Welcome (or welcome back) to another installment of my series on teaching vocabulary to gifted students. In previous posts, I wrote about steps to take before staring vocabulary instruction, including assessing what students already know using a quick and easy self-ratings scale. Next, I wrote about strategies for introducing new words and putting a gifted twist on vocabulary instruction. The whole reason I started researching best practices in vocabulary started when I realized a few things. One, I had gifted students to teach and it was obvious that the regular, run-of-the-mill vocabulary materials handed to me by the district would not be sufficient. Two, had the curriculum been challenging enough for my students, I found it dreadfully boring. If I found it boring, my students would have positively died. And I'm not into creating that kind of emergency in my classroom. And three, I knew the importance of vocabulary instruction and it's far-reaching effects, so it was something I felt I couldn't afford to get wrong. Thus began my own journey into deeper learning so that I could really make an impact in our classroom, while also injecting some FUN! This post goes into a little more depth on the components of quality vocabulary instruction, as well as some of the activities that I used with students to engage them in meaningful word learning and purposeful practice. Just as a quick reminder, a child's vocabulary is a huuuuuuge predictor of academic success in ALL areas. What the Research Says One of the best-known researchers in the field of vocabulary instruction is Robert Marzano. In his studies, he found six key steps were the key to better vocabulary instruction. The first three steps are done with the help of the teacher: Teachers should give students an example, description, and/or explanation of the new term. Students need to restate the explanation, description, or example using their own language. Students should construct a picture, pictograph, or symbolic representation of the term. (If you hop back to my previous blog post, you will find a free download of a graphic organizer on which students can engage in steps two and three). 4. Periodically, students should engage in activities that help them add to their knowledge of the terms in their vocabulary notebooks. 5. Students should be asked to discuss the terms with one another sometimes. 6. Students are periodically involved in playing games that enable them to play with terms. In studies conducted with classrooms using these strategies, it became clear that when teachers engaged their students in alllll of these six practices, students usually showed significant gains in vocabulary learning. Other well-known vocabulary researchers, Dr. Kate Kinsella and Dr. Kevin Feldman, point out three things that don't work in their article, Narrowing the Language Gap: The Case for Explicit Vocabulary Instruction: "looking up words in the dictionary, using written context to determine word meaning, unplanned, extemporaneous vocabulary teaching." Instead, teachers should focus on four important ideas: wide reading, direct teaching of important individual words, teaching word learning strategies, and fostering word conscientiousness through various activities that encourage language play, and choice in writing (Graves, 2000) and (Nagy and Scott, 2000). My General Flow of Vocabulary Instruction and Assessment Now that I've shown you some research, and told you a little about how I preassess and introduce the words, as well as how I accommodate gifted learners, I'm thinking you might be curious about how it all fit together for me. A typical vocabulary cycle flows like this for me: Pre-test students on new words by having students complete a self-ratings-scale prior to starting a new list Introduction of new words. If they already know any of the words well enough to define and use in a sentence, they don’t have to study those words. You can find more about how I pre-assess for vocabulary in this blog post. Students add their words to our “Map It Out” cards. We discuss the definitions of the vocabulary words together. Students continue to work on these throughout the entire cycle, starting with the synonyms and antonyms (you can even do this part together) and reserving the sentence writing portion until near the end. The “Map It Out” cards are great for students to keep with them when they are working on the other learning activities throughout the cycle, too! They can always go back to the cards and add to or revise them as they learn more about their words. You can read more about introducing the words and find a free download of the Map It Out cards here. Students add their words to a catalog or make word wall cards for each root or affix. The “Map It Out” cards themselves are sized to fit on a 5 x 7 notecard or in a composition notebook. I like students to keep a record of all of their words for the year to use for reference and as evidence of all the learning they’ve accomplished! Students choose one to three (or more) learning activities (like the ones outlined below) to complete. *The number of activities chosen should be a reflection of how much time students have and the number of activities you think each student needs. Gifted students may require much less repetition than “typical” peers or students with other learning differences so the activities that go more in-depth may be a better fit for them!