I’ve been thinking about how word puzzles, crosswords, and vocabulary games affect learning. Besides being fun, they seem to help with spelling, memory, and discovering new words which can be useful for students, writers, and anyone trying to improve their English.

When I get stuck, I usually try to solve it myself first, then check a dictionary or learning resources to understand the word and meaning properly. I feel this makes the puzzle more educational instead of just guessing.

Do you think word games really help with education and brain training, or are they mostly just entertainment?
Also curious what methods or resources people use to learn from puzzles when they’re stuck.

(Planning to share a helpful resource later if discussion allows.)

 

MOD NOTE: Discussion will probably not allow. This sounds like the lead in to site promotion of some kind, which is against the rules.

 

This is a no brainer. Almost all kinds of games (physical and mental ones) can be stimulating, educational, build social connections and good behavior, improve memory function, and can prevent or delay dementia, besides being fun.

Unfortunately, I suspect that sharing a resource would be against forum rules.

 

Thanks for the clarification no promotion intended, just interested in the learning aspect of word puzzles. I won’t be sharing any links if that’s against the rules.
I do agree that these kinds of games can be both fun and mentally useful. For me, they help with vocabulary and pattern recognition, especially when I review clues I missed.
Do you feel puzzles still help you learn new things, or are they mostly just for fun now?

 

It's often said that engineers have the smallest vocabulary of the educated professions. And with a good reason - when we use a word it has a very specific meaning, so we don't need another word to mean the same thing.
As I countermeasure, I'm a big fan of New York Times's Spelling Bee although I do get caught out by American spellings from time to time, and I do get annoyed by words I know that are not in their list.
Perhaps we ought to start an off-topic thread on words that should be in Spelling Bee but aren't.

 

It's often said that engineers have the smallest vocabulary of the educated professions. And with a good reason - when we use a word it has a very specific meaning, so we don't need another word to mean the same thing.
As I countermeasure, I'm a big fan of New York Times's Spelling Bee although I do get caught out by American spellings from time to time, and I do get annoyed by words I know that are not in their list.
Perhaps we ought to start an off-topic thread on words that should be in Spelling Bee but aren't.

I would speculate that, in fact, working engineers probably have a larger vocabulary than the average speaker. Now if you want to suggest they might have a smaller vocabulary in some domains that are more common among people who are not engineers, that seems reasonable.

However, it you count the technical terms used routinely by an engineer, I suspect that a more expansive and precise vocabulary is the case.

 

I would speculate that, in fact, working engineers probably have a larger vocabulary than the average speaker. Now if you want to suggest they might have a smaller vocabulary in some domains that are more common among people who are not engineers, that seems reasonable.

However, it you count the technical terms used routinely by an engineer, I suspect that a more expansive and precise vocabulary is the case.

Larger than the average reader because of the copious amount of technical terms (and acronyms?) but smaller than that of a hIstorian or literature specialist.
I did actually read that somewhere, but don’t ask me to cite the source!
Who has the larger number of technical terms? Us, or the medics?

 

they seem to help with spelling, memory, and discovering new words

I would dispute the use of crosswords as a vocabulary builder. In the two to three hours I spend on a New York Times Sunday crossword, I am very unlikely to find a new word that I would actually incorporate into my vocabulary. Two hours of reading might give me several, mostly clarifying the meaning of words I have seen before but did not know the exact meaning or proper usage. The new words I come across in a crossword are primarily proper nouns, archaic, or unusual meanings. I mean, who cares that I now know that a “stoat” is a small mammal related to weasels?

That said, I love the word “quotidian” that I recently learned from seeing it twice in crosswords, and used in a post on this forum.

What I have said applies to crosswords used as entertainment by the general public. Crosswords specifically designed for students would be different.

 

A lot depends on your native language. If English is a second language, it matters if your native language has roots in one of the romance languages, (French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish), or Germanic languages, (Dutch, German, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish) and most importantly, Latin. There are a lot of word roots and similarities among those languages.

