Book Collections
There are lots of different types of collections, but let's start by looking at book collections. A book collection contains all the lists we have for a particular book, in chapter order. It also includes a pretty picture of the book cover, a description of the book, and a link to the author's collection page.
A few of our many book collections
Author Collections
Authors each get their own collection on Vocabulary.com, so you can easily see what resources we have for that author. Want to see all the Shakespeare we have? Easy. Are you a Percy Jackson fan? Check out our Rick Riordan collection.
Author Collections
Featured Collections
We've also created collections for various topics, genres, and themes that allow you to explore, assign, and learn words in a more meaningful way. For example, check out Body Language, a collection to help you learn the etymological roots of words related to the human body. Or, this great collection of graphic novels. There are oodles of collections for you to explore.
A collection featuring YA titles
Improved Search
Speaking of exploring, we've also vastly improved our search functionality. Now when you search, we'll surface any collections we have right at the top of your search. What are you reading? Try searching for it. Looking for something around Halloween? Try searching for "witch" and see what we conjure. Of course, if you didn't see what you were looking for, you can still see the traditional vocabulary lists results below.
Learning a Collection
When you get to a collection that contains lists that you'd like to learn, you can start an activity right from the collection page. Simply click "Start Practice" to get practicing on the first list in the collection. We'll keep track of your progress on each list in the collection as you... err... make progress. (Of course you can also start other activities like Spelling Bees and Vocabulary Jams from a collection page too.)
Start an activity
If you click the "Finish Mastery" button, we'll add the list to your learning program and take you to a focused version of the VocabTrainer, so that you can finish mastering all the words in the list. But beware — finishing up mastery on a list takes more time than finishing progress, and you will see more words from other parts of your learning program interspersed during the process.
After you press the button, your VocabTrainer play will be more focused on mastering that list until you either complete mastery on all the words in the list, or click the "Finish Mastery" button on a different list.
Exploring the Words in a Collection
While we're on a collection page, take a moment to click the "Explore the Words" tab. Here you'll find a bird's-eye view of all the words in this collection, organized by list. Each word appears on a card, with its primary definition, an example sentence, and any notes that were included with the list. Click on any word to go to the dictionary entry for that word.
Explore the Words
If you are on a touch screen, you can swipe over each list to scroll through all the words. If you aren't on a touch screen, you can simply click and drag your mouse on the cards to scroll. You can also change the view to a "grid" or "list" view if you'd prefer not to swipe to see all the words.
Assigning a Collection
If you are an educator and you'd like to assign a collection to your classes, we make that easy too. Now, instead of logging in and assigning a list each week, you can assign all the lists for a book in one fell swoop and space them out over time. Let us show you how.
First, click the "Assign" tab. Next select the activity type you'd like to assign — let's pick "Practice". The first list in the collection will open and give you options for your assignment. After you decide which classes to assign it to, and choose visible and due dates, click "Save Assignment". Now here's the magic — that list will close, and the next list will open with the same selections from the previous list — only the visible and due dates will be advanced one week. Assigning lists for a whole semester was never this painless.
Assign a collection