* Use a quick-check strategy every couple of days to measure progress on learning. I do not use this as a graded quiz. It is meant to be a low-stakes, low-risk tool that students can use to quiz themselves as they are progressing toward mastery. This is a research-based strategy that has been shown to increase retention. Assess student learning following the completion of the activities. This cycle is flexible, but I found it generally took about 7 school days to get everything accomplished. Yours might take more or less time, depending on how much class time you can dedicate to it, and of course, on your students' needs. How I Encouraged Word Play in My Classroom While I definitely engaged students in the super important pre-assessment and direct instruction activities, my FAVORITE part of the vocabulary learning process was definitely allowing students to engage in different activities that helped students achieve deep learning and understanding of their words. This was definitely the part my students enjoyed the most, too. I'll outline a few of my favorite activities here, and maybe even provide a *free* download for you at the end. "WordTube" This activity is a play on the popular YouTube website. Students write each assigned vocabulary word and draw a picture of it on a “WordTube” screen. Then they use the “Up Next” boxes to write the part of speech, identify the roots/affixes contained in the word or the origin if the word does not appear to have Greek or Latin roots or any affixes, and define the word. Students should paraphrase the definition, as this strategy requires more critical thinking and will ultimately help them remember the meaning of the words better. Word Analogies Students create their own analogies for vocabulary words. Creating and using analogies when learning new material is a research-based strategy that requires students to have a deeper understanding of vocabulary words, activates prior knowledge, and helps students bridge the gap between their schema and new learning. There are two ways students can use this strategy-- students can create their own analogies for vocabulary words and complete the entire analogy. Or, students can create partial analogies that they can trade with a partner to solve. For this option, they must also make up an answer key (I suggest they create the answer key first). You'll want to be sure to teach children the different kinds of relationships you can create with analogies--for example, analogies can show part to whole relationships, the can reflect synonyms, antonyms, time sequences, increasing or decreasing intensity, etc. Shades of Meaning For this activity, students generate semantic gradients for their vocabulary words. This requires them to think of or find words that are semantically similar to their vocabulary words and then to arrange the words in order. This activity helps students make meaningful connections between words they already know and their new term. There are, again, two variations of this activity that are fun and useful. For one variation, students would either think of, find (or be provided with) a list of synonyms that align with the original vocabulary word. They would then arrange the terms in order from the strongest expression of the term to words that express the term to a lesser degree. For the second variation of the activity, students think of or look up 5 synonyms and 5 antonyms for the vocabulary word. They place the vocabulary term in the center of the continuum and then arrange the synonyms and antonyms so that they get stronger as they move away from the center. When students are finished, they should discuss with someone why they chose to put their words in order. They could write their rationale instead if no-one is available to discuss. I like to allow students access to both options because some terms don’t really have opposites. Further, I always allow some flexibility with the number of synonyms and antonyms students have to find, as some words—particularly words from content area studies—don’t have many synonyms or antonyms. Also, since these are fairly subjective and there is lots of “grey” area in terms of how the words are arranged, grading these should either be avoided, aside from completion, or rely heavily on the child’s explanations. I highly suggest this activity be completed with pairs or small groups of children to encourage the rich conversations that can occur as they are determining the order in which to place the words. Making Connections Making connections between words really encourages students to think deeply about the meaning of words, and how they relate to other words. This activity is well-suited for small groups of students, as well as the entire class at once if you’re all studying the same words at the same time. Students are each assigned one or two unique words, and then they spend time interacting with others in an effort to find a word that they feel connects with their words. Eventually, students settle on a connection or match. Then, students explain either in writing, to the class, or just to the rest of their group members how their terms are connected. You will want to spend some time with your students discussing the difference between surface-level and deeper connections. For example, students need to look past words having the same number of letters, starting or ending with the same letters or sounds, being in the same chapter in their science book, etc. The activity (and related research) suggest that making deeper connections between words and concepts are really what will help cement the vocabulary into children’s learning, creating long-lasting, authentic learning experiences. Interview a Word This activity is great for helping deepen students’ understanding of words and their possible connotations. One student “becomes” one of the words, and the other student is the interviewer. It is fun to encourage the “words” to show their personality and act as though they were truly embodying their word. My students really enjoy