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B1 level

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albysky
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 Message 1 of 7
28 September 2013 at 2:54pm | IP Logged 
How many words roughfly do you have to know to be B1 in a language in your opinion ?

Edited by albysky on 28 September 2013 at 2:55pm

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beano
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 Message 2 of 7
28 September 2013 at 4:15pm | IP Logged 
I guess it depends on your circumstances. If you find yourself in a situation where you are surrounded by the
language, you will rapidly acquire vocabulary but actually putting words into a meaningful context takes
longer. I think it's possible that someone could know relatively obscure words like chisel, fuse box,
gooseberry, barbed wire and weedkiller but not pass a B1 test. Conversely, someone might speak fluidly
without knowing terms like the aforementioned.
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Jeffers
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 Message 3 of 7
28 September 2013 at 5:09pm | IP Logged 
Apparently, the CEFR scales used to include a recommended number of words per level, but this was dropped for various reasons. One is probably that the definition of a word, as well as the number of words needed, vary from language to language. Another probable reason is that people would take a vocabulary test, and then claim a CEFR level based on the size of their vocabulary.
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leosmith
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 Message 4 of 7
28 September 2013 at 5:49pm | IP Logged 
Rough threshold numbers for an average language imo:
C2 20,000 passive/10,000 active
C1 10,000 passive/5,000 active
B2 5,000 passive/2,500 active
B1 2,500 passive/1,250 active
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Cavesa
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 Message 5 of 7
28 September 2013 at 9:44pm | IP Logged 
Several B1 vocabulary sources I consulted included about 4000 words total. Without distinction passive/active.

Since the CEFR level are based on their communicative skills definitions and not vocab count, I belive you can be functional B1 with less, perhaps as few as 2500 (which is the amount of words in most Assimils, I believe), if you know to use them efficiently. And should you have much wider vocabulary without some other skills, than you might be an awesome B1 but still not B2.
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Elexi
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 Message 6 of 7
29 September 2013 at 12:22pm | IP Logged 
Deutsche Welle state B1.2 is 2500 words. The range in Professor James Milton's survey
of the correspondence between required vocabulary levels and CEFR B1 puts the range at
2500-3250 words (and 3250-3750 for B2, 3750-4500 for C1).

However, the linked article below shows how wild the academic ranges are:

http://www.unomaha.edu/esc/2009Proceedings/EuropeandLanguage Learning.pdf

Professor Milton's range is here at the bottom of page 186:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/58382879/1847692087-Second-Languag e


Edited by Elexi on 29 September 2013 at 12:29pm

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tarvos
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 Message 7 of 7
29 September 2013 at 1:22pm | IP Logged 
It also matters what the language is. If you speak Hebrew then I'm damn sure you can use
less words because if you know how the roots work, you can form a lot of words on the
spot. And Hebrew doesn't have a whole lot of loanwords (and definitely not verbs).


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