Abstract
The purpose of this study was to lay the foundation for considering the differences between the vocabulary used in junior high and high school English textbooks used in Japan. We therefore set out to create four different word lists using spread sheet software and a text editor. The first word list, which was named JH_WL, consists of those words which are used in the Japanese junior high school textbooks of English. The second one, named Hi_WL, is the list of those words which appear in the Japanese high school textbook of English. In this list, the frequency of occurrence of each word was counted. And the third word list, named Target_WL, is composed of those words included in Hi_WL but not in JH_WL, that is to say the difference set between Hi_WL and JH_WL. The fourth one, which was named Int_WL, is the set intersection of Hi_WL and Target_WL. As a result of the analysis, the following results were obtained: JH_WL has 2,593 types; Hi_WL has 14,801 tokens, 1,677 types and the TTR (Type/Token Ratio) is 0.11; Target_WL has 1,740 tokens, 664 types and the TTR is 0.38; Int_WL has 13,061 tokens, 1,031 types and the TTR is 0.07.
