Vocabulary Strategies to

Improve SAT ScoresBy Christine Chadwick, Stefanie Glorioso, and Daniel Morris

Justification

35 Strategies for developing Content Area Vocabulary by Brenda Spencer and Andrea Guillaume

“Content area achievement depends closely on students’ mastery of specialized vocabulary” Our Strategy: Semantic Mapping

35 Strategies for developing Content Area Vocabulary by Brenda Spencer and Andrea Guillaume

“Content area achievement depends closely on students’ mastery of specialized vocabulary” Our Strategy: Semantic Mapping

SIP: Improve SAT scores- “Offer the entire school testing skills and vocabulary words”

Frayer, Frederick, and Klausmeier (1969) show that concept attainment is more effective through visual organization of definitions and connections to relevance (Frayer Model)

Content Area Examples

• English- explicit academic vocabulary instruction is not being observed in some classes; students write the way they talk

• Chemistry- there are many vocabulary words that are highly specific to chemistry that students must be familiar with to be successful in the sciences

Semantic Map• Structured word map

• write the vocabulary word in the center

• connect words that are synonyms, antonyms, definitions, examples, parts of speech, etc.  

• Gives students

• context rather than dictionary definition

• usage rather than memorization

• more vocabulary

Example

Benefits of Strategy

• Allows for a visual/spatial representation of vocabulary

• Students see the relationships between concepts and vocabulary

• Requires higher order thinking skills (Bloom, 1956)

• Can help activate prior knowledge

Research Questions

• Do the students feel comfortable using content area vocabulary? (affective component)

• Are students’ vocabulary scores rising?

Data Collection Plan

Pre-post Tests Student Work

Do students feel comfortable using

content vocabulary?X X

Are vocabulary scores rising?

X X

Pre-Post Assessment

• Half of the questions on the pre-post assessment will look like the following question:

• odious

• A. I have never seen this word before.

• B. I have seen this word before.

• C. I can define this word.

• D. I have used this word before

Pre-Post Assessment

• Post assessment- vocabulary quiz

• odious

• There are two odious young men who have been staring at me this half hour.

• She was odiously joyful.

• She smelled odious.

• He jumped odiously.

English 11 Results

• Vocabulary words used correctly• n = 62• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test average: 5.89• Post-test average: 5.71• p = 0.308 Not Significant

• The semantic maps made a significant difference in increasing vocabulary scores between the first pre and post-test and the two post-tests.

English 11 Results

• Student view on vocabulary knowledge

• n = 62• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test average: 21.285• Post-test average: 29.08• p < .001 Significant

• Semantic maps made a significant difference in increasing student self view of vocabulary knowledge

English 12 Results

• Vocabulary words used correctly• n = 117• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test average: 9.8• Post-test average: 12.5• p < .001 Significant

• The semantic maps made a significant difference in increasing vocabulary scores.

English 12 Results

• Student view of vocabulary use• n = 117• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test average: 13.12• Post-test average: 16.07• p < .001 Significant

• The semantic maps made a significant difference in increasing vocabulary scores.

Chemistry Results

• Vocabulary Words Correctly Used• n = 33• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test 2 average: 3.29 • Post-test 2 average:6.68• p < .001 Significant

• This shows that significant change from both pre-tests to post-tests were leading towards significant.

Chemistry Results

• Student View on Vocabulary Knowledge• n=33• Experimental Week:

• Pre-test average: 19.1• Post-test average: 33.4• p= 1.37x10-16 Significant

•This shows that significant change across all tests.

Answers to Research Questions

• Are students’ vocabulary scores rising?

• Yes, scores are rising in English, but not in Chemistry

• could be due to a lack of vocabulary routine in Chemistry.

Do the students feel comfortable using content area vocabulary?

YES!

Overall Findings

• Vocabulary scores increased from control week to the experimental week with the use of semantic mapping

• Chemistry was approaching significance

• Student view of vocabulary use increased

Next Steps?

• Implications for teachers and students:• Semantic mapping is one of many study tools that

students need to learn.

• We should encourage students to use other visuals as study tools to study for the SAT.

• This strategy can be implemented in different ways to suit different content areas.

• use fewer vocabulary words of relatively equal difficulty