a method for teaching children to read, commonly used in teaching reading
in the mother tongue, in which children are taught to recognize whole
words rather than letter-names (as in the alphabetic method) or sounds
(as in phonics). It usually leads to the use of a sentence method, where
whole sentences are used.Whorfian hypothesis n
see linguistic relativity
Wh-question n
see question
wiki n
the Hawaiian word for “quick,” used to refer to a website with pages that
any user can contribute to and edit, often including text, photos and videos.
within-subjects design n
also repeated measures design
an experimental design where each participant serves in more than one
experimental condition.
women’s speech n
see gender^1
word n
the smallest of the linguistic units which can occur on its own in speech
or writing.
It is difficult to apply this criterion consistently. For example, can a function
word like the occur on its own? Is a contractionlike can’t (“can not”)
one word or two? Nevertheless, there is evidence that native speakers of a
language tend to agree on what are the words of their language.
In writing, word boundaries are usually recognized by spaces between the
words. In speech, word boundaries may be recognized by slight pauses.
see also boundaries, content word, lexeme
word association n
ways in which words come to be associated with each other and which
influence the learning and remembering of words. In a word association
test, a person is given a word or list of words and asked to respond with
another word or words. Word associations have been studied in semantics,
verbal learning theory and psycholinguistics. The following are
common associations to words from American college students:
Whorfian hypothesis