Vocabulary Instruction

Vocabulary instruction is extremely important in the classroom.  I personally feel like I do an o.k. job at it, but know there is a lot of room for improvement.  About 1/3 of my class are ESL (English as a Second Language) students, and these kids need it probably more than the others.  My graduate class textbook (see reference below) gives us several strategies to use to help build a student's vocabulary.  I already use some of them, but others are a little advanced for my first graders, and especially for the ones that need this sort of instruction.

The overall main thing that a person needs to do to gain vocabulary is to read, and most importantly, independently.  As a teacher, it is important for me to be reading everyday to the whole class, because this exposure can also help each student increase their amount of vocabulary. No matter if my students are in whole group or small group instruction,  it is imperative that I front-load them with important words in the text that they will read/hear. If they already have a sense of the difficult word, it will be easier to comprehend what is happening in the text if they hear it before.  The more advanced reader we are, the more vocabulary we have. This should not come as a surprise . . . so lets get everyone reading!!!

Some good activities that I do in my class to help increase my students' vocabulary are: word wall writing (practice words on a white board), word posters (write a word and illustrate it; write a sentence with the word in it), dramatizing words (acting out a word and having another student guess the word), and word sorts (grouping words that are alike; could be by the ending like -ing, or the beginning sound like ch-). I take some of these activities and also make them into board games.  The students really enjoy when they get to play a game, and little do they know they are also learning at the same time!  These activities seem to work well in my classroom, but as I said before, I am always looking for more, successful ways, to increase vocabulary instruction.  Do you have any activities???

Tompkins, G.E. (2010). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Motivation Continued . . .

Last time, I commented on motivation and how important it was to have in the classroom. This week, I read a couple of research articles that had me thinking even more about it. One of the articles wanted to see if early reading failure in students decreased their reading motivation, over time. To me, I thought that was a simple enough answer . .  . yes. How can a child that is struggling to read be motivated and excited about something they fail to do?  After reading the results, the study actually found that it had more to do with their motivation to begin with, that resulted in their motivation over time. Regardless if the child was a strong reader or not, if they were motivated at a young age, they were more likely to be motivated a few years later, and vice-versa. So the big question now is, how do we get ALL children motivated to read at a young age?

As a first grade teacher, I have students at both ends of the reading level spectrum. I have a couple that came in not knowing all their kindergarten words and reading at the Reading Behavior level (knowing their concepts of print, but not really being able to “read”). On the other hand, I have students reading at the end of a second grade level.  With my lowest level students, I needed to find ways to get them up to grade level. We have done drill sandwiches with their kindergarten words, and practiced writing the words repeatedly, which has helped immensely.  They know that when they get all of the words correct, they earn stickers.  These students worked very hard, and after two weeks of hard drilling, they now know all of their words they should have learned last year. The next step is to get them reading texts, at a first grade level. The early levels of reading in first grade are still working on high frequency words, but from the first grade curriculum. Drill sandwiches, boardgames, word sorts that start to work on endings and blends, etc., will be the motivational piece to get them to increase their reading level. They understand that this is important, because there are many exciting books to choose from, especially the higher up you go. For me, I believe I can motivate my readers, because there are many activities that are fun, but also instructional.  However, since the students can get bored easily, I am always looking for new drills, or activities to use with my class. 

What do you find to be the most useful in your classroom?

Motivation

A classmate this week brought in an article about motivation, and how important it is for students in their reading. Since I am also an athletic coach, I know how motivation is imperative to a human being in order to be successful.  Intrinsic and extrinsic are both important, but motivation in itself, is the main thing, no matter where it is coming from.

The article stated that there were "three main facets to fostering motivation in students." This would include interest, confidence, and dedication. I completely agree that there must be an interest to read, in order to help a student be more successful. Usually, I see the students that are in the lower levels are the ones who have the least interest, and vice-versa. If we can get all students to enjoy reading, no matter what level they are at, their level of reading will increase even faster. I also believe that confidence is crucial to a student. This area includes a student feeling safe in their environment and that they know they have teacher support.  I have always tried to have a very comfortable classroom environment, and I truly believe that my class feels comfortable with it, and with me. Although I agree that dedication is important, I believe this would be the least important of the three facets. Every once in a while, I will see a student that is not persistent in reading or doesn't do it as much as they need to, but they are still a strong/high level reader.  It is important for students to dedicate time to reading, but I believe that some people are just more "natural" readers and can still be successful, even with less time spent reading than another person. What do you think? I'm stumped, because I think it's important, but I don't necessarily think it can define or label a reader, and that they HAVE to be dedicated.

With all this talk about motivation, I must say that it cannot be done without teaching it.  I believe that all individuals needs to motivated, but they also need to know how and why.  It is important to have a positive well-being, and a strong self-efficacy almost always leads to success!

Reference: Cambria, J., Guthrie, J.T. (2010). Motivating and engaging students in reading. New England Reading Association Journal, 46(1), 16-28.

Phonics Say What?

Our reading (from our class textbook) this past week dealt with phonics.  Cue the music from Jaws as I write this (because of my fear of phonics).  It's a word that I haven't been comfortable with . . . A word that is like nails on a chalkboard . . . A word that makes me shut down (and believe me, that's hard to do!).  Do I think there is something wrong with phonics? No. Why do I not like the sound (pun intended) of it?  Because I was never taught phonics.  Yes, it's true, I am a teacher that never learned phonics.  That means that as I am teaching my students, I am learning along with them. As an early childhood student in California, I learned the whole word approach to reading.  I learned a word from what it looked like, not because I was able to "sound it out."  Unfortunately, this is very noticeable when I encounter a new word and I have no idea how to pronounce it.  Thank goodness for the internet and dictionary.com that pronounces words for you!  In my class, I teach phonics with certain strategies: word sorts, initial/ending sounds, blends, etc.  I find it helpful, in particular, for my students that have IEPs (individualized education plans) in speech/language and for my ESL students (English as a second language).

Although I have this negative relationship with phonics, I don't necessarily think it's unimportant.  There are many positive things about phonics that help us as readers.  There are rules to follow, that usually work.  But what happens when those rules don't work?  They confuse us!  Then you're not sure about how to read the new word.  Do I follow the rule? Is it the exception to the rule?  Who knows??? Better check dictionary.com . . . The other day I interviewed a colleague of mine, who has been working in education for almost 40 years.  She is currently in the role of a long-term substitute for our reading specialist (who is on maternity leave).  From her experience, she believes learning phonics by itself is useless.  If you learn phonics while working on comprehension, then it is worthwhile.  She was adamant about her feelings with phonics and how to teach it.  I think I'll spend some more time interviewing her about some strategies!

Is phonics necessary?  Did you learn phonics, or whole word, when you were young?  How do you implement it in your instruction?  Please help me . . .(Jaws music is continuing to play).