How to Learn Vocabulary From Reading Without Ending up Overwhelmed

If you love both language learning and reading, chances are, you love the idea of reading authentic materials in your target language.

I'm sure every language-learning bookworm remembers the first time they were able to read a whole book in their target language: not one of those language-graded texts, but a real novel in all its complexity and nuances.

As a language teacher, I often encourage my students not to be afraid of re-reading their favourite novels in Italian or English, or even tackling original works.

And since language learning is never over, even with a C2-level German, I spend a lot of time reading books in German: not just because it's fun, but because it helps me learn new words.

However, reading for the plot and reading to learn are not the same. "Just" reading a book might not be enough to improve your vocabulary.

Reading to learn vocabulary: does it work?

Here are three reasons why books might not be the best investments for your effort as a language learner:

The obvious one: they're not active practice. You're not using the language, you're just absorbing it. In order for passive input to be useful, we need to actively engage with it (see below).
The kind of vocabulary you'll find in literary works is usually not the one you need every day. Depending on what book you're reading, words might be too sophisticated, too complex, no longer currently used, or even a bit ridiculous if used in real contexts.
It's just too much. Even if you're an advanced learner (perhaps even if you're a native speaker), a book contains hundreds of new words. You either focus on the plot and give up looking up every new verb or adjective you come across, or just lose the enthusiasm altogether because you're constantly leafing through the French dictionary to translate yet another synonym for "shimmer".

You might have already had similar experiences. You read a whole freakin' twentieth-century novel in Spanish and end up with the feeling you didn't learn any new words because…there were so many. And at the end, you just skimmed through the pages looking for the crucial passages and ignored the endless descriptions of curtains and urban landscapes.

Yet, there's a way to make reading books an effective activity to improve your vocabulary, and it all comes down to choosing the right words to learn.

But first, let me get something out of the way.

What books should I read?

Whatever you want.

As I started browsing for books to read in German, I was overwhelmed by doubts.

Classics? Too complicated.

Fantasy? Not much use for fairy-related vocabulary in everyday life.

Should I read YA-fiction so I learn current, day-to-day vocabulary and expressions? But the idea of purposely learning teenage slang made me feel a bit like the "Young Mr. Burns" meme.

Should I avoid fiction altogether?

I often ended up choosing books and genres because of the words I expected to find in them. But if you aren't invested in the story, in the characters, reading just feels like another chore.

All books contain words, so feel free to choose based on your preferences. If the book is too complex, just put it aside and come back to it in six months or a year.

Looking up words: yay or nay?

Picture yourself with your cup of tea and your cozy blanket on the couch, a brand-new book in your target language open before you, full of secrets, delights, and new words.

You start reading, and immediately you're going to meet words you don't know. What should you do with them?

I personally look them up. All of them.

I know it's not what teachers say you should do: you need to extract meaning from context, and so on.

But after getting to the end of the sentence, I still like to get acquainted with all the words I don't recognize. I want to know which of those are colloquial, which are particularly elegant or rare, and what the difference between three different nuances of German "angry" is.

For some readers, this might take away from the pleasure of reading, and if that's the case, I recommend not doing it and getting happily lost in the plot. For me, as a language nerd, that actually adds to the pleasure.

Choose your words carefully.

But what's important is what comes after looking up words. I take note of the words I find, not all of them, but only selected ones:

Words I can imagine spontaneously using. Yesterday I learned that "Kümmel" means "cumin" in German. Am I going to want to remember this word? Not really. Because I've used it maybe twice in my whole life in my native language, too.
Words I don't have a more obvious synonym for. "Getöse" means "thunderous noise" (in the book, it referred to the noise produced by a waterfall in the near distance). Cool word. But I already have a word for "noise," and it's "Lärm". Is it identical? Of course not. Mine is more basic, generic, and good for all purposes. And, indeed, I'm here to learn new words and add nuances to my vocabulary, but I can't let perfectionism paralyze me. There are, on average, thirty new words on each page I read, so I have to choose the ones I don't have a decent alternative to.
Words that help me say something I couldn't say before. The German word "zerdenken" means "to overthink something to the point of ruining it". Italian doesn't have a word for that, so I can't say I've ever needed to translate it before, but now that I know it, the word is so powerful and emotional that I definitely want to use it!
Words I "should already know". Not all the words I look up are words I've never met before. How many times have I come across the word "überlaufen"? I should already know it means "crowded". But that's the point: I don't remember it. That makes it a great candidate for my list of chosen words: if I've met it before, it's probably a rather common word, yet it doesn't stick with me. Time to change this! That's also relevant for words I recognize when I see them, but can't think of when speaking, which is annoyingly frequent.

Here are your new words. What are you going to do with them?

Even following the above criteria, I still end up with tens of new words for each hour-long reading session. And just meeting them and writing them down doesn't equal memorizing them. How do I make sure to include them in my vocabulary without getting too stressed out about it?

My approach is pretty basic. While reading, I take notes on my phone, so after reading, I transcribe them in a Google Slides document (random, lazy choice). The mere act of transcribing them is helpful because I see them again. I usually remember the meaning of about half of them, while the others, seen out of context in a list, are already a blank in my mind, but I don't look them up right now. I just write each of them on a separate numbered page (basically creating flashcards) without their meaning.

Then, every day, I pick up five random numbers and review only the five words on those pages (you can do ten if you're brave). I look up the meaning again and use each of them in a sentence, then ask ChatGPT to correct the sentence to make sure I used the word in a way that makes sense.

Don't lose sight of the magic

Of course, after having read a couple of books, you're going to have hundreds of flashcards. Don't be scared. All you need to do is five a day.

And if you skip a day, no problem. Words aren't going anywhere.

You're already going the extra mile. You're collecting words from books and treasuring them. It's not another voice from your to-do list, it's not a performance, it's just a way to get in real contact with the language. Someone wrote that word in their book, and now you're using it. You're choosing the ones you like and welcoming them into your mind.