Teaching vocabulary to be used
in students' reading and writing

The typical methods of teaching vocabulary at the high school level are not notably successful in improving students' ability to read with greater comprehension or write with greater precision.

Goals of vocabulary teaching

If they are to be competent writers and speakers, students need vocabulary instruction so that they:

• Are aware that a word can have different meanings in different contexts.

• Can determine when a word they recognize is used with a different meaning than the one they know.

• Use their everyday vocabulary correctly in speaking and writing.

• Know how to use a dictionary to find the meanings of words.

• Actually use a dictionary to check their understanding of words.

• Continue to expand their vocabularies for reading, speaking, and writing.

Teaching vocabulary in ways that produce these outcomes requires you to teach differently than you were taught.

Do less in more depth

In teaching vocabulary for application to students' reading and writing experiences, you will have best success if you limit the number of new words you attempt to teach, but teach the smaller number to a greater depth.

A superficial exposure to words may be adequate to get Josh and Ciatlin through their SATs, but they will need perhaps dozen or more learning experiences before they make a new word part of their reading and writing vocabularies.

The place of vocabulary lists

It is very helpful to have vocabulary lists to use as you are teaching vocabulary. The lists save you time and help you focus.

Limit vocabulary lists you give students to 10 words. Anything over 10 looks difficult to students. Ten looks manageable to all but the most academically threatened student.

You can use a vocabulary list to prepare students to notice words that will be in their reading and writing that week. Your 10 words might include words from drawn from the:

• General Service List (GSL).

• Academic Word List (AWL).

• Your discipline's vocabulary.

• A specific text students will be reading that week.

• Other lists (such as Virtual Salt or a SAT prep list) or from news sources.

The words you choose to teach for mastery should be words that all students will encounter frequently.

With a bit of creativity, you can coordinate your lists with reading and writing assignments that give everyone in the class an opportunity to demonstrate their knowledge of the vocabulary words and give the better students a moderate challenge.

The meaning of mastery

Mastery is the application level on Bloom's taxonomy of educational objectives. Application means that students initiate use of their knowledge without specifically being prompted to do.

Students may be said to have mastered a vocabulary list when they:

• Recognize the words when they hear them spoken.

• Recognize the words when they see them in writing in various sources.

• Identify from the context whether the words they recognize are used with the meanings they know.

• Use a dictionary to find alternative meanings that fits the context of words which appear to have a different definition in the reading context than the meaning the student learned.

• Use the words correctly in writing a paragraph on a topic you provide.

• Spell the words correctly in their written work.

• Pronounce the words correctly when reading material containing them or when using the word in speaking.