Word Nerds

Goals I will gain knowledge in the area of student vocabulary development. I will learn various researched based active practices for vocabulary. I will participate and walk out with a smile.

1. Some words are more important to teach than others. In Bringing Words to Life (2002) Beck, McKeown, and Kucan talk about the levels of words that they call Tier One, Tier Two, and Tier Three. Tier OneTier TwoTier Three These are words that already know when they come to school. These are high- frequency words that students will likely encounter in school yet probably don’t know well. These words are domain- specific. Clock, happy, baby Coincidence, absurd, industrious Habitat, peninsula, refinery

Identifying Tier Two Words in Context Tier Two Words Students’ Likely Expressions Merchant salesperson or clerk Required have to Tend take care of Fortunate lucky

2. Students have to learn words at more than one level. No knowledge General sense of the word Narrow, context-bound knowledge Having knowledge of the word, but not being able to apply it readily enough to a situation Rich knowledge of the word

3. Students learn words when they experience them multiple times. Different researchers speak to how much exposure to a word a student needs in order for mastery to occur. To really learn a word, students need multiple exposures to it over time (Stahl 2003) Six exposures (Jenkins, Stein, and Wysocki 1984) Twelve exposures (McKeown, Beck, Ormanson, and Pople 1985)

4. Asking students to look up words in the dictionary and write the definition does not help them learn words. Dictionary definitions may actually cloud a word’s meaning rather than help the student learn it. Why do we use dictionaries? Webster’s Definition of Fortunate 1.bringing some good thing not foreseen as certain 2. receiving some unexpected good 7 What does the word fortunate mean in paragraph 1? A wise B happy C lucky D proud

5. When students learn words, they build patterns and networks of meaning called “word schema”. Various kinds of knowledge can be applied to learning new vocabulary (Nagy and Scott 1990) Warm-up Our Schema… RAVE!-Robust Academic Vocabulary Encounters

6. Students can learn some words through the use of wide reading. For students who have learned to read, wide reading of different types of texts, including trade books, along with direct teacher instruction and rich vocabulary experiences can help them continue to build word schema (Anderson 1990; Nagy and Herman 1987) Take time for read aloud…

7. Students can learn some words through rich conversations with adults and peers. Students at risk for academic failure, including children of poverty, minority students, and ELL students, should participate in academic discussions on a regular basis. Comprehension at the Core

8. Students can learn some words through word play. We want to help our students develop the habit of being curious about words. Risk Takers!

9. Students can learn some words by direct instruction. Marzano (2009) Six Step Instructional Plan 1. Provide a description, explanation, or example of the new term. 2. Ask students to restate the description, explanation, or example in their own words. 3. Ask to student to illustrate the word 4. Engage students periodically in activities 5. Periodically ask students to discuss the word with peers 6. Involve students in games

10. Most students need word-learning strategies to become independent readers. Students must be able to determine the meanings of unfamiliar words without help when independently reading. Morphology-the study of the smallest units of meaning

Vocabulary Through Morphology Morphology should be taught as a cognitive strategy to be learned. In order to break a word down into morphemes, students must complete the following five steps: Recognize that they do not know the word. Analyze the word for recognizable morphemes, both in the roots and suffixes. Think of a possible meaning based upon the parts of the word. Check the meaning of the word against the context of the reading. Students who understand how words are formed by combining

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Vocabulary Planning Shared Reading Guided Reading/Stations Read Aloud Content specific-SC SS M Think aloud modeling of vocabulary. You have already read the text, so you can “set-up” a model. Thinking about the genres vocabulary. Stanza, line,…