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These look like one-pagers. Lots of student creativity, which means increased engagement!

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School-wide vocabulary initiative

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Douglas Fisher

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With Word Wise and Content Rich, Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey bring vocabulary in out of the cold and into the heart of daily classroom practice in English,

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Ideas and downloads

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Word walls used to be a term heard only in elementary schools. Nowadays it is more common that teachers of all grade levels are finding them effective and worthwhile for their students to develop and reinforce content area vocabulary.

In 2011, The National Research Council (NRC) developed A Framework for K-12 Science Educationwhich identified practices of science and engineering that were essential for all students to learn. One of the practices involved students obtaining, evaluating and communicating information. It states:
Any education in science and engineering needs to develop students' ability to read and produce domain-specific text. As such, every science or engineering lesson is in part a language lesson, particularly reading and producing the genres of texts that are intrinsic to science and engineering. (NRC Framework, 2012, p. 76)
By using a word wall in the science classroom, the teacher increases access to domain-specific text and can refer the students to it often. Teachers should have students interact with the word wall to help develop concepts and demonstrate content mastery. This can occur by adding arrows to show sequence, or group words together by categories. By interacting with the word wall often, students will start making connections between the current science concepts they are learning as well as previously learned science topics.

It's important when making word walls that a picture or illustration is used alongside the vocabulary term to serve as a visual cue. This is especially important to your English language learners who have been shown to benefit from increased exposure to print and language.
Limited Space? Get Creative!
Sometimes wall space is limited in the classroom, forcing teachers to get creative. One of the most unused real estate in the classroom is the ceiling - start building your students vocabulary above their heads. At least when all faces are turned toward the sky, you'll have immediate feedback that the word "ceiling" is in use.

Using the back of the classroom door or fronts of cabinets will still allow students to see and interact with the scientific terminology. However, words will need to be changed between each chapter or unit, so make it easy on yourself and place Velcro strips on surface and backs of cards for clean and easy exchange.

Enjoy!

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Word walls used to be a term heard only in elementary schools. Nowadays it is more common that teachers of all grade levels are finding them effective and worthwhile for their students to develop and reinforce content area vocabulary.

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Student-created

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Science Word Wall Article

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Multiple subjects in one classroom

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Students continually add to this. This was at the beginning of the year. Teacher commented that students referred to it a lot and were engaged in adding to it.

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2 samples

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Obviously this teacher is into cuteness, but it's a good example nonetheless.

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Words from text being studied

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Students add words and student-friendly definitions.

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Students respond to one specific word each day. This could be done on a white board and changed daily. Better yet, do it on big paper and post in classroom or hallway.

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School-wide word wall initiative article

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School-wide word wall initiative article

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I have a better link I can share!
amy.compton@greenbush.org

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In an effort to improve student achievement at an urban high school, teachers and administrators developed a 5-part, schoolwide vocabulary plan. Over 4 years, teachers provided students with increased opportunities to read, read to their students, developed content-specific vocabulary instruction, taught students academic words, and focused on 5 words each week with a common prefix, suffix, or root. Over the 4 years, student achievement in vocabulary and reading comprehension improved in significant ways, both on reading assessments and state achievement tests.

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Creating a Schoolwide Vocabulary Initiative in an Urban High School

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In an effort to improve student achievement at an urban high school, teachers and administrators developed a 5-part, schoolwide vocabulary plan. Over 4 years, teachers provided students with increased opportunities to read, read to their students, developed content-specific vocabulary instruction, taught students academic words, and focused on 5 words each week with a common prefix, suffix, or root.

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academic language

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One of them yelled out "Ugh, that is so messy!" Yes, it is. I took this picture years ago when I taught high school ELL English Language Arts. Back then, I and Phone were not fused together to form a word so the quality of the picture is not all that. Also, I was a newer teacher and pretty broke so instead of buying bulletin board paper, I used a funky wrapping paper design that I found at the local Dollar Tree. I don't know what was up with style and taste in my early 20's! But, if you look at the word wall closely, you will see that the word cards are not really the neatest, but they are pretty authentic. My students created those word cards with me. They also provided visuals and sentence examples.