acting things out like this! I suggest doing this activity in pairs or small groups, however, if a child is working independently, he or she can just write down the answers to the interview questions on paper instead of posing the questions for someone else to answer. For this activity, you may find it useful to allow students access to websites such as visualthesaurus.com and www.etymonline.com so they can research some possible answers to the interview questions. As a fun aside, having students make and wear nametags for this activity is a fun way to boost engagement! Create a Menu Students get full creative license over designing a menu for a new restaurant and using their vocabulary words in the descriptions. Students start by deciding on a theme and name for the restaurant. Then they decide the names of dishes to include on the menu, all fitting in with the designated theme. Next, students use all of their vocabulary words to create a restaurant menu. In my opinion, it is not necessary that each menu item use a vocabulary word, as long as they have managed to include all of their words on the menu somehow, using them properly in context. Creating a themed restaurant and sticking to only including dishes that fit the theme definitely requires higher level thinking skills. If you find this to be too challenging for some of your students, you could allow them to include dishes on the menu that do not fit into a particular theme, as long as they are still using their vocabulary words to write the descriptions. If you want to take this to the next level, you could do something like have students design and create an actual (miniature) restaurant storefront, or allow students time to visit each other’s restaurants and “order” something off of the menu. Sound like fun? There are SO many other great ideas for helping your students engage independently with their vocabulary word study. I put three of the above ideas together for you in a free exclusive download if you're ready to give them a try. This freebie is available ONLY to my subscribers and can be found among many other free resources in my free resource library. Click the image below to gain access to your free copy! *Just to be clear, by clicking to get these freebies (and instant access to the growing collection of free resources in my library of subscriber exclusives), you're also agreeing to be added to my email list, where I'll send occasional messages with fresh ideas, tips, and other resources straight to your inbox. You can unsubscribe at any time.* If you're ready to save TONS of time, you can find these three activities and many more in my store by clicking on the images below. So far, I have FIVE separate volumes of nine activities created and ready to download and print. Each volume includes a table of contents and full-page student-friendly directions for each of the activities. They also include a choice menu for each volume, which allows students to make choices about which activities they work on to learn their vocabulary words each week. It is also a good tool to track completion of menu options depending on how long or how many options you allow students to complete. All three volumes also include a rubric, the "Map It Out" graphic organizer and nine vocabulary activities that can be used with any of your own vocabulary lists. Each volume of my Word Study Activities also has one or two FREE bonuses, from a formative assessment tool to a student activity proposal form to a pre-assessment and self-ratings scale. I also bundled these activities together for big savings. You'll get all five volumes (45 activities!) and the corresponding bonus resources for the price of four volumes! If students complete one different activity a week, there are enough activities in the pack to last the entire year (or longer)! You can access the bundle by clicking the picture below. Let me know if you have any questions! I love hearing from my readers!
Root words, Suffixes/Prefixes Bell Ringers are the perfect and super quick way to teach your middle school students this important ELA skill.
Are you looking for ways to improve your upper elementary word study or spelling routine this year? You've hit the jackpot! See how I organize and schedule my word study block and routine, differentiate for all levels of spellers, what word study activities have proved successful with students, and
Download FREE Words Their Way word study activities and resources for upper elementary. The activities, resources, tips, and more included in this blog post will help you get your word study routines and schedule ready and organized!
FREE Word Study Activity for Upper Elementary! Read this post to learn about a word study activity that is perfect for 4th and 5th graders.
This post shares how I teach word study and spelling words in my 5th grade classroom. This word study "program" works well in upper elementary grades.
Are you looking for ways to improve your upper elementary word study or spelling routine this year? You've hit the jackpot! See how I organize and schedule my word study block and routine, differentiate for all levels of spellers, what word study activities have proved successful with students, and
I have always struggled with spelling, and how to engage students in meaningful activities to practice their spelling words! I have tried just about everything under the sun, from rotating through teacher-selected word work centers, to a free choice spelling menu where students try to complete different activities throughout the week. Nothing seemed to work!
Take your word work reading center to the next level with these low prep and engaging word work centers! Plus, learn how to organize and run the word work center!
