Vocabulary Instruction in Elementary and Middle Classrooms...

PLAIN TALK ABOUT READINGApril 22 - 24, 2013 | New Orleans

Vocabulary Instruction in Elementary and Middle Classrooms and the Common Core

— Pam Austin —

One Galleria Blvd., Suite 903 | Metairie, LA 70001Phone: (504) 840-9786 | Fax: (504) 840-9968 | Email: [email protected] | Web: www.cdl.org

About CDL

About the Presenter

Founded in 1992, the Center for Development and Learning (CDL) is a results-driven 501(c)(3) organization. CDL’s mission is to improve the life chances of all children, especially those at high risk, by increasing school success.

CDL’s work is focused on increasing teacher effectiveness. Standards set the course, and assessments provide the benchmarks, but it is highly effective teaching that yields substantial, sustained gains in student learning. All children, regardless of how they look, where they come from, or how they learn, can and will achieve school success when provided with highly effective teachers and positive, supportive learning environments.

CDL holds special expertise in the areas of literacy, learning differences, evidence-based teaching strategies, and building the capacity of teachers. We tackle real-time issues such as ways to remediate struggling readers, differentiate instruction, and build and sustain collective capacity. CDL professionals customize professional learning services to meet the specific needs of the schools and districts with whom we work.

Our current initiatives include (1) Language and Learning – Right from Birth, which provides child care providers and parents of children ages birth to three with the information, skills and support they need to help their children grow and be ready to learn when they enter school; (2) Step It Up for Literacy, which builds educators’ capacity to provide systematic, explicit and effective instruction to all students and targeted intervention for students experiencing difficulties; (3) Learning Profiles: Differentiating Instruction for Diverse Learners, which gives teachers the tools to identify and remediate learning problems with instructional and behavioral interventions; and (4) the Greater New Orleans Literacy Institute, a collaborative with Tulane University, Xavier University of Louisiana, and the Greater New Orleans Education Foundation. The Institute’s goal is to found a support initiative to ensure that all children from birth through 12th grade receive effective, evidence-based literacy instruction and graduate from high school – college and career ready.

Pamela AustinPamela Austin is a literacy specialist at the Center for Development and Learning (CDL). She has 24 years of experience as an educator. Previously, Pam was a product consultant for a major educational company, supporting schools and school districts in the implementation of intervention curricula for literacy and mathematics. Prior to that, she was an educator in a large urban school system, serving in a variety of capacities, including elementary teacher, reading interventionist, school site reading coach, and district-level literacy facilitator. She is a certified regional LETRS trainer. In her spare time, Pam authors novels under a pen name.

The Center for Development and Learning

www.cdl.org

Vocabulary Instruction in Elementary and Middle Classrooms and the

Common Core

Pam Austin Literacy Specialist

Strategies for enhancing vocabulary instruction

in elementary and middle school classrooms

April 23, 2013

©CDL 2013

To increase the literacy skills and competencies of all students.

Our Goal

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Objectives

1.   To aim our focus on increasing vocabulary and comprehension.

2.   To review and practice evidence-based vocabulary strategies and identify details reference in the Common Core.

3.   To discuss the impact of research-based vocabulary instruction on comprehension.

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Common Core ELA Standards

www.corestandards.org ©CDL 2013

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CCSS Reading Levels: Fluency, Vocabulary & Comprehension

CCSS - ELA, Appendix A, p. 8 5

Components of Reading by Grade

Written Expression

Comprehension Skills/Strategies

Passage Fluency

Vocabulary

Advanced Phonics/Decoding

Basic Phonics

Phonemic Awareness

Grade K 1 2 3 4 5 6-12 Louisa Moats

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The Center for Development and Learning 1

Essential Components of Reading

Component Elementary Secondary Phonemic Awareness

P * Explicit instruction for SOME

Phonics/Decoding P * Advanced decoding for SOME

Fluency P * Fluency instruction for SOME to promote comprehension

Vocabulary P P Comprehension P P Motivation and Engagement

P P Effective Instruction for Adolescent Struggling Readers, 2008 7

Data-Driven Decisions

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§  900+ meta-analyses

§  50,000 research articles

§  150,000 effect sizes

§  240 million students

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§  An effect size of 0.2 or less is low §  An effect size of 0.4 is medium §  An effect size of 0.6 or more is high

When analyzing effects, we can say that an effect size of over 0.4 is likely to be have a visible, positive effect.

A one standard deviation increase is typically associated with advancing children’s achievement by two - three years or improving the rate of learning by 50%.

Analyzing Effects

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Zone of Desired Effects

Teacher Effects

Reverse Effects

Developmental Effects

Vocabulary Programs: d = 0.67 Hattie, J. (2012)

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The Situation

About 50% of students learn to read relatively easily once exposed to formal instruction, in any classroom, with any instructional emphasis.

The other 50% find learning to read a formidable challenge. It is one of the most difficult tasks that they will have to master throughout their lives.

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G. Reid Lyon, 2001 11

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Causes of Dysfluent Reading

Failure to automatize subskills: 1.   Phonetic knowledge in sounding out novel

or new words

2.   Use of context to facilitate or confirm accurate word recognition

3.   Knowledge of vocabulary and access to word meanings in memory

4.   “Sight” recognition of words as wholes, after one or two exposures

5.   Processing speed for known words

Moats, 2004 12


Vocabulary

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Vocabulary Focus: The Steps

The importance of students acquiring a rich and varied vocabulary cannot be overstated. Vocabulary has been empirically connected to reading comprehension since at least 1925 (Whipple, 1925) and had its importance to comprehension confirmed in recent years (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000).

It is widely accepted among researchers that the difference in students’ vocabulary levels is a key factor in disparities in academic achievement (Baumann & Kameenui, 1991; Becker, 1977; Stanovich, 1986) but that vocabulary instruction has been neither frequent nor systematic in most schools (Biemiller, 2001; Durkin, 1978; Lesaux, Kieffer, Faller, & Kelley, 2010;Scott & Nagy, 1997).

14 CCSS – ELA, Appendix A, p. 33

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Vocabulary Focus: The Steps

1.   Make it a priority: Create a schoolwide focus.

2.   Make it intentional: Have a framework for selecting and teaching.

3.   Make it transparent: The teacher models.

4.   Make it useable: Incorporate peer talk.

5.   Make it personal: Students actively use it.

6.   Make it your own: Keep learning.

Fisher & Frey (2008) 15

The Vocabulary Gap

National Literacy Panel, 2005

Vocabulary is an area in which students from high poverty/under resourced homes commonly lag behind their peers.

