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by Peter Reynolds

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by Sonja Wimmer

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educational: english language & literacy

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Dear Deer: A Book of Homophones: Amazon.ca: Gene Barretta: Books

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Roget and his Thesaurus

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The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus: Jen Bryant, Melissa Sweet: 9780802853851: Books - Amazon.ca

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series of books

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juvenile nonfiction / language arts / grammar

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educational: english language: reading & writing skills

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If You Were an Adverb: Michael Dahl: 9781404819832: Books - Amazon.ca

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books in the series

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Wonderful things are being invented every day in Al Pha's world-fire, the wheel, even shadows! His big chance to be part of history comes when the King announces that the twenty-six recently invented letters need to be put in order. Al makes a bet with himself that he's the man for the job.

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No More Phonics and Spelling Worksheets

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young adult and educational / picture books

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activity books and early learning material / early learning / early learning concepts / early learning: abc books / alphabet books

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juvenile nonfiction / concepts / alphabet

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young adult and educational / picture books

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activity books and early learning material / picture books

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early learning: abc books / alphabet books

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An Alphabet: Amazon.ca: Oliver Jeffers: Books

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"Seven types to rule all words, seven to classify them, Seven types to differentiate, and through instruction bind them." Familiar with Tolkien's Lord of the Rings ? If so, you'll recognize...

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The first in a series on teaching and learning new words.

The importance of a strong vocabulary to successful reading is well-documented. Because of its importance vocabulary development is considered one key to a rich language arts curriculum. But while there are many paths to an increased vocabulary, there is no silver bullet, no magic formula, no quick fix for vocabulary. Vocabulary development is the work of a lifetime, a literal cradle to grave activity, a quest that has no end. As teachers our job is, in part, to teach vocabulary, but more importantly it is to set students up to be in the vocabulary acquisition business for the rest of their lives.

First, let's take a look at the many paths that lead students to a rich vocabulary.

1. Conversation - Children, from the earliest of ages, learn words through conversation with adults and other children. Children who are talked with, rather than talked at, tend to build larger vocabularies. In the classroom it is critical that teachers have real conversations with children and structure the classroom so that children can have real conversations with each other. Conversations are two way streets where participants are expected to listen and also speak.

2. Reading - Before children learn to read independently, they learn new vocabulary through read alouds. Once children learn to read independently, wide reading in a variety of genres and on a variety of topics is the single best way to continue developing word knowledge. Read alouds, with teacher explanation of words, should, of course, continue well after children have begun to read independently. In order for reading to lead to improved vocabulary, that reading must be wide awake to the new words the reader encounters. In other words the reader must have a well-developed word consciousness (see below).

3. Writing - Truly knowing a new word requires many encounters with a word. One good way to reinforce vocabulary learning that comes from reading or direct instruction is through writing. Please note, I am not talking here about writing sentences for words that have been assigned arbitrarily, or the kind of artificial writing created when students are asked to use a set of vocabulary terms in a paragraph. I am talking here of a much more organic approach, where children reinforce new vocabulary by responding to or summarizing what they have read or what new information they have learned. The point of learning new vocabulary is not the words themselves, but the ideas these words convey.

4. Direct Instruction - Research has shown that students can also learn words through direct instruction. Again, direct instruction does not mean being assigned a list of words to look up, writing the definition, and then writing the word in a sentence. This is not instruction at all, but busy work. Direct instruction means the teacher deliberately discussing a targeted word, talking about its meaning, showing how it is used in context and engaging the children with the word by showing how it connects to their own experience.

5. Morphemic Analysis - Knowledge of root words, prefixes, and suffixes can also assist students in determining the meaning of a word and in building vocabulary based on common elements. It is helpful when you run across the word "pseudonym" in your reading, if you know that the prefix "pseudo-" means "fake" , and that the root "nym" means name. This knowledge can then help you extend to other words like homonym, synonym, and antonym.

6. Context Clues - Knowing that authors often leave clues in their writing to help readers determine the meaning of an unknown word is also useful in developing vocabulary. Research has indicated that the use of context clues is most effective when students are directly taught the strategy and the various ways that authors signal the meaning of words.

7. Word Histories - The history of words can also be helpful when trying to determine the meaning of a word. Telling word stories can help students develop an interest and curiosity in words. One such story I tell is about the word "sign." It seems that the word sign was once pronounced with the "g" being sounded, but over the years the "g" was dropped and the "i" made long. But the "g" has been retained in spelling to help us with the meaning of such words as signal, signature, signatory, significant, etc.

8. Consulting an Expert - Sometimes no particular strategy can help and outside help is required. Students need to learn to use resources like a dictionary quickly and efficiently, but I also like to suggest that students should consider other resources that might be available as well. It might be more efficient for the reader to simply ask a classmate (perhaps one with particular knowledge of a particular topic), or the teacher, or another adult.

Just as readers need a repertoire of strategies to decode an unknown word (phonics, word families, chunking, what makes sense?), they also need a repertoire of strategies to determine word meaning. Indeed, any encounter with a new word might involve a bit of recall of instruction, a bit of morphemic analysis, a bit of context, and a bit of consulting an expert. Teaching students these strategies is helpful, but we also need to make sure we teach them to use the strategies flexibly.

