🔵HF: CUM (Vocabulary)

The vocabulary test (CUM) assesses your understanding of the meaning of words. The type of language used in CUM will be familiar to you because it is often used in intelligence and academic achievement tests. This subtest measures basic mathematical vocabulary and general vocabulary.

Some students may be very high in mathematical and computational mechanisation skills and not be able to handle the concepts adequately because they do not sufficiently understand the vocabulary, which is the vehicle for the ideas. Others may work excellently in computation but cannot judge (E) which of the different concepts are required for the test (ESS). Such students will have low scores in arithmetic achievement tests because of a lack of conceptual skills, since they do not understand the meaning of words. Students with a high level of conceptualisation but low scores in computation, also have problems with academic results. They are generally considered to be inattentive. Such students need weekly repetition of mechanisation exercises.

The other vocabulary items are general. These items show the conceptual level of reading or an approximate level of comprehension of words and concepts in reading. These results differ from those obtained in the NTS because they indicate the degree of speed of word recognition in reading. CUM may be taught by presenting words weekly and using them consistently and repeatedly within oral communication. Education systems do not normally emphasise the teaching of vocabulary; they simply use the words that are most familiar to learners. This situation leads to the use of a very sparse dictionary which then causes many problems in secondary and higher education. Reading habits are also often negatively affected because people do not understand a high percentage of the words used and comprehension then becomes very difficult.

This skill cannot be developed intensively, but must be achieved daily in the classroom. Before reading a text, it is necessary that students detect unknown words, mark them and write a synonym above. Once they have done this, they can then move on to reading comprehension. New words should be used more frequently in order to increase the students’ mental dictionary.