Students who want to expand their vocabulary sometimes need more help than they can get in classroom lectures, books and study guides.
Tablet-enabled classrooms with Internet access can provide that help with one of the many apps written for mobile devices. One good app teachers should consider mixing into classroom lesson plans is “Vocabulary Builder” by Magoosh.
The app boasts more than 1,000 vocabulary words selected and defined with usage examples by expert tutors. Many of the words are also found in college entrance exams including SAT and GRE.
“Vocabulary Builder” is particularly good for middle school students in upper-level English language arts, reading and writing classes, and college-bound high school students.
Getting Started
When launching the app for the first time, students need an Internet connection to answer a short survey about how they want to use the app. They also need to create a free user account by adding a name and password. Multiple players can use the app on a single device.
The user account lets students sync their vocabulary study progress with the Web version of the app available for free on the Magoosh website.
Visit the website at www.magoosh.com.
How it works
After logging in, students can choose to study General/GRE words, SAT words or TOEFL/English Learner Words. Each section includes basic, intermediate and advance words in up to eight challenge levels.
The intuitive interface includes links to each word study section. Students begin by tapping the “Start this Level” command in each section to launch the first challenge level. A card appears onscreen with a vocabulary word and four possible definitions. Students tap the definition they believe matches the vocabulary word. The next card tells whether the answer is right or wrong.
There are 20 vocabulary words in each challenge level. Word definitions answered correctly are automatically saved and displayed onscreen after each level is finished. Students can repeat each challenge level as many times at they like.
Completing each challenge level unlocks the next level.
There’s a nice collection of dynamic features to keep students focused and learning while using the app. They include:
Audio. Audio pronunciation for each word.
Definitions. Complete definitions and example sentences for each word.
Levels. Basic, intermediate and advanced word challenge levels.
Progress. Automatic progress tracking.
Quizzes. New vocabulary quizzes each day.
Students with an Internet connection can tap the “Play Someone” icon at the bottom of the screen to challenge another user in a real-time vocabulary game.
What’s included
Content in the “Vocabulary Builder” app is all-inclusive. Once it’s been downloaded into a device, all word quizzes, definitions, sentence examples and games will work without an Internet connection.
However, users need an Internet connection to save their quiz progress and sync it to the online version of the app on the Magoosh website. An Internet connection is also needed to automatically download new quizzes, which are posted daily.
There are no advertisements or in-app purchases.
Download details
The “Vocabulary Builder” app by Magoosh is free. It can be downloaded from iTunes and is compatible with iPhones or iPad tablets running iOS version 6.0 or later. It’s also available on Google Play and is compatible with smartphones and digital tablets running the Android operating system 2.1 or later.