Vocabulary is also an area in which ELLs commonly lag behind their peers.

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Impact of Early Environments on Developmental Competence

Begin kindergarten 2 years behind

Ramey and Ramey 2004 ©CDL 2013

Effects of Speaking in Home to Vocabulary Development

Ramey and Ramey 2004 ©CDL 2013

By age 2 years, 2 months


The Vocabulary Gap

Cumulative Vocabulary by Age 4:

§  Children from professional families 1100 words

§  Children from working class families 700 words

§  Children from welfare families 500 words

These differences persisted into kindergarten and beyond into third grade, the last year in which the children were tested in this study.

Hart & Risley, 1995, 2003 ©CDL 2013 19

The Vocabulary Gap

• Meaningful Differences in Cumulative Experiences

Words heard per hour

Words heard in a 100-hour week

Words heard in a 5,200 hour year

Words heard over three years

Welfare 620 62,000 3 million 10 million

Working Class 1,250 125,000 6 million 20 million

Professional 2,150 215,000 11 million 30 million

Hart & Risley, 1995

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Vocabulary: True or False

§  Initially, children readily learn words from oral conversation because such conversations are context rich in ways that aid in vocabulary acquisition.

§  All children learn words at the same rate and

by age five vocabulary acquisition is consistently even.

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§  Day-to-day conversations have little impact

on vocabulary acquisition. Direct vocabulary instruction of individual words is the best way to increase vocabulary of young children.

§  In discussions, a small set of words (accompanied by gesture and intonation) is used with great frequency to talk about a narrow range of situations children are exposed to on a day-to-day basis.

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As children reach school age, new words are

introduced less frequently in conversation, and consequently vocabulary acquisition eventually stagnates by grade 4 or 5 unless students acquire additional words from written context.

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Vocabulary Learning Task is Huge

First: Can the reader decode the word?

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Second: Can the reader use the word within context and the realm of possible meanings?

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grasp

hold by clasping

with fingers or arms

to hold mentally; to understand

hold; possession or mastery

a hold or a grip


What does it mean to know a word?

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decode

understand the meaning

multiple meanings

use the word figuratively


§  The average 3rd grader knows about 15,000 words.

§  The average 6th grader knows about 25,000 words.

§  The average high school graduate knows about 50,000 words.

§  This means that average students learn 3,000 to 4,000 words a year.

§  This translates to 10 words a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year – with no time off for weekends, summers, or good behavior.

Graves, 2006 ©CDL 2013

Exposure!

Students need 8 to 12 exposures to a new vocabulary word in order to “own” it.

Exposure may be casual (as in conversations) and/or formal (as in classroom texts and academic exercises).

Exposure should be rich, purposeful and often.

Graves, 2005

§  Oral – I own it and use it. §  Aural – When I hear it, I understand it.

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Frayer Model

Definition Characteristics

Non-Examplesword

Examplesvary

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Build Vocabulary Through Morphemes

A morpheme is the smallest unit of meaning in a word. §  May be as short as the letter “s” as in “cats”

§  Are often roots, prefixes and suffixes §  May or may not be a syllable

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Why Teach Morphemes?

§  Third-graders who were given training on the 9 most common prefixes and a strategy for decomposing words into roots and suffixes outperformed a control group on several measures of word meanings.

§  They concluded that teaching the 20 most common prefixes to middle school students would pay dividends in increased vocabulary learning.

White, Sowell and Yanagihara, 1989

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CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.1.4b Use frequently occurring affixes as a clue to the meaning of a word. CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.1.4c Identify frequently occurring root words (e.g., look) and their inflectional forms (e.g., looks, looked, looking). CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.3.4b Determine the meaning of the new word formed when a known affix is added to a known word (e.g., agreeable/disagreeable, comfortable/uncomfortable, care/careless, heat/preheat). CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.3.4c Use a known root word as a clue to the meaning of an unknown word with the same root (e.g., company, companion). CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.6.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek or Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., audience, auditory, audible). CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.9.4b Identify and correctly use patterns of word changes that indicate different meanings or parts of speech (e.g., analyze, analysis, analytical; advocate, advocacy).

Why Teach Morphemes?

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The Powerful Prefix!

Interior

Exterior

Posterior

Anterior

Ulterior

Deteriorate

Susan Ebbers

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What do these numbers mean?

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79

39

33

83

25 98

401

132

126 43

313

80 71

782

76 47 77

216 105

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Common Number Prefixes from Greek and Latin

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Greek Latin 1 mono- uni- 2 di- bi-, du-, duo- 3 tri-, tris- tri- 4 tetra- quadri- 10 deca-, deka- deci- half hemi- semi- many poly- multi-

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Derivational Suffixes Academic, Abstract and Challenging

Derivational suffixes change the part of speech.

§  Words with –ive are often adjectives. (creative, aggressive, sensitive)

§  Words with –ly are often adverbs. (happily, slowly, cautiously)

§  Words with –ion (-sion, -tion) are often nouns. (station, distraction, consideration)

§  Words ending in –ity are often nouns. (simplicity, purity, inferiority)

§  Words ending with –ment are often nouns. (inducement, enrollment, impediment)

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Noun-Making Derivational Suffixes

-ist -or -ian -er -eer

scientist governor pediatrician teacher engineer

dentist mayor musician welder auctioneer

pharmacist senator politician player pioneer

“one who” noun makers

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Inside-Outside/ Outside-Inside Tactic

1.   When you encounter a word that you do not know, first look outside (context) to see what hints you might find about what the word might mean.

2.   Next, look inside the word for morphemes or word parts that you may know.

3.   You may also divide the word into syllables to help with pronunciation.

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Multi Flow

Exit Ticket

Circle


Brace

Frequent, Varied and Extensive Language Experiences

1.   Immerse students in a word-rich environment §  Word walls

2.   Provide rich and varied experiences in listening, discussion, and reading

§  Use academic/$1000/College words §  Read aloud to students, emphasizing new

vocabulary words

Graves, 2010

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About Word Walls…

§  Word walls are appropriate and useful PreK through grade 12!

§  Word walls are best when they are a group effort – allow students to make suggestions for content.

