Vocabulary by Lauren MacBlane

Common Core Critical Vocabulary

lmacblane — 2014-03-02 23:28:24 UTC

This article contains a list of important strategic words CCSS says students should know (such as "paraphrase," "determine") and eleven ideas for teaching them. The glove idea might be impractical (who's going to buy all these gloves?) but a similar organizer in the shape of a hand is an idea I'll keep in mind.

Strategies for Vocabulary Development

lmacblane — 2014-03-02 23:32:00 UTC

This is an article that addresses useful and useless strategies for improving vocabulary, ways to teach students to deconstruct difficult words, and ideas for assessment. Some particularly useful ideas contained here include a succinct clarification of context vs. meaningful use (looking blindly at the surrounding text won't necessarily create meaning) and ways to assess that don't encourage rote memorization.

Collocations

lmacblane — 2014-03-02 23:43:50 UTC

Collocations are word pairings. This page is about teaching appropriate collocations to students, because proper use of the word is part of learning vocabulary in a meaningful way - as the article suggests, "if learners fail to use a correct collocation, even if their utterance is grammatically and contextually correct, their English will still sound unnatural and ‘foreign’, to the extent that their addressee may not understand them at all." I think this would be particularly useful for students with autism and other language disorders who may not have absorbed the "natural" use of English and for whom understanding and using vocabulary correctly might be a problem.

Vocabulary Activities

lmacblane — 2014-03-04 23:16:51 UTC

A list of activities submitted by teachers to teach vocabulary. Activities like "same, opposite, or different dictation" and "collocation pelmanism" have learners categorizing and using words in a variety of ways rather than just offering definitions or writing simple sentences.

Using Multimedia to Support Generative Vocabulary

lmacblane — 2014-03-04 23:24:44 UTC

This site contains some ideas to get students to elaborate on word meanings, create Powerpoints and web sites to expand on what they know and find resources to connect what they already to know to new knowledge. The multimodal word webs consist of using several different mediums to learn about a concept.

Strategies for Teaching Vocabulary

lmacblane — 2014-04-07 23:12:32 UTC

This chapter contains a brief overview of teaching vocabulary, a useful strategy, examples, and accommodations for students with disabilities.

Considerations for Students with Special Needs

lmacblane — 2014-04-07 23:26:04 UTC

Current Practice Alerts

lmacblane — 2014-04-08 11:30:54 UTC

This is an article about teaching vocabulary with current research into the area, some cool semantic maps, and further explanation of how direct instruction can help students with disabilities.

Content Vocab

lmacblane — 2014-04-08 11:33:19 UTC

This is an article about teaching vocabulary to learning disabled students in content areas. I like the morphological analysis - which will teach students the important parts of words they will need to identify related words in the future.

Generative Vocabulary - PDF

lmacblane — 2014-04-08 11:35:19 UTC

This is a really in-depth discussion of teaching vocabulary in a generative way. From selecting to mapping to useful examples, this shows how generative vocabulary is a way to teach as well as a way to learn.