Using context to understand unfamiliar words

If you are learning English as a second language, meeting unfamiliar words is a regular experience, especially if you try to read a daily newspaper like the Bangkok Post. With proper reading skills, this is not a problem, but an excellent opportunity to rapidly increase your vocabulary. 

    The most important skill for this purpose is your ability to use context — the words and sentences which surround an unfamiliar word. The Bangkok Post is an ideal resource for developing this essential skill. Our newspaper is designed to be understood easily. Stories are written for a general audience, not for experts, so technical words are often explained. 

News writers use a style that gives you several chances to understand key concepts. And feature stories are often accompanied by several photographs which allow you to see exactly what unfamiliar words mean. There are a number of different techniques for guessing an unfamiliar word's meaning from context and we have illustrated some of the most useful of them in the Powerpoint presentation you can access here. Try to apply them all with your daily newspaper, preferably, of course, our own Bangkok Post. For international visitors, you can access our electronic paper here.