Yes, my setup may not have won the Pinterest "Word Wall of the Year" award. Let's just face it, it was a tacky hot mess. However, my students interacted with the wall by having a vocabulary scrapbook that listed the words on the wall with pictures or symbols that created a memory cue for students. They reviewed sections of words with me daily. We also had our own assessments we created together as a class with picture cues. (Microsoft Office had pretty funky clip art back in those days.) At the end of the year, I worked with the class to fuse those assessments together into a final exam. Not to toot my own horn, but back in my day we didn't succumb to Teachers Pay Teachers to find vocabulary resources. But this good old fashioned way of working with my students to learn vocabulary (We studied different types of syllables, affixes, roots and derivatives in my ELL Language Arts Class.) was very reliant on a student generated and interactive word wall.
Knowing and Communicating The Purpose of Your Word Wall
Why is this important? Direct instruction of vocabulary and constant practice with vocabulary supports clarity for English Learners across content areas. It is not slowing down instruction, it is appropriate differentiation needed for our students. "Teaching ELs vocabulary the same ways you teach non-ELs vocabulary may not be effective, so you will need to try out and adopt new strategies that are effective with ELs in your classroom." (Snyder & Staehr Fenner, 2017) The value of isolating vocabulary instruction for English Learners is endless. The word wall is a critical piece of it. Because of this, it is only fair to really put the time and energy in making your word wall useful to students and connect your word wall to your vocabulary instruction. Think of it this way, if you had to learn Science as an English only speaker in Mandarin Chinese, wouldn't you want your teacher to create a word wall that is useful to you with visuals and print you can see and understand?

Understanding the purpose of your word wall is one thing. The students knowing the purpose of the word wall is another. Clearly communicating the purpose of the word wall to students will increase their engagement with it. When students understand the "why" behind having a word wall and your routine of interaction with it, it becomes more meaningful and powerful to them. Before you can even explain your word wall routine, you need find ways of helping students know how the word wall connects to their understanding of content. There are a couple of different ways you can do this. First, you can explicitly tell them why you are using the word wall routine. Afterwards, you can use your content and language objectives to emphasize key vocabulary that will be part of the word wall. I like to underline the words and then break them down after I introduce objectives. Then you need to consistently explain and model your word wall routine for your students. It's important to do this because the vocabulary instruction and word walls are not about what the teacher likes. It's more about what is best for kids.
The Assembly of A Student Generated Word Wall
Having your students generate your word wall is probably the best thing you can do for them. I have done this as a teacher at the Middle School and High School Level. What I have done is I have assigned students to document the target vocabulary words in their journals, scrapbooks or personal word wall (This could have been a smaller Science Fair type board). First, I directly teach the words through comprehensible input strategies to the class. Afterwards, all students need to write down each word, a definition in their own words, a sentence, and picture cues. I usually have a pre made table for them. This can then go into a journal or scrapbook. I would use a handout with a table like this to support them:

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If Word Walls Could Talk, They Would Ask For More Student Interaction - Confianza

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By Sarah Said Oh, the lovely word wall. It's the beginning of the year and you are getting your classroom into shape. This was always one of my favorite times of the year as a teacher. You unpack your laminated cards for your word wall.

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divided by chapters or class periods

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High School and Middle School

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English, math, science, history, art, physical education - No matter what the content area, students have to be able to speak the language of the class. Each subject has its own set of unique terms students need to master in order to be able to fully comprehend important skills.

While there are many ways to scaffold literacy in ELA and other content area classes, word walls have been proven to work. They are especially helpful for English Learners and struggling readers, but they certainly don't hurt students who are proficient.

Word walls are most valuable when students take ownership. Speaking from experience, it's really hard for a word wall to be effective when its illegible. Plus, students don't always understand how to design pieces for a word wall so that they are truly a valuable reference. There are two ways to address this concern:

1. Teach students how to create content for a word wall.

2. Have students contribute all of the information, but the teacher can be in charge of creating the actual display piece.

If you're interested in using a word wall in your classroom, keep reading for some specific tips that will help you to maximize its effectiveness.

Tip 1

Limit the number of words. I would suggest not adding more than five to ten words per week to your word wall. It's more beneficial for students to have meaningful and repeated exposure to fewer words per week than to be drilled on twenty or more words at a time, most of which they will forget soon after the quiz.

Tip 2

Add color. Color is a brain-based learning approach. Using color meaningfully heightens our awareness of information by drawing our attention to it. Incorporating color in word walls helps students to transfer the information from short-term memory to permanent memory storage.

Tip 3

Make sure the font is big enough that students will be able to read it from anywhere in the room. Sometimes, you just have to play with the document to see if what you have will work. Before creating a masterpiece to add to a word wall, print out the word by itself, put it on the wall, ceiling, or location of choice, and then sit in various places in your classroom. Will students be able to read it no matter where they are? That's the goal.

