Building Vocabulary - Take 2

My teaching partner and I have signed up to teach an extra class after school, beginning in January. She’s going to be using close reading strategies, and I’m going to be doing a vocabulary piece, so one of the books I just bought is Word Nerds, by Brenda Overturf, Leslie Montgomery, and Margot Smith.  These teachers work in a high poverty school in Kentucky, and the strategies they use to teach vocabulary extend into lessons on life. It’s an impressive book, and I’m both inspired and discouraged. Inspired because they do a lot of interactive lessons, some of which I’m going to try in my regular classes, and some I can try in my afterschool class. But I’m discouraged, because, like all things, vocabulary instruction done well takes time, and this year, more than ever, I’m feeling crushed for time.

So what can I do right now? In the book, they do a lot with synonyms and antonyms, and I’m going to see if there is a way I can incorporate those words more often. I do a “word of the day”, and starting Monday, I’ll also talk briefly about synonyms and antonyms for that word. I think it will help me if I make a chart to hang up that looks like this:

Word	Synonyms	Antonyms

I think having a weekly chart hanging up will remind students of the word of the day, and other words like it.  I may even give students their own chart to fill out each week, so they will have a collection of words to go back and use.  Doing that will allow students to do one of the activities in the book: color the word.

In coloring the word, students are asked to find one color to represent the word. They have to tell why they chose that color, and in the book, that provided some interesting deep thinking. For example, one student chose red for the word “segregation”, because bricks are red and they can be used to build walls that separate people. I like the extra thinking that goes into planning out the colors.

Another activity I would like to try is called Chain Link. The students in the book have vocabulary lanyards, like plastic nametag holders on necklaces. You can put in words and then do a lot of different activities that involve students moving around the room, sorting and resorting themselves by their vocabulary “nametag”. For Chain Link, the first person starts, tells their word and gives the definition. The rest of the students need to find a way to link their word with the first person’s word. If a student can explain how their word relates, that student stands next to the first student. Now there is a new word to link to, and ultimately the goal is not to be the last person standing, because that person is going to have to link both sides of the chain. Of course, the thinking involved at that point is going to be higher level, since there are two words to connect to instead of just one.

I will see how this goes for me as I try to squeeze in more vocabulary practice in my limited teaching time. I think I can do more with the after school class in January, and that may give me the incentive I need to incorporate more vocabulary practice into my regular room.