The document provides an overview of the Lexical Approach theory of language teaching and learning. Some key points: - The theory posits that language consists of grammaticalized lexical chunks rather than lexicalized grammar. Learners acquire language through noticing and internalizing prefabricated chunks rather than by applying rules of grammar. - Chunks include collocations, idioms, formulaic expressions, and delexicalized verbs whose meaning comes from the noun phrases they collocate with. - A lexical syllabus focuses on teaching words, phrases, frames, and other lexical chunks rather than isolated grammar points. Noticing chunks in context is important for both teaching and learning.

1. The Lexical Approach

2. • There are two key references in this area, both by Michael Lewis:
The Lexical Approach, 1993 and Implementing the Lexical Approach:
Putting Theory Into Practice, 1997
• You should refer to those for more detail. What follows is only an
overview and, like all such things, does injury in trying to be concise.

3. • Theory
• Language consists of grammaticalised lexis, not lexicalised grammar
(Lewis 1993: iv)

4. Chunks
• The theory behind the Lexical Approach hinges on the concept of language chunks. Briefly, a language chunk is a group of words which are habitually
found together. That definition will include common collocations such as air-conditioning + unit, dry + stone + wall, steering + wheel, hope for the
best, certain people and thousands of others, of course, as well as fixed expressions such as
• I would like
• Do you mind if
• How are you
• etc. (For more, go to the guide to collocation, linked in the list of related guides at the end.)
• However, it will also include groups of words which are not normally seen as collocations such as
• look at
• just last week
• tomorrow afternoon
• upside down
• right way up
• out of sorts
• have you heard ...?
• etc. Some of these are multi-word verbs, some fixed phrases and some would be called idioms. They all count as lexical chunks and are deployed as
single ideas.

5. • It has long been recognised that native speakers have a huge pool of
language chunks to draw on which serve to cut down on the time we
need to process thought into language and this aids fluency. The
theory is that we don't speak fluently by using our knowledge of
grammar and then slotting in the appropriate words to make the
sense we choose. What we do is select prefabricated chunks and use
our knowledge of grammar in a subsidiary, management role to help
the language along.
This is what Lewis means by Language consists of grammaticalised
lexis, not lexicalised grammar.

6. • Can you pick out the language chunks in the last paragraph? Click here
when you have a few noted down.
• There are lots and lots:
• native speakers
• to draw on
• to cut down on
• The theory is
• slotting in
• appropriate words
• use our knowledge

7. • There are a number of terms for chunks like these and you'll come
across expressions such as binomials, semi-fixed / fixed expressions,
holophrases, polywords and so on.
• In spoken language in particular, where time pressures on speakers
are high, the use of prefabricated lexical chunks oils the wheels and
allows speakers to produce fluent language. It is also the case that
grammar rules are often relaxed in informal speech and we are,
therefore, more dependent on lexis. For example, how did the
speakers in this dialogue produce their utterances?
• Did you pick up the shopping on your way home?
• No, I clear forgot about it. Sorry about that.

8. • In this exchange, it seems likely, according to the theory that the speakers
did not set out with a grammatical utterance in mind. To apply the
grammar rules in this tiny exchange would simply take too long.
For speaker A, the application of grammar rules would be something like:
• form a question with an operator do in the right tense (did)
• insert verb plus adverb particle (pick up)
• choose the article determiner for known reference (the)
• form a prepositional phrase (on ... way)
• insert correct genitive determiner (your)
• choose a zero article as this is the generic use of home in this case

9. • and for speaker B:
• insert negative
• form past tense of forget
• select the correct preposition (about)
• insert adverb to emphasise the verb but remove the -ly ending
• insert appropriate pronoun (in the singular because shopping is
uncountable)
• insert apology with the adjective sorry, ellipting the copular verb and the
subject (I am)
• insert appropriate anaphoric reference demonstrative pronoun to refer to
the previous clause (that)

10. • To do all that would require a lot of very fast processing.
What is probably happening is that both speakers have stored
expressions such as
on your way home as on + genitive + way home
or
pick up the shopping as pick up + article/determiner + uncountable
noun.
Processing the language this way, in prefabricated chunks allows the
speaker to form accurate language quickly without the need to apply
complex grammar rules.
Learners at all levels, the theory implies, can do that, too.

11. • Semantic relationships
• Clearly, relationships such as collocation will be central to this
approach but it goes beyond that.
• For example, if we take an expression such as
• pick up the shopping

12. • we can readily see that a whole range of mass nouns can be substituted
with the same grammatical relationship to the verb and there are also
some other verbs that can have the same relationship
with up as pick has. Furthermore, the pronoun reference will remain the
same as will the matter of separability (we can't have *pick up it etc.). We
can, therefore, have:
• pick up the furniture / information / gossip / news
• pick it up
• gather up the crowd / data / flock
• gather it up
• clear up the mess / spillage / rubbish
• clear it up

13. • and so on.
This close relationship between lexis and grammar (colligation) is
another key element of the Lexical Approach. For more on
colligation, go to the guide, linked at the end.

