Vocabulary is the ability to read a text quickly, accurately, and with proper expression (McKenna & Stahl, 2003; NRP, 2000).

Learning Vocabulary

  • Depth of knowledge about a word is developed over multiple exposures to words in multiple contexts
  • Important Factors
  • Number of exposures to a word
  • Context surrounding the word
  • The relevance of the word to the overall meaning of the passage
  • Vocabulary knowledge is highly correlated with overall achievement (National Reading Panel, 2000)
  • In the content areas, vocabulary instruction is essential to expanding conceptual knowledge and understanding more advanced ideas (Blachowicz, Fisher, Watts-Taffe, 2005)

Incremental Progression of word learning (Nagy & Scott, 2000)

  1. Unknown (I’ve never heard that word)
  2. Knowledge that the word exists (I’ve heard that word before)
  3. Partial knowledge (I kind-of know that word)
  4. Complete knowledge (I know this word’s meaning well enough to use it correctly in speaking and writing)

Rationale for Teaching Vocabulary:

  • Vocabulary affects comprehension
  • Strong correlation (around r = .80)
  • Vocabulary and comprehension influence each other (Stahl & Nagy, 2006)
  • Large individual differences in vocabulary knowledge are evident early in school
  • By the end of the second grade, disadvantaged students lag 2 years behind the average students in their class and 4 years behind students in the upper quartile
  • National Reading Panel (2000) findings:
  • Need for direct instruction
  • Repetition and multiple exposures in rich contexts
  • Restructuring of tasks for low-achieving or at-risk students
  • Activities entailing active engagement
  • Mixed methods for optimal results
  • Need for sensitive measures to detect differences

Strategies for Teaching Vocabulary
Foster Incidental Learning /
  • Discuss new words you “run across” during reading
  • Provide a literature rich classroom environment with wide range of books available
  • High teacher interest in

Word Play /
  • Use games, riddles, plays, songs, puzzles to teach vocabulary
  • Highly motivating
(Blachowicz & Fisher, 2004)
Teach Contextual Strategies /
  • Teach strategies to help students use text to determine the meaning of an unknown word meaning

Teach Word Structures /
  • Teach root word, prefix and suffix meanings to help students figure out word meanings
  • Compound words

“Goldilocks” words /
  • Choose words that are not too easy, not too hard, but just right (Baumann & Kame’enui, 2004)
  • Students should be taught words in their Zone of Proximal Development, learning simpler versions of words prior to more complex versions (Biemiller & Slonim, 2001)

Word Wizard /
  • Post interesting vocabulary on wall and use a poster to keep track of when a student uses new vocabulary in conversation or reports that they heard it used outside of class
  • (Beck, Perfetti, & McKeown, 1982)

Picture Walk /
  • Introduction is conversational
  • Conversation prompts student engagement in activating background knowledge
  • Teacher provides overview of plot, theme, or important ideas
  • Teacher uses the book’s language and vocabulary in the discussion

STAR Model of Direct Instruction /
  • Select the words to teach
  • Choose words that are essential to text comprehension, that students are likely to encounter again
  • Teach the words before, during, and after reading
  • Explain the words before readings, discuss them in context, review meanings after reading
  • Active Analysis and Application
  • Assign pairs of students a word and have them find it in text, mark it with a sticky note, and analyze it’s meaning, present the definition to the class, and use it in a personal context
  • Revisit the words in a future context
  • Questioning after reading, use in writing, personal vocabulary notebooks
(Blachowicz, 2005)
Vocabulary Webs /
  • Teach connections between words through synonym webs that show the relations between words that have the same meanings and words that have multiple meanings (Paul & O’Rourke, 1988)

Keyword Method /
  • Recoding – imagine a part of what the word looks or sounds like that can be pictured easily (apex sounds like ape, so the student pictures an ape)
  • Relating – student relates the definition to the pictured word to help him/her picture the meaning (apex is the highest point, so student imagines an ape at the top of the Empire State Building)
  • Retrieving – student recalls the word by picturing the image
(Mastropieri, 1988)

Resources and References:

Baumann, James F. and Kame’enui, Edward J. (2004). Vocabulary Instruction: Research to

Practice. NY: The Guilford Press

Biemiller, A., & Slonim, N. (2001). Estimating root word vocabulary growth in normative and

advantaged populations: Evidence for a common sequence ofvocabulary acquisition.

Journal of Educational Psychology, 93(3), 498-520.

Blachowicz, D. L. Z. & Fisher, P. (2004). Putting the “Fun” back in Fundamental. In E. Kame’enui

& J. Baumann (Eds.), International Handbook of Literacy and Technology (Vol. 2). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Blachowicz, C. L. Z., Fisher, P. J., & Watts-Taffe, S. (2005). Integrated vocabulary instruction:

Meeting the needs of diverse learners in grades K-5.Naperville, IL: Learning Point Associates.

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (2000). Report of the

National Reading Panel. Teaching children to read: an evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. Retrieved Month, date, year, from

Mastropieri, M. A. (1988). Using the keyword method. Teaching Exceptional Children, 20

(Winter), 4-8.McKenna, M. C. & Stahl, S. A. (2003).Assessment for Reading Instruction. New York: Guilford.

Paul, P. V. , & O’Rourke, J. P. (1988). Multimeaning words and reading comprehension:

Implications for special education students.Remedial and Special Education, 9 (3), 42-52.

Stahl, S. A., & Nagy, W. E. (2006). Teaching word meanings. Mawhah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Associates

Special thanks to Amy Elleman, Ph.D. for sharing her materials from her SPED 2830 reading course to assist in development of this tip sheet.

Links:

  • Vocabulary information, articles, strategies
  • Vocabulary information, articles, strategies related to adolescent learners
  • Resource for information related to students with Learning Disabilities –search vocabulary for articles and strategies
  • Resources for lesson plans & strategies for instruction – Search “vocabulary”