In French, "quotidien" is commonly used and has the same meaning as "quotidian". In Spanish, it is "cotidiano" or "diario" and "quotidiano" in Italian.

With respect to learning English as a second language, puzzles such as crosswords, Scrabble, NYT Wordle and Connections can be helpful but also challenging for an ESL person. I can guess that there are more effective ways to acquire a foreign language.

Studies have shown that learning a second language can help with memory and other brain functions.

 

I bought a $2 handheld electronic item with like 12 buttons on it from amzon haul, it's like a simon-says but with multiple games to play using the light-up buttons, with sounds. 1) motor skills / exercise, you need to press quickly in some games, 2) memory skills, as all the games are memory type.

But duly noted, I have no way of measuring if I am smarter, better than before, or worse than before. Sometimes I walk across the house to get my slippers, but I end up using the toilet instead. LOL.

 

I think almost anything we do has potential to provide beneficial effects, some of which are obvious and others not so much. For some things, like watching TV, we do have to be a lot more selective about what we watch if we want the positive to outweigh the negative, though. As was already pointed out, unless specifically designed for that purpose, I don't know that most crosswords really help build vocabulary. But they do help develop certain types of association and reasoning skills, particularly with the specific form of the clue is, itself, an important part of the clue. It requires that we look under the surface and pay attention to minute details. Logic puzzles, such as the classic, "The guy with the red car lives three houses down from the girl that lives in the green house,", or Sudoko, help you build reasoning skills, both in interpreting what a given clue tells you about the relationships, but also what it implies about other relationships and what is and is not possible. Many games, like Clue, are based on this. Other games and puzzles are about pattern recognition, or math skills, or exercising decision trees or logic chains.

Reading a diverse selection of material, from news to history to detective stories to science fiction, is probably among the best ways to build vocabulary (although interacting socially with other humans is probably pretty good too, if something that most engineers aren't particularly good at). The downside of reading is that we might see a spelled word and understand its meaning from context, but we don't hear how it is pronounced and so might not recognize it when we hear it or pronounce it correctly if we try to use it in conversation. Though this is probably not the norm. The one word that sticks out in my case is "fascade", "facade". I saw it in writing and new what it meant, and I heard it pronounced and new what that word meant, but it was years before I saw and heard them at the same time (I think if was a subtitle of a movie) and realized that they were the same word because, in my mind, I was pronouncing the written word completely wrong. To this day, I still pronounce it in my mind wrong, though that's really more for private amusement than anything else).

I think that anything that engages the mind in almost any way has positive benefits when it comes to forestalling mental decline. The more engaged the mind is, probably the more the benefit. I would also surmise that doing different things that engage the mind in different ways has even more benefit.

EDIT: Fixed type pointed out by MrChips.

 

"facade" is an example of a word with French origins, "façade", and rooted in Latin, "facia", that can be easily mispronounced. Going by spelling alone, there are many different ways to say it, but only one correct way.

I cannot find any official record of the word "fascade".

 

I’ve been thinking about how word puzzles, crosswords, and vocabulary games affect learning. Besides being fun, they seem to help with spelling, memory, and discovering new words which can be useful for students, writers, and anyone trying to improve their English.

When I get stuck, I usually try to solve it myself first, then check a dictionary or learning resources to understand the word and meaning properly. I feel this makes the puzzle more educational instead of just guessing.

Do you think word games really help with education and brain training, or are they mostly just entertainment?
Also curious what methods or resources people use to learn from puzzles when they’re stuck.

(Planning to share a helpful resource later if discussion allows.)

Strangely enough, writing is an excellent way to improve one's vocabulary. One often faces questions like "is this the best word for what I'm trying to express" and "is this assertion absolutely true" and that self criticism can lead to learning new words.

I now have a question for you. Do you have any interest whatsoever in electronics?

 

"facade" is an example of a word with French origins, "façade", and rooted in Latin, "facia", that can be easily mispronounced. Going by spelling alone, there are many different ways to say it, but only one correct way.

I cannot find any official record of the word "fascade".

