VocabKitchen: Awesome Vocab. Profilers!

http://vocabkitchen.com/Default.aspx

VocabKitchen's Academic Word List (AWL) Vocabulary Profiler (beta version) is already awesome! It quickly highlighted, listed, and sorted on- and off-list vocabulary in sample texts. It also was "dictionary enabled," which means you can get Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online definitions of almost any words by double-clicking on them (not a name like Tanaka). Though the percentages of on- and off-list words for the first sample I tried didn't add up (7% + 101%, respectively), text and highlight colours were easy to read on the white background.

VocabKitchen's General Service List (GSL) Vocabulary Profiler (beta version) performed similarly well on the same sample. Highlighting, listing and sorting was speedy, but again the percentages didn't add up (see below). It's still a quick, cool, easy-to-use tool. However, VocabKitchen's choice of tint for highlighting words in in the GSL 2nd 1K (RGB: 48, 152, 204) offered slightly less background-to-text contrast than had the AWL Vocabulary Profiler's on-list colour (especially when used on a grey heading bar), and the location of the sort button in the GSL-beta profiler differed for off-list words.

VocabKitchen's Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) Vocabulary Profiler was available in both a beta and a regular version. The main differences seemed to be that 1) the CEFR-beta version was "dictionary enabled" like the AWL-beta profiler, and 2) the CEFR-beta version also provided an Export to Word function. Nevertheless, background-to-text contrast, at least for B1 level words and corresponding headings (RGB: 249, 154, 0), seemed a bit problematic.

On the CEFR-beta display, VocabKitchen avoided the low-contrast problem on grey header bars by using a shade close to black (RGB: 34, 34, 34). Something closer to black (0, 0, 0) might be even better!

VocabKitchen (also in beta), please keep up the good work. I'm looking forward to trying out the Social Reader Tool. In the mean time, I'll strive to cut down on off-list words–at least on this blog!

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