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1. Preprinted Response Cards and Write-On Response Boards: Made for large group instruction where everyone answers in unison. The teacher reads a definition and students hold up a preprinted answer or write their own on dry erase boards.

2. Classwide Peer Tutoring: Structured peer tutoring where students work in pairs. Index cards with definitions are used and students take turns testing each other. The student must get the words correct three days in a row.

3. Ask Questions: After teaching a vocabulary word, teachers need to find every opportunity to ask questions about the new word. Who, what, where, why, when, and which.

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Using Morphemic Analysis to Teach Independent Word-Learning Strategies

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Using Morphemic Analysis to Teach Independent Word-Learning Strategies

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Morphemes (smallest units of meaning) can be used to figure out the meaning of new vocabulary words.
Example: careless
consists of two morphemes: care and less
If students know that less means without, they know that careless means doing something without care or without being careful.

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How Can I Provide Extra Practice for My Students?

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How Can I Provide Extra Practice for My Students?

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Repeated exposures must be rich, meaning that students are actively involved in using and thinking about word meanings and creating lots of associations among words This extra practice must extend beyond the classroom and into community environments as well.

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The scientific research on vocabulary instruction reveals that most vocabulary is learned indirectly and that some vocabulary must be taught directly. Thus, research supports using a combination of both indirect and direct approaches.

Children learn the meanings of most words indirectly, through everyday experiences with oral and written language. Children learn word meanings indirectly in three ways:

Young children learn word meanings through conversations with other people, especially adults. As they engage in these conversations, children often hear adults repeat words several times. They also may hear adults use new and interesting words. The more oral language experiences children have, the more word meanings they learn.

Children learn word meanings from listening to adults read to them. Reading aloud is particularly helpful when the reader pauses during reading to define an unfamiliar word and, during and after reading, engages the child in a conversation about the book. Conversations about books help children to learn new words and concepts and to relate them to their prior knowledge and experience.

Children's books typically contain more unusual, sophisticated words - new vocabulary words - than does everyday conversation, even the everyday conversation of well-educated adults (Hayes & Ahrens, 1988). One reason why reading aloud to children is so important is that it increases children's exposure to new vocabulary.

Children learn many new words by reading extensively on their own. The more children read on their own, the more words they encounter and the more word meanings they learn.

Unfortunately, the children who often need vocabulary development the most - struggling readers - tend to be those who read the least, because of limitations in their skills or because they have had so many failure experiences with reading that they lack motivation to read. This is one reason why it's important to combine direct teaching methods with indirect vocabulary learning.

Direct vocabulary learning

Although a great deal of vocabulary is learned indirectly, some vocabulary should be taught directly.

Direct instruction helps students learn difficult words, such as words that represent complex concepts that are not part of the students' everyday experiences. Direct instruction of vocabulary relevant to a given text leads to better reading comprehension.
Direct instruction includes:

Providing students with instruction in specific words that are important to students' content learning or understanding of a particular text

Teaching students more general word-learning strategies that they can apply to a variety of words, such as analyzing parts of words (e.g., root words)

Teaching specific words before reading helps both vocabulary learning and reading comprehension.

Before students read a text, it is helpful to teach them specific words that they will see in the text and that are particularly important to understanding the text. Teaching important vocabulary before reading can help students both learn new words and comprehend the text.

Providing instruction over an extended period of time encourages students to use vocabulary in different contexts - both in spoken and written communication.

Children learn words best when they are provided with instruction over an extended period of time and when that instruction has them work actively with the words - for example, using new words in their writing. The more students use new words and the more they use them in different contexts, the more likely they are to learn the words.

Repeated exposure to vocabulary in many contexts aids word learning.

Students learn new words better when they encounter them often and in various contexts. The more children see, hear, and work with specific words, the better they seem to learn them.

When teachers provide extended instruction that promotes active engagement, they give students repeated exposure to new words. When the students read those same words in their texts, they increase their exposure to the new words.

Exposure to words in many contexts also gives students a deeper understanding of the meaning of a word and how it is likely to be used. For instance, miserly and thrifty are both adjectives that describe a person who avoids spending money, but thrifty has a much more positive connotation than miserly.
Adapted from: Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read Kindergarten Through Grade 3, a publication of The Partnership for Reading.

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The scientific research on vocabulary instruction reveals that most vocabulary is learned indirectly and that some vocabulary must be taught directly. Thus, research supports using a combination of both indirect and direct approaches. Children learn the meanings of most words indirectly, through everyday experiences with oral and written language.

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How Can I Teach My Students to Answer Vocabulary Questions on High-Stakes Tests?

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How Can I Teach My Students to Answer Vocabulary Questions on High-Stakes Tests?

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Teach your students to be test-wise. Being test-wise means that students are familiar with the test formats and are able to apply strategies that increase their chances of getting correct answers, even when they are unsure of the correct answers.

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Here are three basic test-taking strategies that elementary students should review prior to testing. Plus, download 10 free printable test-taking strategies resources that can be shared with students or hung in the elementary classroom.

Strategy 1: Review the Different Question Formats

To be successful on exams students must be familiar with the different question formats and feel comfortable moving between a scantron and their test packet.