Tip 4

Ask yourself, What will students find confusing about this word, and how can I scaffold their understanding? Simply typing a word on a document is not an effective approach to a word wall. If you are creating the word wall yourself or making elements that students have brainstormed, don't forget to add picture associations, memorable examples, or short definitions in addition to the word. Definitions can be straightforward or humorous. For instance, a variable can be defined as "a number disguised as a letter."

Tip 5

Protect all of the hard work that you and your students collectively invested in the word wall. Laminate the pieces and back them with cardstock. Plus, laminating and backing helps them to be more sturdy and to stand out more when they are displayed on the wall.

Tip 6

Hang words in a place students will always see them. If your students face the front of the room 80% of the time, why would you hang the word wall in the back? Think about the easiest reference point for the students, and if you have to move posters or lamps to place the words in the most convenient spot, so be it.

Tip 7

Make them interactive. There are so many ways to involve students!

1. For example, you can type up the word and a brief definition. Students can then create a picture association or write an example on a smaller piece of paper (Post-It, cardstock, Astrobright - whatever you choose), and they can place their work on the wall around or under the word itself.

2. You can also host competitions. See which class period can collaboratively design the best piece for a new word.

3. Divide students into groups, and have group one write the word (maybe graffiti style or symbolically), ask group two to draw a picture, have group three write down related words, and so on.

4. Leave space between the words, and throughout the year, have students add examples they find that relate to the words on the wall.

Those are a just a handful of ideas.

Tip 8

Lastly, don't forget to talk about your word wall often with students. Whenever you are using a word in your speech or a student asks a question related to a word on the wall, make an effort to go stand by the word, point it out to students, review the term, and talk about the words as much as possible. This repetition will help. Also, referring to the word wall reminds students that it's there to help them.

Those are some of my favorite tips for creating word walls in secondary. What would you add? Leave your thoughts in the comments. We'd love to hear from you!

Hey! Are you a math teacher, you can download this PDF with domain-specific vocabulary terms for teaching algebra concepts.

FURTHER READING:

RELATED RESOURCE:

This free vocabulary activity will complement almost any word list in almost any class or subject area. It's intended to be used in secondary classrooms and features brain-based learning and differentiated learning approaches. Click the image to download for use.

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8 Tips for Creating Effective Word Walls in Secondary | Reading and Writing Haven

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English, math, science, history, art, physical education - No matter what the content area, students have to be able to speak the language of the class. Each subject has its own set of unique terms students need to master in order to be able to fully comprehend important skills.

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I've been using a Word Wall with my high school students for 9 years now, and the results have been incredible.

I have 90-minute classes, so I'm able to give my students 8-10 minutes of free reading time each day. I put this time at the BEGINNING of the class for several reasons.

1. I express that free-choice reading is SO important in helping students with many aspects of their personal and student life that it deserves to be first in my class.
2. If you save it for last, students will be more likely to talk and not read.
3. It settles a class down and sets the vibe for the remaining portion of the class.

During these 5-10 minutes of reading time, students are to find ONE word that they don't know, find challenging, or like the sound of while reading. They write this word and sentence down immediately then continue reading. Then, I give them around 3 minutes to fill out their Frayer boxes on the word they found. Since I'm in a 1:1 classroom, they do this digitally in their Classroom OneNote Notebooks. Here is what it looks like:

If you would like this strategy, plus more vocabulary strategies for classroom OneNote, follow my OneNote Pinterest Board and download my free vocabulary notebook found in my collection!

My daily schedule goes like this:
1. Free Reading
2. Vocabulary
3. Daily Grammar Practice ( See how I incorporate music into my grammar program here: link)
4. Main Lesson

Monday Vocabulary Time:
By finding a new word each day, they will end up with 5 new words each Monday. It is on this day that I walk around the room and pick out the best of the best words. As I'm walking and checking work, I keep students busy by practicing roots words or reviewing their former words (more on this in a minute). I will ask the students with the best words to go up to my computer and type in their word, part of speech, sentence, and definition. I repeat this for all 3 classes (I'm on a block schedule) and end up with around 15-20 great words and sentences from YA books. I personally narrow these down to the top 10 that I see most often in literature and in life. I often teach a variety of grades (10th-12th), but have never had an issue with using the same list for all classes. It has always worked out well for me. I try to get the same amount of words from each class to be fair.

