelle, P. Hiligsmann, A. Michiels, A. Moulin and S. Theissen (eds) Euralex 1998 Proceedings. Louvain: University of Louvain.
Hwang, K. and Nation, P. (1994) VocabProfile. (Vocabulary analysis software.) Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand: English Language Institute.
Jewitt, C., Kress, G., Ogborn, J. and Tsatsarelis, C. (2000) Multimodal teaching and learning: beyond language. Teaching Education 11: 3.
Jewitt, C., Kress, G., Ogborn, J. and Tsatsarelis, C. (2001) Multimodal teaching and learning: the rhetorics of the science classroom. London: Continuum.
Johnson, S. (1998) Skills, Socrates and the Sophists: learning from history. British Journal of Educational Studies 46(2): 201–213.
Kittredge, J. and Lehrberger, J. (eds) (1982) Sublanguage: studies of language in restricted domains. New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Kress, G. and Van Leeuwen, T. (2001) Multimodal Discourse: the modes and media of contemporary communication. London: Arnold.
Lambrou, A. (1979) Definitions in undergraduate science text books. Unpublished MA Thesis. Sudan: University of Khartoum.
Landau, S. (2001) Dictionaries: the art and craft of lexicography. (Second edition.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Laufer, B. and Hulstijn, J. (2001) Incidental vocabulary acquisition in a second language: the construct of task-induced involvement. Applied Linguistics 22(1): 1–26.
Lemke, J. (1998) Multiplying meaning: visual and verbal semiotics. In J. Martin and R. Veel (eds) Reading Science. London: Routledge.
Lowe, R. and Schnotz, W. (eds) (2006) Learning with Animation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lowry, R. (2007) Concepts and Applications of Inferential Statistics. Online at http://faculty. vassar.edu/lowry/webtext.html (Accessed 25 May 2007).
McEnery, A. and Wilson, D. (1996) Corpus Linguistics. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press.
McNeill, D. with Chilvers, M. (2006) Modern Statistics: a graphical introduction. Sydney, Pearson Education.
Meyer, I. and Mackintosh, K. (1996) The corpus from a terminographer’s viewpoint. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 1(2): 257–285.
Nation, P. (1990) Teaching and Learning Vocabulary. New York: Newbury House.
Nation, P. (2001) Learning Vocabulary in Another Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Nation, P. and Waring, R. (1997) Vocabulary size, text coverage and word lists. In N. Schmitt and M. McCarthy (eds) Vocabulary: description, acquisition and pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Oh, J., Lee, J., Lee, K. and Choi, K. (2000) Japanese term extraction using dictionary hierarchy and a machine translation system. Terminology 6: 287–311.
Poole, M. (1976) Social Class and Language Utilization at the Tertiary Level. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press.
Prinsloo, D. and Gouws, R. (2000) The use of examples in polyfunctional dictionaries. Lexikos 10 (AFRILEX-reeks/series 10: 2000): 138–156.
Sager, J. C. (1990) A Practical Course in Terminology Processing. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
Scott, M. (2001) Comparing corpora and identifying key words, collocations and frequency distributions through the Wordsmith tools. In M. Ghadessy, A. Henry and R. L. Roseberry (eds) Small Corpus Studies and ELT: theory and practice 47–67. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Selman, J. (2005) Dictionary of Food Science and Technology. Oxford: Blackwell. Publishing.
Sinclair, J. (1991a) Corpus, Concordance, Collocation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Sinclair, J. (1991b) Shared knowledge. In J. Alatis (ed.) Linguistics and Language Pedagogy: the state of the art. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.
Sinclair, J. (1997) Corpus evidence in language description. In A. Wichmann, S. Fligelstone, T. McEnery and G. Knowles (eds) Teaching and Language Corpora. London: Longman.
Sökmen, A. J. (1997) Current trends in teaching second language vocabulary. In N. Schmitt and M. McCarthy (eds) Vocabulary: description, acquisition and pedagogy 237–257. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
STEPS (2004) Statistical Education through Problem Solving. The STEPS Consortium. Online at http://www.stats.gla.ac.uk/steps/ (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Stuart-Smith, V. (1998) Constructing an argument in psychology: rhetorical structure theory and the analysis of student writing. In C. N. Candlin and G. Plum (eds) Researching Academic Literacies. Vol. 1. Framing Student Literacy: cross cultural aspects of communication skills in Australian universities 31–146. Sydney: NCELTR.
SurfStat (2007) Surfstat.australia: an online text in introductory statistics. Online at http:// www.anu.edu.au/nceph/surfstat/surfstat-home/surfstat.html (Accessed 25 May 2007).
Sutarsyah, C., Nation, P. and Kennedy, G. (1994) How useful is EAP vocabulary for ESP? A corpus based study. RELC Journal 25(2): 34–50.
Swales, J. (1990) Genre Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sweller, J. (2002) Visualisation and instructional design. In Proceedings of the International Workshop on Dynamic Visualizations and Learning (Tübingen, Germany, 18–19 July) Tübingen, Knowledge Media Center.
Temmermann, R. (2002) Towards New Ways of Terminology Description: the sociocognitive approach. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Thurstun, J. and Candlin, C. (1997) Exploring Academic English: a workbook for student essay writing. Sydney: NCELTR.
Tufte, E. (1984) The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. Cheshire, Connecticut: Graphics Press.
Unsworth, J. (2006) Towards a metalanguage for multiliteracies education. English Teaching: practice and critique 5(1).
Vitayapirak, J. (2001) A Corpus-based Approach to ESP Lexicography: the case study of English for Thai computer science students. Unpublished PhD thesis, Macquarie University.
Vitayapirak, J. and Pornchalermpong, P. (2006) Dictionary of Food Engineering (English– Thai). Bangkok: Food Information Network Inc.
Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
West, M. (1953) A General Service List of English Words. London: Longman, Green and Co.
Widdowson, H. (1991) The description and prescription of language. In J. Alatis (ed.) Linguistics and Language Pedagogy: the state of the art. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.
Widdowson, H. (2000) On the limitations of linguistics applied. Applied Linguistics 21(1): 3–25.
Wordsmith tool. Online at www.lexically.net/wordsmith
Xue, G. and Nation, I. S. P. (1984) A university word list. Language Learning and Communication 3: 215–229.
Published
2015-09-14
Issue
Section
Articles
License
Equinox Publishing Ltd.
How to Cite
Peters, P., Jones, A., Smith, A., Winchester-Seeto, T., Middledorp, J., & Petocz, P. (2015). TermFinder: creating online termbanks of technical terms for early university study. Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice, 3(2), 219-248. https://doi.org/10.1558/japl.v3i2.219