Are you interested in getting your upper elementary students to spell more words correctly, understand the meaning behind more words and read more words independently? If so....then code based instruction must continue in the classroom. What is code based instruction?? This is when students are taught phonics skills in an explicit and specific sequence. Research tells us, code based instruction is the most effective way to teach students to read and spell. If a student is taught using this approach they will have the skills needed to apply learned patterns when spelling or encountering the unknown word in text. According to international literacy expert and co-author of LETRS, Dr. Carol Tolman, orthographic learning should continue beyond phonics concepts into morphology and etymology. Morphology is the study of morphemes. Morphemes are units of meaning in language (i.e. prefixes, suffixes and root words). Etymology is study of the historical development of words (i.e. identifying if the morpheme is of Greek, Latin or Anglo Saxon origin). Typically instruction on morphemes and etymology would happen at the end of third grade progressing into middle school and beyond, although younger students can easily learn basic morphemes. Dr. Tolman uses the hourglass figure below to clearly illustrate the multiple layers of direct instruction teachers should provide, progressing from phonological skills all the way into etymology. The video is about 20 minutes in length, but well worth the watch if you want to learn more about all of the layers. There is a sort of natural progression of instruction with morphemes. You will notice the progression goes from easier to understand to more difficult concepts that require background knowledge. One might first start with Anglo Saxon and Latin compounds which are free morphemes. A free morpheme is a morpheme that can stand alone and have meaning (i.e. dog and house alone mean one thing, but combined make doghouse, which means something else). Compounds are a great introduction to illustrate word chunks are meaningful. Next, one might progress to inflectional morphemes. Inflectional morphemes change what a word does, but doesn't change its meaning (i.e. ing, ed, etc.). Then, one might progress to irregular past tense plurals (i.e. catches, catch and caught). After that, one might teach common prefixes (un, re, pre, etc.) and then move to less common prefixes (macro, mono, fore, etc.) Next, one might instruct on derivational suffixes, which are suffixes that make a word change a grammar class. For example this means a word can go from being a noun (ex: pore) to being an adjective (ex: porous) by adding a derivational suffix (in this cause -ous). Finally one might teach Greek and Latin roots. Greek roots are not as common as Latin roots and are more scientific and technical. After a prefix, suffix or root word is explicitly taught there needs to be multiple exposures and chances to engage with the learned morpheme. Some great ways to further explore taught morphemes are by creating word webs, thinking of a visual or action that represents the morpheme, word hunts, graphic organizers, cloze activities or playing games. Ready to better instruct on morphology? Prefix, suffix and root word graphic organizers are a great way to deepen understanding of morphemes! Send me morphology graphic organizers!! We respect your privacy. Unsubscribe at any time. Powered By ConvertKit > Bottom line--the more students understand about the structure of words, the better they will be at reading them independently, understanding their meaning and how to correctly spell.
Ideas and resources for independent word work centers in grades 2-4.
I'm sharing 12 FREE, NO PREP, customizable Spelling Activities perfect for K-2 students and details about my Year-long, Weekly Word Study Units for K-3!
Do you have students who struggle when they encounter long words when reading? Use this process described in this blog post to help your struggling readers learn to decode multi-syllable words correctly and independently!
I am feeling really lucky this year. I have the kind of class that tries everything you throw at them, and does it with gusto. Like when one of my students who visits our ESL teacher came back to class with a little notebook and explained that he was trying to find awesome and interesting […]
This post shares how I teach word study and spelling words in my 5th grade classroom. This word study "program" works well in upper elementary grades.
When I was planning word work for my kiddos, I was struggling to find things that were upper elementary. I wanted students to practice their vocabulary words while thinking and analyzing each word. My other goal was to have my students completely independent. I have learned that to create completely independent children in daily 5 ... Read More about Word Work for Upper Elementary
Looking for new ideas to perk up your Daily 5 Word Work? This post is filled with fresh ideas!
I have a confession to make…Planning for word study is one of my superpowers. I like to think about it, I like to talk about it, I like to create activities to help students improve their word study and spelling abilities. You probably don’t want to hear about my dreams of gameboards at night, but I
Looking for an engaging way to teach upper elementary students word work skills? Look no further than A Teacher's Wonderland Word Work for 5th Grade!