§  Word walls should be organic – they should be updated/changed often.

§  Word walls should be referred to so students come to understand and see their relevance.

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Read and Review

1.   Skim the article, “Teach the Academic Word List.”

2.   Highlight words in the list that seem relevant to your subject and that may appear in your text.

3.   Decide which words you will highlight and informally define and teach to your students.

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Teach Words on the Academic Word List

§  List of words that appear with high frequency in English-language academic texts

§  Compiled by Averil Coxhead at the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand

§  Contains 570 word families; divided into 10 sublists, each containing 60 word families, except sublist 10, which contains 30

§  To find these words, an analysis was done of academic journals, textbooks, course workbooks, lab manuals, and course notes. The list was compiled following an analysis of over 3,500,000 words of text.

Averil Coxhead, 2000 ©CDL 2013

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60 Most Common Academic Words

Analysis, approach, area, assessment, assume, authority, available, benefit, concept, consistent, constitutional, context, contract, create, data, definition, derived, distribution, economic, environment, established, estimate, evidence, export, factor, financial, formula, function, identified, income, indicate, individual, interpretation, involved, issue, labor, legal, legislation, major, method, occur, percent, period, policy, principle, procedure, process, required, research, response, role, section, sector, significant, similar, source, specific, structure, theory, variable Averil Coxhead, 2000

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Word Tiers

Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

calibrate formulate itemize

1: Everyday speech

2: General Academic

3: Domain-specific Non-fiction/Expository Text

complete describe challenge

aorta carburetor

relative

specificity

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Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2002, 2008) CCSS – ELA, Appendix A, p. 33

accumulate

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Word Tiers*

Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

clock baby happy

reluctant drowsy morsel insist

1: Most Familiar

2: High Frequency

3: Low Frequency

Bringing Words To Life Beck, McKeown, Kucan (2002)

A Pocket for Corduroy

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*Word tiers are referenced in Appendix A, p. 33 of the ELA CCSS

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Which Words? Word Tiers*

Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

zoom budge silky

sedentary gullible idiosyncrasy

1: Most Familiar

2: High Frequency

3: Low Frequency Charlotte’s Web** provender

*Word tiers are referenced in Appendix A of the ELA CCSS

**Listed as CCSS Grades 2 – 3 read aloud exemplar, Appendix B) 51

Expand Vocabulary with Synonyms

Expand students’ vocabulary by modeling how to build from smaller to larger words, such as replacing great (“I had a great time”) with fantastic, magnificent, incredible, extraordinary or with distinguished, eminent, illustrious (“He was a great leader”).

Ask students to upgrade their word choices.

What is an upgraded word that you could use for hot? see? mad? very? walk? think?

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Use College/$1,000 Words

Commonly Known Word

$1,000 Words

big large, gigantic, immense, enormous, vast, extensive, spacious

very extremely, incredibly, vastly, exceedingly, especially

small slight, minor, petite, trivial, insignificant, trifling

talkative chatty, loquacious, verbose, garrulous

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1.   Tell your student the meaning of words when first used. “We don’t want to procrastinate today on reading our story. Procrastinate means to put off doing something.”

OR…

2.   Pair the meaning of the word by using parallel language.

“What is your bias… your prejudice?”

Use Academic ($1,000/College) Words

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Juxtapose: place close together for contrasting effect

The Benefit of Visuals! Reading Aloud

Reading aloud with young children is the single most important activity for building the knowledge and vocabulary they will eventually require for learning to read and reading to learn.

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Listening and Reading Comprehension, by Age

CCSS – ELA, Appendix A, p. 26

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Read Aloud PreK - 12!

Reading aloud to students is an important activity for building the knowledge and vocabulary.

This holds true for all grades – PreK-12.

Hmmm… How often in kindergarten? How often in 11th grade?

Dickinson and Neuman, 2006 ©CDL 2013

Give Quick, Brief Definitions When Reading Aloud

To avoid disrupting the flow of text and taxing working memory, give the briefest of definitions when an unknown word is encountered. The idea is not to break the pattern of thought.

If you are the reader, briefly turn your head away from the text when giving the synonym-type definition. This body language sends a message to your listeners that what you are saying is not part of the text but an explanation.

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I Do

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He accidentally tipped over the open-lidded box, and suddenly he was covered with soft, slippery soap flakes. Gradually Corduroy began to slip and slide… Oh, what fun!” he said with a smile. “I’ve always wanted to ski down a steep mountainside.

Excerpt from A Pocket for Corduroy


We Do

Extracted 4-12-13 http://school.familyeducation.com/reading/fiction34343.html ©CDL 2013

Avery came into the room. Avery was ten. He was heavily armed -- an air rifle in one hand, a wooden dagger in the other. "What's that?" he demanded. "What's Fern got?" "She's got a guest for breakfast," said Mrs. Arable. "Wash your hands and face, Avery." "Let's see it!" said Avery, setting his gun down. "You call that miserable thing a pig? That's a fine specimen of a pig -- it's no bigger than a white rat." "Wash up and eat your breakfast, Avery!" said his mother. "The school bus will be along in half an hour." "Can I have a pig, too, Pop?" asked Avery. "No, I only distribute pigs to early risers," said Mr. Arable. "Fern was up at daylight, trying to rid the world of injustice. As a result, she now has a pig.

You Try It

The Great Gatsby In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since.

“Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had.”

He didn't say any more, but we've always been unusually communicative in a reserved way, and I understood that he meant a great deal more than that. Effective Instruction for

Adolescent Struggling Readers, 2008 ©CDL 2013

Say the word aloud if…

If the food I say is a very small piece of food, say “Morsel”. If it isn’t a morsel, don’t say anything.

§  One Cheerio §  A whole pie §  A raisin §  A turkey dinner §  A cake crumb

Bringing Words to Life, p. 61

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Tell About Something…

§  Tell about something you would be reluctant to do.

§  Tell me about a time when you might feel drowsy.

§  Tell me about a time when you might insist on something.

(A Pocket for Corduroy, appropriate for ages 3 – 8.)


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Have you ever…?

Tell me about a time when you might cuddle with someone, congratulate someone, urge someone.

Tell me about a time when you may feel joy, feel fantastic, feel helpful.


