Synthesis:
Vocabulary is vital to learning across all curriculums. When students lack an adequate vocabulary, they struggle in school, they lose interest in learning, and they can shut down. To help students, all content-area teachers must teach vocabulary, but just teaching the words is not enough. According to Karen Bromley, students must interact with the vocabulary through vicarious experiences, direct experiences, and direct instruction in order to truly comprehend the words. Wood and Blanton's article went into a more in-depth analysis of content-area vocabulary, but they also stressed the importance of multiple exposure to vocabulary words in a variety of different ways. Although it discussed the importance of vocabulary and teaching it in a variety of ways, the Manzo, Manzo, and Thomas article focused more on the decline of vocabulary and its impact on American society.
Response:
Bromley (Ch 7): I really enjoyed this chapter, and I know that I can implement some of the strategies easily into my classroom. I shared the Root Word Web and Inspiration Organizer with my co-teacher, and we are going to implement them when we begin our unit on root words. I think they're simple and easy strategies, but they will help students learn the root better than the other strategies that we've tried so far. I also liked the concept of Teach-Teach-Trade, and I want to share this strategy with my science and social studies teachers.
Wood and Blanton article: I liked how they went into detail about the different content-area vocabulary. Even though words are central to language arts, I think I take for granted how difficult math, science and social studies content vocabulary can be. (Unless I sit back and remember how many times math made me cry in high school!) After reading this, I am going to help my students relate the words in our curriculum to their other subjects, and hopefully more discussions and applications will help increase their vocabulary.
Manzo, Manzo, and Thomas: I loved this article, and I completely agree that vulgarity is taking over as "low frequency" words become obsolete and old-fashioned. I think a large vocabulary gives one an advantage over those who are content to live with a limited, vulgar one. I shared this article with my students, especially when they complained about having to read outside of class. We discussed the difference in mass media when I was young and now, and we discussed how important learning new words was to their success.
Questions:
1) When reading to increase word exposure and vocabulary base, how important is the type of material being read? Should students be focused on higher-leveled material, or are easily-accessible texts sufficient?
2) What is an engaging way to incorporate higher-level vocabulary in on daily basis in a classroom with students with reading levels varying from 3rd-10th grades?
Wow that is a varied level of reading levels!! What came to mind when I read that question was paired activities. I know we try to not separate based on levels, but with vocabulary development it seems okay since 3rd grade vocab is very different from 10th. Maybe pair them up with a similar reading level, then each week the students bring in a new word they learned and teach it to the other partner. Then they could do other activities together or with a group.
ReplyDeleteIn response to your first question, I think that it's absolutely important to expose them to rigorous texts, but to avoid giving them texts that are too challenging. I think there should be a few words that they don't know (or don't know well enough to use them in their own communication), or else their word learning won't improve very much. Although, if they're struggling with every other word, they'll give up (and I don't blame them!).
ReplyDeleteI'm still working on a problem related to your second question. I'm doing a lot of stuff with word roots this year, so I hope that will help my students! Let me know if you discover anything useful for helping students with very low reading levels and a wide variety of reading levels.