Native-speaker children have about 2,500 words at school entry and vocabulary growth becomes exponential once independent reading begins¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · reviewr1·q1
Currency · newest study 2006 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · overdue for a recheck since 2011: baselines and conditions change
Subclaims¶
Reading the evidence codes
q is the design tier, i the impact, n the sample, and the kind with its r
the rigour judged within that kind: what each code means.
This claim: no standardized effect is recorded in observations/ for it yet, so no benchmark reading is possible.
q1 i? Citing Moskowitz (1978), the author reports native-speaker 6-year-olds have around 2,500 words at school entry, gain about 3,000 words a year, and that vocabulary growth appears exponential once independent reading begins around GE 4-5. → Roessingh 2006
Evidence¶
Roessingh 2006¶
Roessingh, H. (2006). BICS-CALP: An Introduction for Some, a Review for Others. TESL Canada Journal/Revue TESL du Canada, 23(2), Spring 2006. https://doi.org/10.18806/tesl.v23i2.57
q1 · i? · review · r1
The review attributes these figures to Moskowitz (1978), a study it describes as still widely cited, reporting around 2,500 words at school entry and about 3,000 words acquired per year. The reviewed study's design is not described.
"Moskowitz (1978), in a study that is still widely cited, puts the figure at around 2,500. The child acquires about 3,000 words a year for the first several years of school."
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- Joint Book Reading Predicts Literacy Success — related
- Preserving a bilingual student's heritage language supports rather than hinders English acquisition — related
- A critical mass of roughly 10,000-12,000 words is needed for fluent reading, from which ESL strategies can begin — related
- Native and non-native learners require around 30 years to reach asymptotic performance — related
- Single exposures yield partial word knowledge, and repeated encounters in varied contexts build complete word meaning (fast mapping then full mapping) — related
- Number of exposures was the strongest predictor of incidental vocabulary learning of both word form and meaning — related
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
ns-vocabulary-2500-entry-exponential-growth |
title |
Native-speaker children have about 2,500 words at school entry and vocabulary growth becomes exponential once independent reading begins |
description |
Native-speaker children have about 2,500 words at school entry and vocabulary growth becomes exponential once independent reading begins |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
weak |
newest_evidence |
2006 |
recheck_by |
2011 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-15 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — roessingh-2006 |
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