14. • Delexicalised verbs
• Allied to the idea above about the relationships between grammar and lexis is the
concept that some verbs are 'delexicalised'. The most common of these in
English are:
• do | have | get | go | make | put | set | take
• A glance at the dictionary entry for any of these will tell you what's odd about
them. For each of these verbs, an online dictionary entry runs to several pages.
In the case of get, for example, the online Oxford dictionary lists:
• receive | experience | contract | attain | fetch | prepare | find | travel by |
obtain | contact | reach
• and so on before we even get to (!) the uses with prepositions and adverb
particles.
• (Source: https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/get)

15. • What is meant by delexicalisation, in Lewis' view, is that the verbs in question do not carry an
intrinsic meaning. What happens is that they acquire their meaning from the noun phrase with
which they collocate. Many of these verbs refer to performing an action so we get, for example:
• hold a meeting
• run a meeting
• give permission
• take a look
• take a chance
• make apologies
• take pity on
• throw a party
• do wonders
• give thanks

16. • There is no semantic choice to be made here in terms of which verb
collocates with which noun phrase.
• Naturally, all these verbs also have lexical meanings. For example:
• hold = grasp in the hand
• run = move quickly / flow
• give = present
• throw = project through the air
• take = move to another place
• and so on.
• The point being made is that in these uses they are delexicalised.

17. • Given this demoralising range of meanings, it is little surprise that learners sometimes despair of
ever understanding what the verbs mean (because, in fact, they don't mean anything much). All
the verbs in the list exhibit the same phenomenon.
• The problem for teaching then is to encourage our learners to notice the variety of meanings that
any of these verbs can exhibit and notice, too, that it is second half of the chunk, such as
• make the beds
• do the cooking
• get the message
• have a bath
• go bad
• put in place
• set the clock
• take a minute
• etc. which actually carries the meaning.

18. • The use of delexicalised verbs is often semi-opaque. That is to say that while we can easily see
the meanings behind, for example:
• do the cooking
• make dinner
• the choice of the verb is not to do with its meaning. It is the meaning of the noun phrase which
determines the meaning of the clause and the choice of verb may seem random.
• However, opacity is not an on-off phenomenon because some verbs may be seen as semi-
delexicalised. For example in:
• give thanks
• pay a compliment
• take an interest
• set an example
• etc., there is some sense in all cases of the verb's meaning although it is still very difficult to guess
which verb will form the appropriate collocation.

19. • It is also the case that even usually delexicalised verbs can be used
metaphorically so, for example:
• Take the car to the garage
• is the normal lexical use of the verb meaning moving to another
place, but:
• Take a hammer to it
• has a wholly different, figurative meaning of:
• Hit it with a hammer.

20. • If you dislike the term 'delexicalised verb', an alternative is 'empty
verb' and you can get a list of them here.
• There is also a lesson for B1 / B2-level learners on delexicalised verbs
here (new tab).
• The concept of delexicalised verbs is not a new one (although the
term is new) because the idea of prime verbs in languages has been
around for a while. The prime verbs in English are usually listed as:
• be | bring | come | do | get | give | go | keep | make | put | take
• and 5 of those are common to both lists.

21. Besides the delexicalised nature of many of these verbs in certain collocations, they
are also the verbs which are basic to most idiomatic language and which often take
the place of more formal or synthetic verbs. So, for example:
We can render ... ... as this with a prime verb
He appeared suddenly He was suddenly there
They have raised four children They have brought up four children
He attended the meeting He came to the meeting
I executed her instructions I did as she told me
I arrived at the hotel late I got to the hotel late
I handed in my essay I gave my essay in
He travelled to New York He went to New York
Please retain the receipt Please keep the receipt
I prepared dinner I made dinner
She garaged the car She put the car in the garage
I caught the train I took the train

22. • There are, in fact, very few verbal concepts in English which cannot be
rendered less formally and more simply by using one of the prime
verbs in combinations with adverbials.

23. Communicative efficiency
• Schmitt, 2000:400, states the case like this:
• There is a good psycholinguistic basis for believing that the mind stores and
processes these chunks as individual wholes. The main reason stems from
the structure of the mind itself. It can store vast amounts of knowledge in
long-term memory, but is only able to process small amounts of it in real
time, such as when one is speaking. In effect, the mind makes use of a
relatively abundant resource (long-term memory) to compensate for a
relative lack in another (processing capacity) by storing a number of
frequently-needed lexical chunks as individual whole units. These can be
easily retrieved and used without the need to compose them on-line
through word selection and grammatical sequencing. This means there is
less demand on cognitive capacity

24. • If this is true, then learners will be better able to communicate if they are
equipped with lexical chunks rather than grammatical knowledge. And
there's another reason: lexical chunks form an integral part of functional
language use.
• For example, expressions like
• Can you let me have ... ?
• are both produced and perceived as if they were single lexemes, cutting
out the need for the speaker and the listener to process them word by
word. The learner who produces this does not need to understand its
constituent parts, nor is it necessary to understand the meaning of any of
the five words when heard. All that is needed is the knowledge that it is a
polite request for something to be given to the speaker.

