The Lexical Approach

The Lexical Approach is a pedagogy which most academics and teachers agree is important, but nonetheless, it has never become established. Advocates assert that vocabulary should be given much more prominence in language teaching. They reject the grammar and vocabulary dichotomy and believe that all language items can be placed upon a cline. Author of The Lexical Approach, Michael Lewis, divides lexis into words (including contractions and polywords), collocations, semi-fixed- and fully fixed expressions. Multi-word expressions play an important role in language processing and language production. When producing language, speakers can access an abstract structure and populate its slots with vocabulary, or they can directly access multi-word units and string them together in order to communicate. As working memory has a limited capacity, the latter strategy reduces cognitive load. Furthermore, Lewis believes that semi-fixed expressions with open slots and fillers play an important role in language acquisition. In his book, Implementing the Lexical Approach, he sets out a wide variety of ways of identifying lexis, recording it, and practising it. A number of criticisms have been made of the Lexical Approach, the main one being that there are simply too many lexical units to systematically teach.