Of the five components of reading instruction (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary), vocabulary instruction may be the least talked about. We might think kids develop a strong vocabulary naturally by being exposed to life experiences, conversation, and content area instruction. While this is true, it’s also not the whole story. And what about our students who don’t have equal access to varied life experiences, language-rich conversations, and robust content area instruction? How can we help these kids develop their vocabulary skills?
There are no easy answers but as teachers, parents, or caretakers, we can learn more about the process of acquiring a strong vocabulary and how that impacts comprehension. This will help us to make changes to support our learners, no matter what walk of life they come from.
This post contains affiliate links.
Is vocabulary instruction really necessary or is it just an “extra”?
First, let’s cover why vocabulary instruction is important and why it deserves just as much attention as phonics and comprehension usually get. According to Lehr et al., (2004), “One of the most persistent findings in reading research is that the extent of students’ vocabulary knowledge relates strongly to their reading comprehension and overall academic success.” Essentially, this tells us that students will struggle to comprehend both oral and written language if they do not understand the words being used. It makes sense, right?
And when students struggle to comprehend, they lose interest. And when they lose interest, they miss out on learning opportunities, which further impacts their vocabulary development. It sets “the Matthew Effect” in motion.
What is the Matthew Effect?
In 1986, researcher Keith Stanovich related the Gospel According to Matthew to the development of early reading skills. He described “rich get richer and poor get poorer patterns of reading development.” Stanovich explained that good readers will read more and gain more vocabulary knowledge, while poor readers will read less and gain fewer words.
As the parent of two voracious readers, I see how the Matthew Effect has allowed my children to acquire vocabulary terms that sometimes surprise me in our casual conversations. They have the benefits of explicit vocabulary instruction in school and additional vocabulary terms gained through reading. They have also gained vocabulary terms through all the avenues that this teacher-mom makes available to them. On the other hand, as a special education teacher in high-needs districts, I see that many of my students are missing out on opportunities to gain new words and knowledge. Why? One reason is that reading is challenging and therefore it is a non-preferred activity. Another reason is that many of these students do not have access to the resources and experiences that would help them implicitly grow their vocabularies.
Truthfully, I often feel frustrated and helpless in my role as a special educator in a high-needs public school system. Much of my career has been spent working with third graders who are non-readers or emergent readers from families of low socioeconomic status. While I do feel that I’m able to help my students make a sufficient amount of progress during the short time we have together each year, I worry about all the lost time before I met them and I worry about their trajectory as they move on to higher grade levels. With only one thirty-minute intervention block per day, there is simply not enough time to teach them everything I want to teach them. Many days, the task of closing that academic gap feels insurmountable and I wish I could take all my students in smaller groupings and loop with them until they’ve come within grade-level expectations.
Forgive me for going off on a tangent but this subject really does make me yearn for change within our school systems! Let’s get back on track.
What impact does vocabulary development have on other areas of reading?
Having a strong vocabulary is not a stand-alone skill. Beyond supporting comprehension, a strong vocabulary also helps children develop phonemic awareness skills and helps them map sound to print. (Orthographically mapping sounds to print is what helps students recognize words with automaticity, or “by sight”).
How? If a word is already in a child’s oral vocabulary, they will be able to identify the word in context with greater ease than if they have never heard it before. Additionally, students with strong oral vocabularies can use a skill called “set for variability” to determine when they have decoded part of a word incorrectly, which is particularly helpful when students attempt to decode a word with an irregular element (Steacy et al., 2019).
What is “set for variability” and how does it help students decode?
Imagine a native English speaker who is also an emergent reader. He is trying to decode the word warm. He first pronounces it to rhyme with the word arm, but quickly uses his set for variability combined with his familiarity with the word warm and any available context clues to fix his mispronunciation.
Meanwhile, a non-native speaker at the same reading level may not be able to fix her mispronunciation of the word warm because she has never heard the word warm before. This non-native speaker may even have stronger decoding abilities than the first student, but her smaller vocabulary will make decoding (and consequently comprehending) challenging.
Now that we’ve discussed the importance of vocabulary development, what can we do to promote it?
Let’s talk about the components of quality vocabulary instruction. Lehr et al. (2004) summarized the findings of the National Reading Panel (NRP) report, which concluded that there is not one specific instructional method that is adequate in terms of vocabulary learning. Rather, instruction must combine a variety of methods that include both “incidental word learning” and “intentional word teaching.”
What’s the difference between incidental word learning and intentional word teaching?
Incidental word learning is word learning that occurs through oral language experiences and wide reading. (Wide reading simply means reading many types of books.) On the other hand, intentional word teaching is the explicit teaching of specific words and word-learning strategies.
Lehr et al. (2004) remind us that intentional vocabulary instruction is necessary for some but beneficial for all. Our students who do not have the reading skills required to become “wide” readers rely on us to provide them with vocabulary instruction that will help them keep pace with their same-age peers who are able to read widely: “Whereas intentional instruction can benefit all students, it is especially important for students who have not developed the decoding and comprehension skills necessary for wide reading. For these students in particular, intentional, explicit teaching of specific word meanings and of word-learning strategies is especially important.“ This means that we have the power to set the Matthew Effect in motion in the right direction.