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Student-friendly Definitions

Student-friendly vs. dictionary definitions

Collins COBUILD Learner’s Dictionary www.collinslanguage.com

www.learnersdictionary.com

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Useful Vocabulary Websites www.vocabulary.com Vocabulary lists with definitions for novels, math,

science, geography, history, social studies, language arts, art

www.academicvocabularyexercises.com Practice exercises for each set of academic words www.wordmagicsoft.com Free bilingual and bidirectional English-Spanish

dictionary

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8. Multiple Strategy Use*

Multiple Strategy Use includes: 1.   Active listening 2.   Mental imagery

3.   Mnemonics

4.   Building (and connecting to) prior knowledge 5.   Vocabulary-comprehension connection

6.   Integrating strategies into/across the curriculum

National Reading Panel Report, 2000

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May you have the hindsight to know where you’ve been, the foresight to know where you are going, and the insight to know when you have gone too far. (Irish blessing)

Susan Ebbers ©CDL 2013

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References ACT (2008). The forgotten middle: Ensuring that all students are on

target for college and career readiness before high school. Iowa City, IA: Author.

Berninger, V. W., and Richards, T. L. (2002). Brain literacy for educators and psychologists. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

Birch, J. R. (ed) (2011). Multisensory teaching of basic language skills (Third Edition). Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing.

National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers (2010). Common core state standards. Washington, DC: Authors.

Coxhead, A. (2000). A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly, 34, 213-238.

Ebbers, S. (2009). Linking the language: A cross-disciplinary vocabulary approach. Published online at www.cdl.org/resource-library/pdf/Ebbers_LanguageLinks_Oct.2009.

Fisher, D. and Frey, N. (2008). Word wise and content rich: Five essential steps to teaching academic vocabulary. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

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References Graves, M. (2005). The vocabulary book: Learning and instruction.

New Your, NY: Teacher’s College Press. Graves, M. (Editor) (2009). Essential readings on vocabulary

instruction. Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Hart, B. and Risley, T. (1995). Meaning differences in the everyday

experience of young American children. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers. New York: Routledge. Hattie, J. (2009). Visible learning: A synthesis of over 800 meta-

analyses relating to achievement. New York: Routledge. Louisiana Department of Education (2010). Louisiana

comprehensive literacy plan. Author. National Institute for Literacy and National Institute of Child Health

and Human Development (2007). What content-area teachers should know about adolescent literacy. Jessup, MD: EdPubs.

Moats, L. (2010). Speech to print: Language essentials for teachers (2nd edition). Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co.

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References Marzola, Eileen S. (2006). Strategies to improve reading

comprehension in the multisensory classroom. In Birsh, J.R. (Editor), Multisensory teaching of basic language skills (pp. 377-412). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Company.

Thomas, A. (2012). Building vocabulary through morphemes: Using word parts to unlock meaning. www.cdl.org.

Thomas, A. (2010). Teach students the all-purpose academic word list. www.cdl.org.

Thomas, A. and Thorne, G. (2010). Differentiating instruction: 150+ targeted strategies for diverse learners. Metairie, LA: Center for Development and Learning.

Torgesen, J. K., Rashotte, C., Alexander, A., Alexander, J., & MacPhee, K. (2003). Progress toward understanding the instructional conditions necessary for remediating reading difficulties in older children. In B.R. Foorman (Ed.), Preventing and remediating reading difficulties: Bringing science to scale (pp. 275–298). Baltimore: York Press.

Tyler, A. and Nagy, W. (1989). The acquisition of English derivational morphology. Journal of Memory and Language, 28, 649-667.


©CDL 2012

Contact Information

Pam Austin, Literacy Specialist Center for Development and Learning

(504) 840-9786 [email protected]


Common Core State StandardS for engliSh language artS & literaCy in hiStory/SoCial StudieS, SCienCe, and teChniCal SubjeCtSa

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speaking and Listeningthe special role of speaking and Listening in K–5 LiteracyIf literacy levels are to improve, the aims of the English language arts classroom, especially in the earliest grades, must include oral language in a purposeful, systematic way, in part because it helps students master the printed word. Be-sides having intrinsic value as modes of communication, listening and speaking are necessary prerequisites of reading and writing (Fromkin, Rodman, & Hyams, 2006; Hulit, Howard, & Fahey, 2010; Pence & Justice, 2007; Stuart, Wright, Grigor, & Howey, 2002). The interrelationship between oral and written language is illustrated in the table below, using the distinction linguists make between receptive language (language that is heard, processed, and understood by an individual) and expressive language (language that is generated and produced by an individual).

Figure 14: Receptive and Expressive Oral and Written Language

Receptive Language Expressive Language

Oral Language Listening Speaking

Written Language

Reading (decoding + comprehension)

Writing (handwriting, spelling, written composition)

Oral language development precedes and is the foundation for written language development; in other words, oral language is primary and written language builds on it. Children’s oral language competence is strongly predictive of their facility in learning to read and write: listening and speaking vocabulary and even mastery of syntax set boundar-ies as to what children can read and understand no matter how well they can decode (Catts, Adolf, & Weismer, 2006; Hart & Risley, 1995; Hoover & Gough, 1990: Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998).

For children in preschool and the early grades, receptive and expressive abilities do not develop simultaneously or at the same pace: receptive language generally precedes expressive language. Children need to be able to understand words before they can produce and use them.

Oral language is particularly important for the youngest students. Hart and Risley (1995), who studied young children in the context of their early family life and then at school, found that the total number of words children had heard as preschoolers predicted how many words they understood and how fast they could learn new words in kindergar-ten. Preschoolers who had heard more words had larger vocabularies once in kindergarten. Furthermore, when the students were in grade 3, their early language competence from the preschool years still accurately predicted their language and reading comprehension. The preschoolers who had heard more words, and subsequently had learned more words orally, were better readers. In short, early language advantage persists and manifests itself in higher lev-els of literacy. A meta-analysis by Sticht and James (1984) indicates that the importance of oral language extends well beyond the earliest grades. As illustrated in the graphic below, Sticht and James found evidence strongly suggesting that children’s listening comprehension outpaces reading comprehension until the middle school years (grades 6–8).

Figure 15: Listening and Reading Comprehension, by Age



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The research strongly suggests that the English language arts classroom should explicitly address the link between oral and written language, exploiting the influence of oral language on a child’s later ability to read by allocating in-structional time to building children’s listening skills, as called for in the Standards. The early grades should not focus on decoding alone, nor should the later grades pay attention only to building reading comprehension. Time should be devoted to reading fiction and content-rich selections aloud to young children, just as it is to providing those same children with the skills they will need to decode and encode.