A week or so before a high-stakes test, use specific test preparation strategies and handouts to review the different questions students will see on the exam.

It's always a good idea to review and practice multiple-choice (selected-response) strategies before an assessment. On multiple-choice tests, the vocabulary and layout of the answers can confuse students.

These are my six tips to help students feel like they Multiple-Choice Champions before a big test:

1. Reread the question. Make sure you understand what is being asked.

2. Come up with an answer to the question before looking at the list of choices.

3. Read ALL of the answers and cross out the choices that don't make sense.

4. Underline the section in the text or question that supports your reasoning.

5. Look carefully at similar-sounding answers. Find the more precise answer.

6. Select "All of the above" if two or three answers seem correct.

Download the Be A Multiple-Choice Champion Tip Sheet and hang it up in your classroom on the day of an exam. I guarantee your students will look at the poster sometime during the testing period to boost their confidence and recall strategies for answering multiple-choice questions.

Most schools have an acronym they use school-wide to help their students with open-ended responses. If your school has not adopted an acronym that is used throughout the school, I highly recommend you do. It promotes consistency as the students move from grade level to grade level. The acronym we use at my school is ACE:

Answer the question:

Turn the question into your answer and answer it

Cite an example:

Give a specific example from the text to support your answer

Extend your thinking

Give another example OR state another thought about the text that supports your answer

Help students remember how to answer open-ended responses with the ACE Open-Ended Responses Tip Sheet.

Finally, I review simple strategies that students can use to attack any question.

For older students, I have a list of suggestions for answering the various types of questions from multiple-choice to essay prompts.

For younger grades, I use a fabulous handout that delves into some of the strategies I discuss when reviewing multiple-choice questions and gives students concrete examples to look over.

This resource will show students the following strategies to puzzle out questions they may find confusing. It highlights the following strategies:

1. Substitute each answer in the blank

2. Justify answers my underlining information from the passage

3. Cross out answers that don't make sense

Strategy 2: Strengthen Student Vocabulary

Unfamiliar vocabulary in a literary text or a standardized test can confuse and/or discourage students.

Make sure your students are armed with the vocabulary strategies they need to come out victorious rather than feeling defeated after taking a test. Below are word strategy resources to ensure students come out on top!

Here are 10 terms students should know heading into a standardized test (words may vary depending on your state test). Download the 10 ELA Test Terms To Know Reference Sheet and review the words with students until you're confident they understand their meaning.

A similar download you may find useful is the 10 High-Stakes Test Terms to Know Poster. Teachers should incorporate these terms into classroom activities and should clarify how best to answer each question stem while the stakes are low.

For example, a teacher could ask an introductory question such as

"Infer from the reading on page 3 how Jimmy felt about his friends."

"Compare the reading we did for homework with the passage on the board."

"Analyze how Martha came to make the decision she did."

The last strategy/handout teaches students how to break down individual words and puzzle out their meanings. Here's an example using the word submersible:

STEP 1: BREAK THE WORD INTO SMALLER PARTS. LOOK FOR THE PARTS OF THE WORD YOU KNOW.

Submersible → sub mersible

What does the word sub make you think of?

You can investigate even further by asking, "Do subways and submarines have anything in common?"

Both are used for transportation and traveling from one point to another

Both are underground

STEP 2: LOOK FOR THE CONTEXT CLUES. WHAT DO THEY TELL YOU?

" Explorer, the submersible watercraft, sank deeper into the ocean."

From the passage clues, we know that:

Submersible is describing a feature of the watercraft.

The watercraft can travel deep into the ocean.

STEP 3: USE YOUR BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE.

I know a sub or submarine travels underwater.

The passage says, "...sank deeper into the ocean."
You can conclude that submersible means a vessel or vehicle that is capable of traveling and operating underwater.
This example is a great resource to share with students as a handout or you can hang up the poster on the classroom wall. Once students have reviewed this strategy, assign them words to break down using these three steps.

Strategy 3: Use Practice Prompts

As a literacy specialist, there are a few "key literary elements" that I make sure to emphasize in my teaching because I know they will help my students perform well.

Fortunately, these "key literary elements" support strong reading comprehension and should be focused on even if there were no standardized tests to be taken.

Available for download are reading practice prompts for fiction, nonfiction, and poetry texts. Download Sample Reading Prompts for Standardized Test Preparation for grades 3-5 now.

In Conclusion

Standardized tests can be stressful for students and teachers. Hopefully, these test-taking strategies for elementary students and accompanying resources will relieve some of the anxiety.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Vocab Gal's Favorite
Test Prep Resources

Strategies for Answering
Math Questions

Test-Taking Strategies Poster

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3 Test-Taking Strategies for Elementary Students (Includes 10+ Printables)

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Here are three basic test-taking strategies that elementary students should review prior to testing. Plus, download 10 free printable test-taking strategies resources that can be shared with students or hung in the elementary classroom. To be successful on exams students must be familiar with the different question formats and feel comfortable moving between a scantron and their test packet.

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Using the Dictionary to Teach Independent Word-Learning Strategies

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Using the Dictionary to Teach Independent Word-Learning Strategies

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Students should use learner-friendly dictionaries that are often developed for English learners that uses language that is accessible for any student who struggles with language.