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Developing Academic Vocabulary
William G. Brozo (United States)
Vocabulary knowledge is one of the five essential components of effective reading (RAND Reading Study Group, 2002). Thus, helping students expand their knowledge and use of words is an expressed outcome of schooling. Certain words, however, have more currency than others in academic contexts. Helping students recognize and understand specific terms and concepts encountered in disciplinary texts and classrooms (science, social studies, mathematics, language arts), and use these terms appropriately, is one of the essential challenges for any teacher (Marzano & Pickering, 2005). Knowledge and facility with academic vocabulary makes it possible for students to engage with, produce, and talk about texts that are valued in school and on standardized assessments (Flynt & Brozo, 2008). It allows students to read with understanding and communicate their knowledge on tests, in discussions, and in other class demonstrations (Harmon, Hedrick, & Wood, 2005). And it helps youth take advantage of career and professional opportunities that might not otherwise be available to them (Brozo & Simpson, 2007).
To develop students’ knowledge of and facility with academic language teachers should take advantage of three overarching principles of effective word learning.
- Students must have both definitional and contextual understandings of words in order to know them really well (Nagy & Scott, 2000).
- Students need multiple exposures to words in multiple contexts (Blachowicz & Fisher, 2004).
- Students must be active participants in the word learning process (Stahl, 1999)
Three strategies that take full advantage of these principles of vocabulary teaching and learning are Word Grid, Vocabulary Self-Awareness, Vocabulary Cards. These strategies are ideally suited to building both contextual and definitional word knowledge, and providing students repeated exposures to new vocabulary.
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