This focus on oral language is of greatest importance for the children most at risk—children for whom English is a second language and children who have not been exposed at home to the kind of language found in written texts (Dickinson & Smith, 1994). Ensuring that all children in the United States have access to an excellent education re-quires that issues of oral language come to the fore in elementary classrooms.

read-alouds and the reading-speaking-Listening Link

Generally, teachers will encourage children in the upper elementary grades to read texts independently and reflect on them in writing. However, children in the early grades—particularly kindergarten through grade 3—benefit from participating in rich, structured conversations with an adult in response to written texts that are read aloud, orally comparing and contrasting as well as analyzing and synthesizing (Bus, Van Ijzendoorn, & Pellegrini, 1995; Feitelstein, Goldstein, Iraqui, & Share, 1993; Feitelstein, Kita, & Goldstein, 1986; Whitehurst et al., 1988). The Standards acknowl-edge the importance of this aural dimension of early learning by including a robust set of K–3 Speaking and Listening standards and by offering in Appendix B an extensive number of read-aloud text exemplars appropriate for K–1 and for grades 2–3.

Because, as indicated above, children’s listening comprehension likely outpaces reading comprehension until the middle school years, it is particularly important that students in the earliest grades build knowledge through being read to as well as through reading, with the balance gradually shifting to reading independently. By reading a story or nonfiction selection aloud, teachers allow children to experience written language without the burden of decod-ing, granting them access to content that they may not be able to read and understand by themselves. Children are then free to focus their mental energy on the words and ideas presented in the text, and they will eventually be better prepared to tackle rich written content on their own. Whereas most titles selected for kindergarten and grade 1 will need to be read aloud exclusively, some titles selected for grades 2–5 may be appropriate for read-alouds as well as for reading independently. Reading aloud to students in the upper grades should not, however, be used as a substitute for independent reading by students; read-alouds at this level should supplement and enrich what students are able to read by themselves.



pp

en

dix

a | 32

Vocabulary

Acquiring Vocabulary

Words are not just words. They are the nexus—the interface—between communication and thought. When we read, it is through words that we build, refine, and modify our knowledge. What makes vocabulary valuable and important is not the words themselves so much as the understandings they afford.

Marilyn Jager Adams (2009, p. 180)

The importance of students acquiring a rich and varied vocabulary cannot be overstated. Vocabulary has been em-pirically connected to reading comprehension since at least 1925 (Whipple, 1925) and had its importance to compre-hension confirmed in recent years (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000). It is widely ac-cepted among researchers that the difference in students’ vocabulary levels is a key factor in disparities in academic achievement (Baumann & Kameenui, 1991; Becker, 1977; Stanovich, 1986) but that vocabulary instruction has been neither frequent nor systematic in most schools (Biemiller, 2001; Durkin, 1978; Lesaux, Kieffer, Faller, & Kelley, 2010; Scott & Nagy, 1997).

Research suggests that if students are going to grasp and retain words and comprehend text, they need incremen-tal, repeated exposure in a variety of contexts to the words they are trying to learn. When students make multiple connections between a new word and their own experiences, they develop a nuanced and flexible understanding of the word they are learning. In this way, students learn not only what a word means but also how to use that word in a variety of contexts, and they can apply appropriate senses of the word’s meaning in order to understand the word in different contexts (Landauer & Dumais, 1997; Landauer, McNamara, Dennis, & Kintsch, 2007; Nagy, Herman, & Ander-son, 1985).

Initially, children readily learn words from oral conversation because such conversations are context rich in ways that aid in vocabulary acquisition: in discussions, a small set of words (accompanied by gesture and intonation) is used with great frequency to talk about a narrow range of situations children are exposed to on a day-to-day basis. Yet as children reach school age, new words are introduced less frequently in conversation, and consequently vocabulary acquisition eventually stagnates by grade 4 or 5 unless students acquire additional words from written context (Hayes & Ahrens, 1988).

Written language contains literally thousands of words more than are typically used in conversational language. Yet writing lacks the interactivity and nonverbal context that make acquiring vocabulary through oral conversation rela-tively easy, which means that purposeful and ongoing concentration on vocabulary is needed (Hayes & Ahrens, 1988). In fact, at most between 5 and 15 percent of new words encountered upon first reading are retained, and the weaker a student’s vocabulary is the smaller the gain (Daneman & Green, 1986; Hayes & Ahrens, 1988; Herman, Anderson, Pear-son, & Nagy, 1987; Sternberg & Powell, 1983). Yet research shows that if students are truly to understand what they read, they must grasp upward of 95 percent of the words (Betts, 1946; Carver, 1994; Hu & Nation, 2000; Laufer, 1988).

The challenge in reaching what we might call “lexical dexterity” is that, in any given instance, it is not the entire spec-trum of a word’s history, meanings, usages, and features that matters but only those aspects that are relevant at that moment. Therefore, for a reader to grasp the meaning of a word, two things must happen: first, the reader’s internal representation of the word must be sufficiently complete and well articulated to allow the intended meaning to be known to him or her; second, the reader must understand the context well enough to select the intended meaning from the realm of the word’s possible meanings (which in turn depends on understanding the surrounding words of the text).

Key to students’ vocabulary development is building rich and flexible word knowledge. Students need plentiful op-portunities to use and respond to the words they learn through playful informal talk, discussion, reading or being read to, and responding to what is read. Students benefit from instruction about the connections and patterns in language. Developing in students an analytical attitude toward the logic and sentence structure of their texts, alongside an awareness of word parts, word origins, and word relationships, provides students with a sense of how language works such that syntax, morphology, and etymology can become useful cues in building meaning as students encounter new words and concepts (Beck, McKeown, & Kucan, 2008). Although direct study of language is essential to student progress, most word learning occurs indirectly and unconsciously through normal reading, writing, listening, and speaking (Miller, 1999; Nagy, Anderson, & Herman, 1987).

As students are exposed to and interact with language throughout their school careers, they are able to acquire un-derstandings of word meanings, build awareness of the workings of language, and apply their knowledge to compre-hend and produce language.



pp

en

dix

a | 33

Three Tiers of WordsIsabel L. Beck, Margaret G. McKeown, and Linda Kucan (2002, 2008) have outlined a useful model for conceptual-izing categories of words readers encounter in texts and for understanding the instructional and learning challenges that words in each category present. They describe three levels, or tiers, of words in terms of the words’ commonality (more to less frequently occurring) and applicability (broader to narrower).