Tuesday Vocabulary Time:
After I have the vocabulary list all nice and neat (remember the students did the work), I project the vocabulary list of the week up on my board, and students copy the information. Since they aren't hand-writing these, I want them to do something with them, so I make them color-code the context clues in the sentences. I label each week's words a different color. For example, Red words 1 (I also color-code my Onenote notebook for an easy way to organize) More on why I color-code in a minute. This is what my student's notebook looks like after they have highlighted the context clues.

Wednesday Vocabulary Time:
Students review words with partners or play a game such as Kahoot, Quizlet, or ball toss (toss the ball and the catcher must call out the correct definition or they are out). I especially love using Quizlet because I simply copy and paste the words by using the "import" function (i.e. less work for me).

UPDATE! I've recently started incorporating a new game, and it might just be my FAVORITE! It's called Word Sneak, and I got this idea from my students. They were playing around and trying to make up funny sentences with the words, and I told them that we should use that as a game. They informed me that game has already been invented and is on The Tonight Show. Since I'm normally asleep by 8:30 each night, this explains why I've never seen it. 😉 #partylikeanEnglishteacher

So, anyway, watch this clip to get an idea of the game then download my FREE game template here to play!

Here is a picture from my Instagram with this game in action:

I share all of my ideas first on Instagram, so be sure and follow me there! @Bsbooklove

Thursday Vocabulary Time:
Vocabulary Bingo: Students draw 9 boxes (3 across and 3 down) and put the new set of words in the boxes. When you build your wall up, you can use more colored sets. For example, I say, "9 boxes with any blue or red word." Once they have their boxes made, I make up sentences and have students put an X on the word that fits with the sentence until someone gets a bingo. I have a little box full of candy and toys for the winners.

I'm always surprised how much big kids like toys like these!

Friday Vocabulary Time:
We play a different review game each Friday. Here are the ones in rotation:

* The fly swat game. I have two fly swats and make a bracket with 8 teams (I just have my students number off to 8). The teams go up against each other until the bracket gets to a winner. The first person to swat the correct word on the wall gets to move up the bracket. I do single elimination so this game doesn't take too long.

*Quizlet Live. This is my students' new favorite game!!!

*Others mentioned above such as ball toss, word sneak, Kahoot or bingo.

I also give a quiz each Friday over the new set of words PLUS last week's words OR ....and here's where it gets complicated to explain... the same colored set of words. For example, my quizzes will go like this:

Week 1- Red words
Week 2- Red words plus new Blue words
Week 3- Blue words plus new Yellow words
Week 4- Yellow words plus new Green words
Week 5- Green words plus new Orange words
Week 6- Red words 1 plus new Red words 2
Week 7 Blue words 1 plus new Blue words 2
etc.

I use sentences with context clues for my quizzes. Since we practice highlighting context clues on Tuesday, this really helps them to search for these on the quiz. I differentiate by highlighting the context clues for certain students.

*As you can see, having a color-coded visual of words makes it extremely easy for teachers and students to constantly review new words.

*If you are trying to add more Greek and Latin words into your curriculum as I am, you can focus on a root a week and have students try to find these roots in their reading. You can also add quiz questions regarding these roots.

*Word Walls set the atmosphere for easy, no-prep games to add fun to your classroom.

*Students love being able to look at this wall and add words to their writing (I always put a huge smiley face when I see a word wall word used in student writing).

*Students take ownership of their vocabulary instruction.

*It helps set a routine for your class which is very beneficial for behavior problems.

*It promotes good reading skills

*It promotes free-choice reading. We do a book project every 9 weeks, and it's the best day of the year. I absolutely LOVE the creative projects my students come up with. Want to get a FREE download for my Fun Foodie Book Project Choices? Sign up for my newsletter to receive your free download!

*Word Walls give you an instant inspiration board when you want students to practice writing grammatically correct sentences. (For example: Tell them, "Use one blue word and one yellow word to form a compound sentence using a semicolon")

For a free vocabulary template, click here: 5 New Words a Week Template

Want to see my newly updated Word Wall letters to match my new Harry Potter-ish themed classroom? Click Here: Harry Potter Secondary Classroom

Want more teaching and time-saving tips? Be sure to follow me and sign up for my newsletter using the prompt above!

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How and Why to Use Word Walls with Older Students - Building Book Love

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I've been using a Word Wall with my high school students for 9 years now, and the results have been incredible. How: I have 90-minute classes, so I'm able to give my students 8-10 minutes of free reading time each day. I put this time at the BEGINNING of the class for several reasons.