The Vocabulary.com Top 1000

Front 1

1. consider = deem to be

Back 1

Consider is a verb that simply means to think about, look at, or judge. Consider, for a moment, the perks of house sitting for your pool-owning neighbors before you immediately refuse their request.

Coming to us from the Latin word considerare, meaning “to look at closely" or "observe,” consider is a very common word that describes something you likely do multiple times a day: You probably consider what to wear in the morning, weigh your options for lunch, take into account the weather when deciding to grab your umbrella. Your life is full of consideration and you didn't even know it!

At the moment, artemisinin-based therapies are considered the best treatment, but cost about $10 per dose - far too much for impoverished communities.
—Seattle Times (Feb 16, 2012)

Front 2

2. minute = infinitely or immeasurably small

Back 2

Craftsmen can paint whole villages or detailed portraits of people on a grain of rice using minute, or tiny, paintbrushes. Often the works of art are so minute that you can only see them with a magnifying glass.

Minutus is the Latin word for "small," and it gave rise to both the adjective minute (my-NOOT), or incredibly small, and the noun minute (MIN-it), or 60 seconds of time. Though they are pronounced differently, both words refer to small measurements. An object can be minute, like a flea compared with its dog, and less concrete things can be minute, like your minute chance of winning the lottery. A minute freckle on the side of your nose is a minute detail of your whole face.


EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
The minute stain on the document was not visible to the naked eye.

Front 3

3. accord = concurrence of opinion

Back 3

If you clean your room of your own accord, you parents will be pleased—it means you did it without having to be asked. They might even accord you an extra privilege. Warring nations make peace accords.

A Honda Accord is a nice, agreeable car, and the word accord is all about agreement, or unity. If a whole class begs with one accord to postpone a quiz for a day to allow more review, the teacher is more likely to listen than if it was just one student asking.

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
The committee worked in accord on the bill, and it eventually passed.

Front 4

4. evident = clearly revealed to the mind or the senses or judgment

Back 4

If something is evident, it's visible. If you blush furiously and start shaking every time your crush comes near, your infatuation will be evident to everyone.

Evident means conspicuously visible, often the mark of an action or a feeling. If a room is in total disarray, with everything pulled out of the drawers, it's evident that someone has been searching for something. If you leave the room in the middle of a tense meeting, your frustration will be evident. Evident can also simply mean visible. If you look closely at a key hole of your car door, small scratches will be evident in the paint.

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
That confidence was certainly evident in the way Smith handled the winning play with 14 seconds left on the clock.
—Reuters (Jan 15, 2012)

Front 5

5. practice = a customary way of operation or behavior

Back 5

Practice can be a noun or a verb, but either way it's about how things are done on a regular basis. You can practice shotput every day because your town has a practice of supporting track-and-field events.

One can practice the tuba for hours on end, repeating the same song over and over, serving to both get better at the tuba and to convince the neighbors they should move to Florida. You could learn the common practice of offering a guest a beverage when they arrive at your party, if you care to be polite. One can also practice a profession or a religion, as in “I practice Buddhism and I have a booming international law practice.”

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
He directed and acted in plays every season and became known for exploring Elizabethan theatre practices.
—BBC (Feb 16, 2012)

Front 6

6. intend = have in mind as a purpose

Back 6

If you intend to do something, you mean to do it or have it in mind as a goal. Do you plan on getting your holiday cards in the mail before February this year? Then you intend on getting them out early.

The world is full of good intentions, meaning there are lots of people who intend to be nice, eat better, floss more, or pick up their dirty socks. But things don't always go as planned. Your actions could produce results that you didn't expect, specify, or ever intend — that might explain the well-known proverb, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions."

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
“Lipstick, as a product intended for topical use with limited absorption, is ingested only in very small quantities,” the agency said on its website.
—BusinessWeek (Feb 15, 2012)

Front 7

7. concern = something that interests you because it is important or affects you

Back 7

Concern is both a noun and a verb. As a noun it's something that you find particularly important. If you love pizza, getting the crust just so is a major concern during your pizza party.

Concern can also be something or someone that makes you upset or anxious, like your concern over the quality of the pizza crust. It can be a feeling of sympathy, like when your mom expresses concern over your obsession with pizza crust. As a verb, concern means to be relevant to something. Your main goal today may concern studying for your math test. Concern can also describe worry. When you stay out past curfew, your mom will be concerned.

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
The scandal broke out in October after former chief executive Michael Woodford claimed he was fired for raising concerns about the company's accounting practices.
—BBC (Feb 15, 2012)

Front 8

8. commit = perform an act, usually with a negative connotation

Back 8

To commit is to fully dedicate yourself to something. To commit yourself to being the coolest kid on the beach means spending hours at the mall trying on trunks and flip-flops.

Commit can also mean "perform an act" — often the kind that can get you in trouble. Just ask anyone who's committed theft, or arson, or vandalism. If you are committing another person, that means you are sending that person to an institution. Someone may be committed to prison, or to a psychiatric hospital for treatment.

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
In an unprecedented front page article in 2003 The Times reported that Mr. Blair, a young reporter on its staff, had committed journalistic fraud.
—New York Times (Feb 15, 2012)

Front 9

9. issue = some situation or event that is thought about

Back 9

One copy of "Celebrities are Cool" magazine is an issue. It is issued, or put out, by the publisher. You and your mother may argue over the issue, or topic, of whether or not you should read it.

The original meaning of the word issue was to put something out. If a celebrity issues a statement or the post office issues new stamps, they put them out for the public. Likewise, an issue is a current topic, sometimes controversial, that is being discussed. Politicians often say they want to talk about the issues (and not their personal lives!). You might hear someone say, "He's got issues" about a person who has some problems, usually emotional ones, but this is a very new use for the word.


EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
As a result, the privacy issues surrounding mobile computing are becoming ever-more complex.
—Time (Feb 16, 2012)

Front 10

10. approach = set up or found

Back 10

To establish something means to begin it or bring it about. If you want everyone in your family to bring you chocolate every evening, you can establish a “Chocolates for Me” policy requiring it.

Establish is related to stable through its Latin roots and has many meanings, but all have the feel of building on a stable foundation. Besides the meaning of setting a policy, establish can also mean to prove one's value. You should establish yourself in a community before you try to bring change to it. Similarly, if you like to debate controversial issues, you'd best begin with facts that have been established and are not open to question. If you have a lot of money and want to build up your community, you can establish, or found, a school or library there.

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
Spain’s jobless rate for people ages 16 to 24 is approaching 50 percent.
—New York Times (Feb 15, 2012)