While the term tier may connote a hierarchy, a ranking of words from least to most important, the reality is that all three tiers of words are vital to comprehension and vocabulary development, although learning tier two and three words typically requires more deliberate effort (at least for students whose first language is English) than does learn-ing tier one words.

• tier one words are the words of everyday speech usually learned in the early grades, albeit not at the same rate by all children. They are not considered a challenge to the average native speaker, though English language learners of any age will have to attend carefully to them. While Tier One words are important, they are not the focus of this discussion.

• tier two words (what the Standards refer to as general academic words) are far more likely to appear in written texts than in speech. They appear in all sorts of texts: informational texts (words such as relative, vary, formulate, specificity, and accumulate), technical texts (calibrate, itemize, periphery), and literary texts (misfortune, dignified, faltered, unabashedly). Tier Two words often represent subtle or precise ways to say relatively simple things—saunter instead of walk, for example. Because Tier Two words are found across many types of texts, they are highly generalizable.

• tier three words (what the Standards refer to as domain-specific words) are specific to a domain or field of study (lava, carburetor, legislature, circumference, aorta) and key to understanding a new concept within a text. Because of their specificity and close ties to content knowledge, Tier Three words are far more common in informational texts than in literature. Recognized as new and “hard” words for most readers (particularly student readers), they are often explicitly defined by the author of a text, repeatedly used, and otherwise heavily scaffolded (e.g., made a part of a glossary).

Tier Two Words and Access to Complex TextsBecause Tier Three words are obviously unfamiliar to most students, contain the ideas necessary to a new topic, and are recognized as both important and specific to the subject area in which they are instructing students, teachers of-ten define Tier Three words prior to students encountering them in a text and then reinforce their acquisition through-out a lesson. Unfortunately, this is not typically the case with Tier Two words, which by definition are not unique to a particular discipline and as a result are not the clear responsibility of a particular content area teacher. What is more, many Tier Two words are far less well defined by contextual clues in the texts in which they appear and are far less likely to be defined explicitly within a text than are Tier Three words. Yet Tier Two words are frequently encountered in complex written texts and are particularly powerful because of their wide applicability to many sorts of reading. Teachers thus need to be alert to the presence of Tier Two words and determine which ones need careful attention.

Tier Three Words and Content LearningThis normal process of word acquisition occurs up to four times faster for Tier Three words when students have become familiar with the domain of the discourse and encounter the word in different contexts (Landauer & Dumais, 1997). Hence, vocabulary development for these words occurs most effectively through a coherent course of study in which subject matters are integrated and coordinated across the curriculum and domains become familiar to the student over several days or weeks.

Examples of Tier Two and Tier Three Words in ContextThe following annotated samples call attention to tier two and tier three words in particular texts and, by singling them out, foreground the importance of these words to the meaning of the texts in which they appear. Both samples appear without annotations in Appendix B.

Example 1: Volcanoes (Grades 4–5 Text Complexity Band

Excerpt

In early times, no one knew how volcanoes formed or why they spouted red-hot molten rock. In modern times, scientists began to study volcanoes. They still don’t know all the answers, but they know much about how a volcano works.


Building Vocabulary Through Morphemes: Using Word Parts to Unlock Meaning By Alice Thomas

Direct instruction of the most common morphemes (prefixes, suffixes, and roots) can greatly enhance and build the vocabulary and reading comprehension of all students, especially struggling readers. Once students become familiar with the most common morphemes, they can then use their knowledge of word parts to help determine meaning when they encounter unknown words.

Morphemes, the smallest units of a word that have meaning, are commonly divided into prefixes, suffixes, and roots. The word misspelled, for example, is comprised of three morphemes: the prefix mis–, the root or base word spell, and the suffix –ed.

Because some students may not realize that they can use their knowledge about how to divide words into parts to gain word meanings, it is important to provide direct instruction to ensure that students develop their ability to analyze the structure of multisyllabic words. In particular, struggling readers, under expossed students, and students with learning disabilities may be lacking in word analysis skills.

We have evidence that teaching morphemes to students increases vocabulary and reading comprehension. In one study, third graders who were given training on the nine most common prefixes and a strategy for decomposing words into roots and suffixes out performed a control group on several measures of word meanings (White, Sowell and Yanagihara, 1989). Researchers concluded that teaching at least the top nine prefixes, if not all 20, to students would pay dividends in increased vocabulary learning.

It is never too early to introduce students to meaningful word parts. For example, teachers of pre-kindergarten students can readily point out the meaning of the prefix pre–, meaning “before” to their students, as in pre-kindergarten, and preview. Further, pre-kindergarten students can easily grasp the meaning of un–, meaning “not”, as in untied (“My shoe came untied”), uncover, unlock and unsafe.

Students in lower elementary school can be taught to add prefixes and suffixes to short Anglo-Saxon base words and discuss the meaning. Teachers can start the thought process of combining by having students identify and then form compound words (e.g., football, cupcake) and then move students to affixing prefixes and suffixes to base words, such as “view”: preview, review, viewed, viewing, and viewer.


Students in upper elementary school and the secondary grades will benefit as they learn the meanings of additional affixes and common Latin and Greek roots. For example, knowing that spect comes from Latin and means “to see, to watch” will help students to understand the meaning of inspect, inspector, spectator, introspective and spectacles. Knowing the Greek root graph, meaning “to write” or “to draw” opens the reader to multiple words such as autograph, photograph, telegraph, lithograph, biography, and graphite. Knowing that “bio” means “life” will help them to unlock the meaning of biology, biography, autobiography, bionic, antibiotic, and biometrics.

A user-friendly resource for teaching word parts is Vocabulary Through Morphemes by Susan Ebbers.

The PDF link below contains a compilation of common prefixes, roots and suffixes. The compilation is by no means exhaustive; it should be used only as a place to start.

_____________________________ References

Carroll, J.B., Davies, P., & Richman, B. (1971). The American Heritage word frequency book. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Ebbers, S. (2011). Vocabulary through morphemes. 2nd edition. Longmont, CO: SoprisWest.

Moats, Louisa C. (2010). Speech to print: Language essentials for teachers (2nd Edition). Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co, Inc.