None of the good vocabulary instruction we do will matter much unless we simultaneously help students develop word consciousness. Word consciousness means an awareness of and a curiosity about new words that will motivate the learning of new words. I have written about word consciousness extensively in this post. Teachers have a critical role to play in developing student word consciousness. First, and most critically that role includes being a model of word curiosity. During read alouds and any other activity, the teacher must communicate her fascination with, enthusiasm for, and love of words, at the ingenious ways that words work, at how the same word can have so many different meanings, at how authors choose to use certain words to communicate certain ideas.

By skillfully and regularly using think alouds teachers can help students develop their own fascination and enthusiasm for words. Here is an example of a think aloud from a fourth grade read aloud.

From the reading: The truck farm is located on a beautiful stream in a pastoral setting.

Boys and girls, I am not sure I know the meaning of "pastoral" in this sentence, so let me see what I can use to help me figure it out. I know that the suffix -al is used on adjectives, so the word is a describing word for the noun "setting." If I take the -al off I am left with the root word "pastor." I know a pastor is kind of like a minister or a priest, but that meaning of the word doesn't seem to make sense here. "Pastor" also looks a bit like "pasture", and this sentence is talking about a farm, so I wonder if the word could mean something along the lines of "like a pasture." That seems to make sense. Let's look the word up and see what the dictionary has to say. So the dictionary says "associated with the country life." So that seems close to what we guessed. The dictionary also says that this is the type of farm is usually associated with sheep or cattle. The word comes from the Latin word pastor meaning shepherd. That also seems to be where the word "pastor" meaning minister comes from, because religious pastors are often referred to as tending to their flock, in this case, not sheep, but the people who attend their church.

In this think aloud I have tried to demonstrate for the children that they can use context clues, morphemic analysis, word histories, and outside experts in combination to discover the meaning of a word and to get the bonus of discovering some interesting ways that words are intertwined in meaning.

Armed with word consciousness and some word solving skills, students are positioned to grow their vocabulary with each encounter with text.

In future posts in this series, I will look in more detail at other instructional strategies we can use to build vocabulary.

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The first in a series on teaching and learning new words. The importance of a strong vocabulary to successful reading is well-documented. Because of its importance vocabulary development is considered one key to a rich language arts curriculum. But while there are many paths to an increased vocabulary, there is no silver bullet, no magic formula, no quick fix for vocabulary.

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How a Portable Word Wall Can Help Your Students with Spelling | TWO WRITING TEACHERS

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How a Portable Word Wall Can Help Your Students with Spelling

My daughter, who is in second grade, brought home all of the writing she did during her first unit of study, Lessons from the Masters: Improving Narrative Writing, last week Just as I would remind a fellow educator not to look at the writing from a deficit perspective, I looked past the misspelled words, missing punctuation, and different colors of ink so I could focus on the content of her writing. I looked at her writing and asked myself "What is Isabelle doing well as a writer." As I flipped through her booklets, I discovered she wrote about a variety of topics that held meaning and value to her. I realized her process now included more detailed sketches. In addition, I noticed her volume had increased markedly since the previous school year. These are some of the wonderful things I have celebrated with my daughter since she brought home her small moment writing.

The week before the writing came home, Isabelle and I had been talking about spelling people's names (e.g., her grandparents, her teachers, her friends) properly. I started writing down the proper spelling of names she used frequently in her at-home writing on sticky notes so she could keep it on her craft table, which is where she chooses to write. We talked about making a personal word wall at home, but we couldn't decide on a space where it should go. (Also, I realized taking up part of her playroom with a word wall was a bit intrusive.) Therefore, I began adding the names to a portable word wall I created in a Word document on my computer.

Once the writing from the first unit of study came home from school, I noticed Isabelle needed help with more than just proper nouns. There are many words she uses frequently misspells, like because, next, and said. Therefore, I recorded the words she misspelled several times across her booklets and added them to the portable word wall I started creating on my computer.

I made a double-sided portable word wall for Isabelle with one side being the names of people and places she often writes about, while the flip side contains commonly misspelled words. I printed out a copy for her craft table and emailed another copy to her teacher, who laminated it and talked with Isabelle about how she could use the portable word wall at school.

When I was a new classroom teacher, I assigned spelling words to my students. Then, I wondered why their spelling didn't improve in their writing. Eventually, I realized it was because they weren't practicing the words they were misspelling. Therefore, I began giving my students personal spelling word lists, which was a game changer. The words on their lists came from misspelled words I identified in their writing, and high-frequency word lists for their grade level (or words from the previous grade level they hadn't mastered). Doing this was a game changer since, with extra practice, I noticed my students' spelling improve.

Having a portable word wall, like the one I created for Isabelle, is something both differentiated and up-close for students to use, which makes it more appealing than a full-class word wall that's located on a wall away from most students' work spaces. Also, portable word walls can be updated - if they're kept on a computer - whenever words are mastered or (new) words to learn are added. Also, they can be used discreetly during any stage of the writing process.

Click here for a portable word wall template you can download and customize for your students.

More blog posts and spelling strategies:

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How a Portable Word Wall Can Help Your Students with Spelling

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My daughter, who is in second grade, brought home all of the writing she did during her first unit of study, Lessons from the Masters: Improving Narrative Writing, last week Just as I would remind a fellow educator not to look at the writing from a deficit perspective, I looked past the misspelled words, missing punctuation, and different colors of ink so I could focus on the content of her writing.

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http://resources.corwin.com/sites/default/files/koutrakos_sticks_online_resources_rev_iii_after_hours.pdf