Vocabulary knowledge contributes to comprehension, fluency, and student achievement. The goal of vocabulary instruction should be to build students' independent word‐learning strategies.
This article provides research and theory in support of nine key ideas about words and vocabulary instruction. These ideas are important for middle and secondary teachers to know and understand in order to provide sound vocabulary teaching across the content areas. Topics discussed include
The English language and the consistency of its rules
How language competence grows from oral to written
How words are learned
Multiple meanings
Multisyllabic words
The importance of teachers' modeling word consciousness and their own excitement about learning new words
For each key idea, the author provides several practical suggestions for classroom instruction, including strategies for individuals, small groups, and the whole class. Several websites for developing vocabulary as well as professional resources for teachers are suggested.
This article is also the source for a Class Acts podcast. Download “Teaching vocabulary in middle and high school” from
http://www.reading.org/resources/podcasts/index.html
Supplementing classroom reading with smartphones can develop better vocabulary knowledge, comprehension, technology skills, and writing. This article connects smartphones to reading complex, informational text and the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The author suggests that smartphones motivate, scaffold comprehension, and invite investigations that allow students to engage with authors, illustrators, and each other in ways that invite deep and thoughtful reading.
Blending online research with face-to-face classroom discussion can change traditional literature circles in ways that foster research using digital resources, comprehension, and literary analysis.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.