Mountain, L. (2005, May). ROOTing Out Meaning: More Morphemic Analysis for Primary Pupils. The Reading Teacher, 58(8), 742–749.

White, T.G., Sowell, J., & Yanagihara, A. (1989). Teaching elementary students to use word part clues. The Reading Teacher, 42, 302-308.

Reprinted with permission of the author.

Alice Thomas is president and CEO of the Center for Development and Learning (CDL). She will be a presenter at CDL’s 2013 Plain Talk about Reading Institute.


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ly, a

brup

tly

-acy

noun

stat

e or

qua

lity

priv

acy,

occ

upan

cy, d

emoc

racy

, buo

yanc

y, s

alie

ncy,

lite

racy

, sec

retly

, pol

itely,

rapi

dly

-anc

e, -e

nce

no

unst

ate

or q

ualit

y of

mai

nten

ance

, em

inen

ce, p

rom

inen

ce, d

omin

ance

, coi

ncid

ence

, dec

aden

ce, c

aden

ce

-dom

no

unpl

ace

or s

tate

of b

eing

freed

om, k

ingd

om, w

isdo

m, f

iefd

om, b

ored

om, m

arty

rdom

-er,

-or,

-ist,

-ian,

-eer

no

unon

e w

ho; w

hat/t

hat/w

hich

train

er, t

each

er, t

oast

er, m

ento

r, su

rviv

or, o

rato

r, go

vern

or, p

iani

st, s

peci

alis

t, de

ntis

t, lib

raria

n, m

agic

ian,

tech

nici

an, e

ngin

eer,

pion

eer

-ism

noun

doct

rine,

bel

ief

com

mun

ism

, soc

ialis

m, p

ragm

atis

m, r

ealis

m, f

euda

lism

, rac

ism

, Cat

holic

ism

, B

uddh

ism

, cap

italis

m -i

st

noun

one

who

chem

ist,

soci

alis

t, bi

olog

ist,

publ

icis

t, re

alis

t, ro

man

ticis

t, pr

agm

atis

t

-ity

, -ty

no

un

qu

ality

of

vera

city

, hon

esty

, cla

rity,

laxi

ty, s

anity

, van

ity, r

igid

ity, v

eloc

ity, c

urio

sity

, res

pons

ibili

ty

-men

t

no

unco

nditi

on o

far

gum

ent,

judg

men

t, ap

artm

ent,

cont

entm

ent,

rese

ntm

ent,

base

men

t

-nes

s

noun

stat

e of

bei

nghe

avin

ess,

hap

pine

ss, o

penn

ess,

har

shne

ss, c

lean

lines

s, c

arel

essn

ess

-ion

, -si

on, -

tion

noun

stat

e of

bei

ng; q

ualit

y; a

ctco

nces

sion

, tra

nsiti

on, a

ctio

n, e

rosi

on, v

isio

n, in

vita

tion,

con

clus

ion,

con

dem

natio

n

Com

mon

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fixes


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o-lo

gy

noun

stud

y of

bi

olog

y, m

iner

alog

y, e

colo

gy

-age

noun

resu

lt of

an

actio

nm

arria

ge, p

ilgrim

age

-hoo

d

noun

cond

ition

of b

eing

neig

hbor

hood

, fal

seho

od, c

hild

hood

-ary

noun

plac

e fo

r, co

llect

ion

of; o

ne

who

glos

sary

, lib

rary

, sec

reta

ry, d

igni

tary

-shi

p

no

unar

t or s

kill

of, c

ondi

tion,

ra

nk, g

roup

of

lead

ersh

ip, c

itize

nshi

p, o

wne

rshi

p, c

ompa

nion

ship

, frie

ndsh

ip

-abl

e, -i

ble

ad

ject

ive

able

to b

e, w

orth

y of

, ca

pabl

e of

com

forta

ble,

lika

ble,

enj

oyab

le, h

onor

able

, pre

dict

able

, ter

rible

, sen

sibl

e, in

cred

ible

, ed

ible

, vis

ible

-ful

ad

ject

ive

nota

ble

for,

full

of

fanc

iful,

beau

tiful

, won

derfu

l, co

lorfu

l, ev

entfu

l, fe

arfu

l, ha

tefu

l, re

sent

ful

-ic,

-al,

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adje

ctiv

e, n

oun

perta

inin

g to

, rel

atin

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ener

getic

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toric

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cani

c, re

fusa

l, re

gion

al, p

ropo

sal,

fata

l, co

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l, te

rrito

rial,

spat

ial,

soci

al, c

omic

al, h

isto

rical

, mag

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, log

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al -i

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adje

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ech

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y, fu

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nutri

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pre

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qual

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h, c

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som

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Com

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Latin

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bibl

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earth

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junc

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junc

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adj

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s, lo

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, meg

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, meg

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evol

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n

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smal

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min

imum

, min

i, m

inia

ture

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ity

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send

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mis

sion

, tra

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sile

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mis

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path

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foot

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pede

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Com

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Com

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Roo

ts (c

ontin

ued)


Teach Students the All-Purpose Academic Word List By Alice Thomas

The Academic Word List (AWL) consists of 570 word families that occur reasonably frequently over a wide range of academic texts. The list was developed and evaluated by Averil Coxhead for her MA thesis (Coxhead, 2000). The AWL word families were selected according to range and frequency. For range, the word families had to occur across disciplines (e.g., the arts, commerce, law and science). For frequency, AWL word families had to occur over 100 times in the 3,500,000-word Academic Corpus. Additional information about the AWL word selection can be found at www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/resources/academicwordlist/principles.aspx. Almost all of the words in the Academic Word List are headwords of word families (e.g., the headword analyze represents several other forms of that word such as analysis, analyzes, analyzed, analyzing, analyst, analytic, analytical and analytically). Therefore, students who master the AWL will increase his vocabulary exponentially beyond the 570 headwords. The 570 words are grouped into 10 sublists that reflect word frequency. Thus, the first sublist contains words with the highest frequency and the last sublist contains the words with the lowest. Each sublist contains 60 words except sublist 10, which contains 30 words. Because of the words were selected by their range and frequency in the English language Academic Corpus, the AWL is useful for learners across the disciplines. The AWL does not contain technical words likely to appear only in a specific discipline such as trapezoid, photosynthesis or preposition. Adolescent students should benefit from teachers who (1) explicitly teach the word families on the AWL, (2) regularly use words on the AWL, (3) elaborate on the AWL word families, and (4) require student usage (verbal and written) of AWL words. Free practice exercises for each sublist of words may be found at www.academicvocabularyexercises.com. AWL Sublists (http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/resources/academicwordlist/information.aspx) Sublist 1 analyze • approach • area • assess • assume • authority • available • benefit • concept • consist • constitute • context • contract • create • data • define • derive • distribute • economy • environment • establish • estimate • evident • export • factor • finance • formula • function • identify • income • indicate • individual • interpret • involve • issue •