You are correct -- I made a typo that I didn't catch. Thanks for point it out. It's been corrected.

 

Strangely enough, writing is an excellent way to improve one's vocabulary. One often faces questions like "is this the best word for what I'm trying to express" and "is this assertion absolutely true" and that self criticism can lead to learning new words.

While I agree principle, I would suspect that very few people actually apply that process to their writing and the ones that do, while benefiting from it the most, are probably also the ones that need to do it the least in the sense that they are the kind of people that have already built strong vocabularies through many other ways. In fact, I suspect there's a bit of chicken-and-egg at play. People that ask questions like "is this the best word" do so because they already have a bunch of possible words to use and so they HAVE to make a choice, conscious or unconscious, while people with limited vocabularies simply choose the one word they know.

I dislike using the same nontrivial word multiple times in the same sentence or thought expression (if it spans a few sentences). I just find it awkward and ugly. So I frequently find myself looking for synonyms to make it flow better, but then have to decide if the synonym is truly conveying the right thing, or is there a subtle difference that is important. I think this has helped build my vocabulary quite a bit over the years.

 

While I agree principle, I would suspect that very few people actually apply that process to their writing and the ones that do, while benefiting from it the most, are probably also the ones that need to do it the least in the sense that they are the kind of people that have already built strong vocabularies through many other ways. In fact, I suspect there's a bit of chicken-and-egg at play. People that ask questions like "is this the best word" do so because they already have a bunch of possible words to use and so they HAVE to make a choice, conscious or unconscious, while people with limited vocabularies simply choose the one word they know.

I dislike using the same nontrivial word multiple times in the same sentence or thought expression (if it spans a few sentences). I just find it awkward and ugly. So I frequently find myself looking for synonyms to make it flow better, but then have to decide if the synonym is truly conveying the right thing, or is there a subtle difference that is important. I think this has helped build my vocabulary quite a bit over the years.

I've always thought your posts are well composed. A test I often apply is "is what I've written, the best way of saying what I really mean?".

 

This brings up an interesting point. Very often, when posting on AAC, I am tempted to write it in a way that comes naturally to me. Then when I realize that this is a website with an international audience, I might rephrase it with simpler vocabulary and grammatical construction, especially when the TS might not be an English language speaker.

On the other hand, sometimes I intentionally keep the less common word or phrase because I think that this would be a good way for an ESL person to learn the language.

 

I've always thought your posts are well composed. A test I often apply is "is what I've written, the best way of saying what I really mean?".

Thank you. I try to make them so, with admittedly varying degrees of success. It always amazes me how many typos and poorly phrased things I find when I re-read them. I generally try to proofread pretty carefully before I submit, but it's a bit shocking how must stuff makes it through. If I catch it soon enough, I'll edit the post and fix it (and I often have to do that several times before I think I've caught them all). Otherwise, I just leave it to posterity unless it truly affects the message.

I know that I have a habit to get wordy and go into far more detail than is often needed, but people don't have to read what I've written and I'm sure some don't, especially the longer posts.

When I was writing for journals and conference papers, I realized (almost said, "amazed," but I used that already ) how much fluff there was in my writing. I discovered that, with some effort, I could almost always reduce the length by half without removing anything of true value. If anything, I think it made what remained significantly more effective. But it did take time and effort, and I'm seldom willing to put that effort into a forum post.

 

I am a member of Toastmasters for over 18 years.
One of the tips we give members:
Writing a speech is like preparing to go on an airplane trip. When you're packing your suitcase, you will find that you cannot close it and it's way over the luggage weight limit. You need to remove half the stuff.

Same with writing a speech. Write the speech. Then eliminate half what you have written. Be concise and precise.

 

Strangely enough, writing is an excellent way to improve one's vocabulary. One often faces questions like "is this the best word for what I'm trying to express" and "is this assertion absolutely true" and that self criticism can lead to learning new words.

I now have a question for you. Do you have any interest whatsoever in electronics?

Reading much more than writing. No matter how much you understand reading can progress faster. My case.