Robust Vocabulary Instruction: Sample Lesson!

Alright, so now that you've had some time to process all of the information I posted last week regarding robust vocabulary instruction of tier 2 words, we are ready to move on!

The robust instruction approach proposes a 5-day cycle, and while that would be ideal, it just may not be reality for many of us speech teachers as we only see our kids 1-3 times per week for only 30 minutes on average!  Here's how I try and block out my vocabulary instruction:

Day 1:  Read text selection, take Pre-Test
Day 2:  Vocabulary Journal/Introduce all words
Day 3:  Vocabulary Questions, Brainstorming Topics, Matching Comments, provide them with carryover activities
Day 4:  Review vocabulary words, Post-Test

So basically I block out TWO WEEKS for my vocabulary instruction.  Most of my language groups are 2x per week.  

To get a better idea of how I do each activity listed above, open up my SAMPLE VOCAB PACKET for the book 'The Stranger' and follow along!

Vocabulary Journal:

• I provide all of my students with the full vocabulary packet.  This is especially helpful for the Vocabulary Journal section to save on time.  I originally had the students write everything down in a notebook but it was just taking way too long.  So I typed up the journal and took out some words and added blanks instead.  This way they still had to follow along with the lesson as they had to write the appropriate word in the blank.  I don't always leave out the actual vocabulary word.  I usually pick out words important to the overall meaning or sentence.  In my sample I provided you with the entire definitions/sentences so you know what it's supposed to say! You can take out whichever words you want.

• For the first bullet point in the journal, I just show the students the page the word originated from and read the entire paragraph so provide more context.  We just write the actual sentence the word is in though.

• For the second bullet point, we talk about the definition.  We use a website called COBUILD.  This is a fantastic website that provides you with student-friendly definitions so they actually make sense to kids (and adults)!!  

• Third bullet point is an additional sentence that uses the word.  You can make one up or sometimes COBUILD provides extra sentences.

• Last bullet point allows for interaction with the word.

Vocabulary Questions:

• For this section, I either read the questions to the group and they answer out loud OR they work in a group and write down there answers before discussing with me.

Brainstorming Topics:

• For these I usually give a few examples then have the students work together to make the lists and discuss.  Then we come together as a group and talk about what they came up with.

Matching Comments:

• We usually do this section as a big group.  I say the comment and they tell me which word it goes with.

Sentence Stems:

• I actually don't do the Sentence Stems as an additional activity.  I use this task as my Pre and Post tests.  I often create the Pre and Post Tests on Edmodo which the kids love!  Check out my previous post to find out more about Edmodo (basically a Facebook for education).

Vocabulary Carryover:

• I pick a few different tasks for the students at the end of Day 3 to promote carryover.

I hope this all makes sense! Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback!

Robust Vocabulary Instruction of Tier Two Words: The Facts

During my first year as an SLP, I didn't really know exactly how I wanted to teach vocabulary.  I tried doing a Word of the Day, having students write down words and definitions in a notebook, pre-teaching curriculum vocabulary, teaching prefixes, suffixes, and root words, and many others.  I kept switching around because I didn't feel like any of those approaches were really helping the students in the long run.  They were just a temporary bandage.  The kids rarely used the words outside of my lesson since it was just a quick memorization task basically and then they could forget about it.  I wanted something that was engaging and that would truly enhance their spoken communication outside of the therapy room.

I researched a bunch of different methods/books and finally landed on 'Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction' by Beck, McKeown, and Kucan.   I barely got past the first chapter and was already hooked!  *I bought the first edition but apparently now there's a second edition!  Get it HERE.

Here is the little book description blurb from Amazon.com:

Hundreds of thousands of teachers have used this highly practical guide to help K-12 students enlarge their vocabulary and get involved in noticing, understanding, and using new words. Grounded in research, the book explains how to select words for instruction, introduce their meanings, and create engaging learning activities that promote both word knowledge and reading comprehension. The authors are trusted experts who draw on extensive experience in diverse classrooms and schools. Sample lessons and vignettes, children's literature suggestions, end-of-chapter summaries, and "Your Turn" learning activities enhance the book's utility as a classroom resource, professional development tool, or course text.

I loved this book so much that I wanted more examples and information so I went and purchased their next book 'Creating Robust Vocabulary: Frequently Asked Questions & Extended Examples.'  Check it out HERE.  This one is even more helpful than the first as it provides a ton more details and examples!!  If you want my honest opinion, you can skip the first book and go right to the Extended Examples one.  It provides a nice little review so you can really get all the info you need out of that book alone :)

What are Tier Two vocabulary words you ask?  Well I will start by defining Tier One and Tier Three...

• Tier One words:  everyday, basic, familiar words

• Tier Three words:  words that are very rare and ones that are domain specific (i.e. science, social studies vocabulary)

So now you can slide Tier Two words right in between those two and you get, according to Beck, words that are more sophisticated than the basic set but of high utility for literate language users.  Students are less likely to run into Tier Two words in everyday oral language therefore learning these words comes primarily from interaction with books. Tier One words occur in everyday conversation and meanings are more easily implied based on intonation, gestures, body language, etc.  Tier Three words are more specific and aren't used often in daily language. So the main take-away message regarding tiers is that they do not necessarily correspond to words that are hard, harder, and hardest but instead the role they play in language.

Here is the basic outline they propose for a 5-day robust instruction cycle:

Day One:  Selection is read and discussed.  Pull out some words that are necessary to overall understanding and BRIEFLY clarify them during the reading or before reading.  Key word there is BRIEFLY because stopping frequently during the read-a-loud hinders comprehension.

Day Two:  Introduce each word (pick approx 4-7 words) by providing the following information:

• the context in which the word appeared in the story
• a student-friendly definition (www.COBUILD.com)
• an additional context the word might be found
• an opportunity for students to interact with the word

Day Three:  Ask the students to respond to related questions (1 question per word) using the target words (e.g. Would someone show fear or joy if they saw something ominous?).  Then have students create a list based on brainstorming about the words (e.g. Describe some ominous situations).

Day Four:  Ask students to match targeted words with related comments (e.g. "That sounded like the wind is getting wilder").  Ask students to complete sentence stems (e.g. An ominous sight in a forest might be seeing...).  Have students think about vocabulary words outside of the classroom with different activities (i.e. Have students find an ominous situation in a TV show they're watching or a book they're reading).

Day Five:  Review of vocabulary words and assessment.  They propose assessing student knowledge in either a True/False format or Completing Sentences to truly find out their understanding of the words.  So basically more sentence stems.

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I will give you a little time to digest all of this information and then I will do another post on how I have modified the approach to work for me!  This approach is geared toward regular classrooms that have 5 consecutive days to do this and obviously we don't have that kind of time!  So with some little adjustments I have been able to make it work for my 30 minute pull-out sessions.  I mean not all of those things crammed into one session, but spread out amongst a few sessions using different methods to speed some things up.

Does anyone else use this method? Have you heard of it before?