25. • Theory of learning
• Once the chunk has been acquired, goes the theory, the learner can
analyse it at leisure and notice that can may be replaced by other modal
auxiliary verbs such as would to vary the meaning and let me have can be
replaced by any number of phrases. This means we can generate, e.g.:
• Would you pass the salt?
• Could you open the door?
• and so on, virtually ad infinitum.
• Thus the grammar is acquired through the medium of lexical-chunk
learning. In other words, grammar is not learned by combining small units
into longer ones but by breaking longer units down into smaller ones: an
analytic rather than a synthetic process.

26. • A lexical syllabus
• Once the focus is taken away from language structure and grammar
and placed on the lexical systems of the language, the next decision
that needs to be made is what to include in a teaching programme.
• This is not an uncontroversial area and different practitioners of a
lexical approach (whether whole- or half-hearted) will draw up lists in
quite different ways.
• Nevertheless, there is some consensus that the following will form
the content of the syllabus.

27. • words / lexemes
• This is not surprising but nor is it a great departure from all syllabuses which must by nature include some attention to the lexicon of the target language.
• What is different is that this is the starting point for a syllabus, not an add-on module.
• polywords
• These are mini-expressions such as by the way, upside down, back and forth, out and out, insofar as and so on.
• Many analyses (including the one on this site) will refer to these as fixed idioms but a lexical approach broadens the definition to include phrases which are transparent in
meaning, unlike most idioms, but are treated as single concepts. That is, of course, also part of the definition of a lexeme.
• Many analyses place multi-word verbs in this category whether they are phrasal, prepositional or phrasal-prepositional verbs.
• collocations
• These are familiar to most people in the profession and may be where the commitment to a lexical approach starts and stops.
• This will include items such as:
• vested interest
• heavy rain
• fully sure
• ocean-going liner
• and thousands more weak, strong or semi-fixed collocations blurring into compounds as the last example shows.

28. • institutionalised utterances
• These are exemplified as expressions such as:
• We'll see
• I could use some help
• How will it end?
• What's the matter?
• and thousands of other clichéd expressions which are used as single items to free up cognitive processing
space for other content.
• sentence frames
• These are ways of constructing more complex thoughts around a structure already acquired and re-used
many times. Examples include:
• This is more ... than you ...
• ... combined with .... make(s) ...
• ... is pretty much the same as ...

29. • The difficulty here is not identifying routinised sentence frames; it is selecting
those most frequently found in the language and most useful for learners to
internalise. Corpus studies can help considerably.
• text frames
• These are an extension of sentence frames but operate at the level of longer
texts. They might include:
• Let me tell you about ... Well, firstly, of course, and then ... but in the end ...
• In this essay I will set out ... but will exclude from consideration ... The starting
point is ... Now we need to consider ...
• Such text frames are of particular use to those who need to write more formally
and adhere to conventional information staging patterns in specific genres.
•

30. • Practice
• If you accept all, or even some, of the theory outlined here, it will
make sense to you to focus learners much more on lexical chunking
than on the grammar of the language.
• Implementing a lexical approach, in full or as an adjunct to a more
traditional approach does not imply a major shift in methodology or
techniques in the classroom. What does alter dramatically, is the
content and focus of the teaching and learning.
• It is, so to speak, a change in pedagogical mind sets, not a new
methodology.

31. Noticing
• It is clearly undesirable to try to teach the many thousands of lexical
chunks that a native speaker commands so proponents of a lexical
approach lay emphasis on noticing. Learners need to notice that
certain combinations of words perform single functions or represent
single ideas as in the examples above. Once they have done that,
they can then go on to analyse the chunk and in doing so acquire the
grammar.

32. • Noticing can be encouraged in a number of ways (and there is a guide
to noticing on this site, linked at the end in the list of related guides):
• Teacher-led noticing
• The teacher deliberately uses models in the classroom which are rich
in transferable lexical chunks and highlights these as the teaching /
learning targets for the lesson. Typically, this is done through a
listening or reading text with the items emphasised in some way.
• The learners go on to using the chunks in authentic, communicative
tasks and finally to analyse them.

33. • Student-led noticing
• With practice and some familiarity with the approach, learners can become more independent and take examples of language in use to focus
themselves on the potential lexical chunks it contains.
• Then they can incorporate them into their own production and go on to analyse them at leisure.
• Reformulation
• The teacher can reformulate student output (either spoken or written) to focus the learners on lexical chunks. So, for example, the production of
• I cooked the dinner
• I arrived at the station
• or
• I received a present
• can be reformulated more naturally as
• I made the dinner
• I got to the station
• and
• I got a present
• respectively.

34. • By the same token, the production of
• I'm going to tell you about ...
• can be reformulated as
• Have you heard that ...

35. • A number of criticisms have been made. Among them are:
• Implementing a lexical approach will produce learners whose speech is
limited to a range of clichés and who will not have the language means to
deal with new or unexpected topics and functional demands.
• The lexical approach ignores the way second languages are actually learned
and that is by understanding the nature of grammar and using this
competence to produce novel and accurate utterances. Acquiring lexical
chunks is part of this, not the origin of it.
• Claims for the efficacy of a lexical syllabus are not supported by empirical
evidence.