Ready for more details on quality vocabulary instruction?
The 2000 National Reading Panel report offers eight points to keep in mind about quality vocabulary instruction:
- Direct instruction of vocabulary terms is necessary for specific texts.
- Students learn best with frequent exposure to new terms in many contexts.
- Words targeted for vocabulary instruction should be useful in more than one context.
- The focus should not be simply on learning new vocabulary words. Students need to truly interact with the new words in meaningful contexts.
- Students should be actively engaged in learning tasks.
- There is a place for technology in quality vocabulary instruction.
- Many vocabulary terms can and should be gained through incidental learning, repetition, and the use of rich and meaningful experiences.
- Teachers should not rely on one vocabulary instructional method if they wish to provide optimal learning.
Not sure where to start?
In the absence of a structured vocabulary curriculum that has already been created for you, there are small changes you can make to help your students grow their vocabularies. To begin, set a goal of focusing on a specific number of words in a certain amount of time. Choose something manageable to start with and you can increase the number as you get more comfortable. You might try to teach one new word per week and choose from the phonics list. Maybe you want to teach four new words from your current social studies unit, which will take about two weeks to complete. Find a plan that works for you and you might find that it’s easier than expected once you get started.
Some sources for your vocabulary words include your phonics list, your content area curriculum (science, social studies, math), your current read-aloud book, and the school-wide social/emotional learning curriculum. Remember that the NRP recommends teaching words that are useful in more than one context. While chlorophyll is certainly a word they must know to pass the science test, other words from the plant unit (process, energy, convert, absorb) will offer more “bang for your buck” because your students will see these words in many other contexts.
Specific Strategies for Word Learning
Once you start thinking about where to look for words, you can consider some specific strategies for helping your students master these words. Here are some ways you might incorporate what you’ve learned in this post:
- The first thing to do is define the word in student-friendly language. If I’m not entirely sure of the best way to explain a word, I’ll look at a couple of different dictionaries to find a definition I think my students will understand with ease. Kids Wordsmyth has very simple definitions. Merriam-Webster also has a kids’ dictionary but sometimes the navigation is a little tricky.
- Complete a graphic organizer for multiple-meaning words. Words like draft and stress have several meanings that your students can relate to. A graphic organizer allows students to write the word, use it in a sentence, and illustrate the concept, all alongside the other meanings of the word.
- Talk about what a new word means and what the word doesn’t mean. This will help students learn the subtleties of complex words.
- Brainstorm synonyms and words related to the new word.
- Relate new vocabulary words to previously learned ones. In my Wilson lessons, my students are introduced to draft when they learn consonant blends, and then we relate draft to edit and publish when we reach the concept of multisyllabic words.
- Challenge students to use the word throughout the week and to notice when the teacher uses it. Consider offering a reward to students who use the word or notice it being used. I once got a group of fifth-grade boys very invested in their vocabulary instruction when I offered squishies in exchange for stories about how they used their new vocabulary terms outside the four walls of my classroom. They’d come to me each morning with stories about transporting the groceries into the house or when the kids playing tag at recess disbanded.
- Be on the lookout for books that use or relate to words you want your students to learn. For example, you may choose the book Ish by Peter H. Reynolds for your read-aloud and discuss the main character’s drafts of his drawings or the stress he felt when his brother made fun of his art. After a school year of focusing in on vocabulary growth, you’ll likely develop a list of trade books that are great sources of useful vocabulary terms.
- Don’t forget to review, review, review! After you’ve introduced a word to your students, add it to a list, whether it’s posted for all to see or tucked into your planner. Make a point of revisiting the words in many ways: use them in conversation, challenge your students to incorporate them into their writing, act them out with the class, and sneak them into your word problems in math.
A final note: Vocabulary instruction is not just about teaching words.
It’s also about teaching word-learning strategies (Lehr et al., 2004). While we can’t possibly teach students all of the words they need to know to become proficient readers, we can teach them strategies for understanding unfamiliar words with increasing independence.
One way to do this is to encourage questioning. When a student pauses to ask what a word means, celebrate their curiosity. Remind them that good readers and active learners stay curious and investigate what they don’t understand. Even if it wasn’t in the lesson plan, take a moment to use one of the strategies above: define the word, offer examples, brainstorm synonyms, use the word in sentences, compare it to known words, act it out, etc. Reinforce how their understanding is enhanced when they go back to the unfamiliar word and apply a strategy. Studying morphology is another great way for students to develop word-learning skills. Let me know in the comments if you’d like to see a blog post about morphology instruction in the future!
Sources:
Lehr, F., Osborn, J., & Hiebert, D. E. H. (2004). Pacific Resources for Education and Learning. Research-Based Practices in Early Reading Series: A Focus on Vocabulary. Retrieved March 13, 2022.
Steacy, L. M., Wade-Woolley, L., Rueckl, J. G., Pugh, K., Elliott, J. D., & Compton, D. L. (2019). The role of set for variability in irregular word reading: Word and child predictors in typically developing readers and students at-risk for reading disabilities. Scientific studies of reading: the official journal of the Society for the Scientific Study of Reading. Retrieved March 13, 2022, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7449249/
I would like a post on morphology. Thank you.