labor • legal • legislate • major • method • occur • percent • period • policy • principle • proceed • process • require • research • respond • role • section • sector • significant • similar • source • specific • structure • theory • vary Sublist 2 achieve • acquire • administrate • affect • appropriate • aspect • assist • category • chapter • commission • community • complex • compute • conclude • conduct • consequent • construct • consume • credit • culture • design • distinct • element • equate • evaluate • feature • final • focus • impact • injure • institute • invest • item • journal • maintain • normal • obtain • participate • perceive • positive • potential • previous • primary • purchase • range • region • regulate • relevant • reside • resource • restrict • secure • seek • select • site • strategy • survey • text • tradition • transfer Sublist 3 alternative • circumstance • comment • compensate • component • consent • considerable • constant • constrain • contribute • convene • coordinate • core • corporate • correspond • criteria • deduce • demonstrate • document • dominate • emphasis • ensure • exclude • framework • fund • illustrate • immigrate • imply • initial • instance • interact • justify • layer • link • locate • maximize • minor • negate • outcome • partner • philosophy • physical • proportion • publish • react • register • rely • remove • scheme • sequence • sex • shift • specify • sufficient • task • technique • technology • valid • volume Sublist 4 access • adequate • annual • apparent • approximate • attitude • attribute • civil • code • commit • communicate • concentrate • confer • contrast • cycle • debate • despite • dimension • domestic • emerge • error • ethnic • goal • grant • hence • hypothesis • implement • implicate • impose • integrate • internal • investigate • job • label • mechanism • obvious • occupy • option • output • overall • parallel • parameter • phase • predict • principal • prior • professional • project • promote • regime • resolve • retain • series • statistic • status • stress • subsequent • sum • summary • undertake Sublist 5 academy • adjust • alter • amend • aware • capacity • challenge • clause • compound • conflict • consult • contact • decline • discrete • draft • enable • energy • enforce • entity • equivalent • evolve • expand • expose • external • facilitate • fundamental • generate • generation • image • liberal • license • logic • margin • medical • mental • modify • monitor • network • notion • objective • orient • perspective • precise • prime • psychology • pursue • ratio • reject • revenue • stable • style • substitute • sustain • symbol • target • transit • trend • version • welfare • whereas Sublist 6 abstract • accurate • acknowledge • aggregate • allocate • assign • attach • author • bond • brief • capable • cite • cooperate • discriminate • display • diverse • domain • edit • enhance • estate • exceed • expert • explicit • federal • fee • flexible • furthermore • gender • ignorant • incentive • incidence • incorporate • index • inhibit • initiate • input •


instruct • intelligence • interval • lecture • migrate • minimum • ministry • motive • neutral • nevertheless • overseas • precede • presume • rational • recover • reveal • scope • subsidy • tape • trace • transform • transport • underlie • utilize Sublist 7 adapt • adult • advocate • aid • channel • chemical • classic • comprehensive • comprise • confirm • contrary • convert • couple • decade • definite • deny • differentiate • dispose • dynamic • eliminate • empirical • equip • extract • file • finite • foundation • globe • grade • guarantee • hierarchy • identical • ideology • infer • innovate • insert • intervene • isolate • media • mode • paradigm • phenomenon • priority • prohibit • publication • quote • release • reverse • simulate • sole • somewhat • submit • successor • survive • thesis • topic • transmit • ultimate • unique • visible • voluntary Sublist 8 abandon • accompany • accumulate • ambiguous • append • appreciate • arbitrary • automate • bias • chart • clarify • commodity • complement • conform • contemporary • contradict • crucial • currency • denote • detect • deviate • displace • drama • eventual • exhibit • exploit • fluctuate • guideline • highlight • implicit • induce • inevitable • infrastructure • inspect • intense • manipulate • minimize • nuclear • offset • paragraph • plus • practitioner • predominant • prospect • radical • random • reinforce • restore • revise • schedule • tense • terminate • theme • thereby • uniform • vehicle • via • virtual • visual • widespread Sublist 9 accommodate • analogy • anticipate • assure • attain • behalf • bulk • cease • coherent • coincide • commence • compatible • concurrent • confine • controversy • converse • device • devote • diminish • distort • duration • erode • ethic • format • founded • inherent • insight • integral • intermediate • manual • mature • mediate • medium • military • minimal • mutual • norm • overlap • passive • portion • preliminary • protocol • qualitative • refine • relax • restrain • revolution • rigid • route • scenario • sphere • subordinate • supplement • suspend • team • temporary • trigger • unify • violate • vision Sublist 10 adjacent • albeit • assemble • collapse • colleague • compile • conceive • convince • depress • encounter • enormous • forthcoming • incline • integrity • intrinsic • invoke • levy • likewise • nonetheless • notwithstanding • odd • ongoing • panel • persist • pose • reluctance • so-called • straightforward • undergo • whereby _____________________________ References

Coxhead, A. (2000). A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly, 34(2): 213–238. http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/resources/academicwordlist/information.aspx. Kinsella (2003). The academic word list: A list of 570 high-incidence and high-utility academic word families for secondary school, higher education, career. Retrieved on July 15, 2010 from http://teacher.scholastic.com/products/read180/community/pdfs/Vocabulary/Academic_Word_List_by_Frequency.pdf


Reprinted with permission of the author.

Alice Thomas is president and CEO of the Center for Development and Learning (CDL). She will be a presenter at CDL’s 2013 Plain Talk about Reading Institute. About Averil Coxhead Averil Coxhead, Ph.D., is a senior lecturer in Applied Linguistics at the University of Wellington in New Zealand. She teaches courses on second language learning. She has taught in New Zealand, England, Estonia, Hungary, and Romania.


Vocabulary Instruction in Elementary and Middle Classrooms...

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