[geeks] New Tech Schools: Digital Harbor in Baltimore

[Brian Dunbar]

Micah R Ledbetter wrote:
> On Apr 11, 2007, at 13:13, Patrick Giagnocavo wrote:
> 
>> I was talking to a pastor, asking him which Bible translations he
>> recommends in addition to the KJV.  He made the point that in the  
>> 1950s
>> the average vocabulary was 10,000 words for high school graduates.   
>> Now
>> it is 4,000 words.  KJV requires a vocabulary of (I think) about 6,000
>> words, RSV requires 4,000, ESV (based on RSV / KJV blended) requires
>> 8th grade vocabulary which I think is about 2,000 words.
> 
> As a linguist-to-be, I find 4K and even 10K words pretty difficult to  
> believe. What is the source of this information? My intro to  
> linguistics textbook said that one learned about 1K words per year in  
> the first fear years of life, which puts you past 4K by the time  
> you've started first grade.
> 

I don't know linguistics.  But find a turn of the 20th century grammar
level textbook.  The ones I've read are far more complex than what we
hand high school graduates these days.  Or heck - high school kids in
the college prep courses in MY day (80s).

Big words - complex sentence structure.  It certainly feels like they
had a larger vocabulary in the old days.

-- 
Brian Dunbar
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