Erin Beers from Mrs. Beers' Language Arts Classroom here, and I am thrilled to be guest blogging at Fifth in the Middle today! I am a 6th grade language arts and reading teacher. As you prepare your upper elementary classroom and begin your planning, I wanted to share some ideas for implementing the Daily 5 into your teaching. The Daily 5 turned Daily 4 was a huge undertaking in my 6th grade classroom, so I wanted to share some tips and tricks as you begin the year in your upper elementary classroom. My focus for my 110 minutes of instructional time is word work, writing, read to someone, and read to self. Before you get the idea that all of these tasks were happening each and every day and in seamless fashion, don't fret, they weren't! I realized that each had a place and I needed to find that spot in the day/week in order to make the schedule work for my students, the demands of testing, and the expectation of administration. Here is how it worked best for my students and me. Word Work was the easiest component to incorporate because I begin every day/class with a morning starter/bell ringer. Three different tools for this are: Word of the Day, Boggle, and the spelling component from Reading Street. A huge weakness for my students is vocabulary, therefore having it in three different formats has proven invaluable. The BOGGLE Board was an enrichment activity that students could work on any time they finished classroom work. I change the letters on the board weekly, they could grab a new sheet from the board, and turn in on Friday. Some of my students AMAZED me with the words they found. For those that love puzzles and word searches, this is a classroom must-have. My Word of the Day resource is something I created to meet the needs of my students. I was unable to find a vocabulary resource that I could utilize in only minutes per day. In addition, my students STRUGGLE with identifying synonyms, antonyms, prefixes, suffixes, and roots, so this was created to enhance their understanding. Twice a week the word would be posted on the MIMIO or Smart board, and my students record the definition, identify any synonyms, antonyms, affixes, create a picture of the word, and use it in a sentence. Word of the Day organizer for daily student word work in minutes a day. The spelling component of Reading Street is my other word work source. On Monday we would go over the rule of the list, define the words using context clues as a whole class, and my students write the words 5X each. That may sound a bit dated, but the only practice my students get with these words is in the classroom. Studying at home is a challenge for the majority, so I need to make sure their understanding and grasping of words truly takes place in the classroom. On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday we will do different word games and activities with the spelling list words, so that by Friday, spelling test day, they are prepared, and can not only spell the words correctly, but incorporate them into their writing pieces and written responses. A fast-paced game of spelling word concentration in action! Writing is done in multiple ways in my upper elementary classroom through written responses to reading, Photo of the Day writing, end of novel projects, and general writing instruction. Drafting and publishing! This tool is an example of how I teach essay writing. Click the image to download this FREEBIE. I try to engage my students in writing as often as possible with high-interest topics and prompts, but they need continuous work organizing their thoughts and articulating them clearly on paper. Read to Someone is done daily in my classroom. One method is through partner reading novels or mentor texts, but another tool I utilize is a modified version of 6-Minute Solutions, which is a fluency tool that is a necessity for 90% of my 6th graders. Because students at the 6th grade level should be reading grade level text at a rate of 120-150 per correct per minute, and many of my students are not quite there, I have to incorporate fluency practice into my instructional time. Here is how it works: I pair up students based on their fluency rates, each student is given a reading passage at their current reading level that is marked with the number of words. Before the first person reads, the students exchange texts, the student on the left (the stronger reader) always reads first for one minute, which I time, data is recorded (number of words read in the minute minus any miscues), and then repeat with the reader on the right. The passage is read Monday-Friday with a fluency partner, and then on Friday, I progress monitor each student for the 6th read. I keep this data in order to keep students, parents, and administrators aware of student progress. If you are looking for a tool to enhance speed of reading, this is a great one. Read to Self is another daily component. We are always reading a novel or navigating a reading selection to enhance our knowledge of reading literature or informational text. While I will instruct or work with reading groups for a period of time each day, students will also be given designated time for read to self. I can't say it is a period that we build stamina for, instead it is a time students are allotted daily. When they have completed reading that is assigned during class, my students have the opportunity to read their library books or magazines, books, or other texts from around the classroom. Struggles in implementing the Daily 4. I have to be honest and share that this is still a work in progress. Every day can present a new challenge and I have more to learn. The two components that I need to re-evaluate are: Book box organization due to the need for 65 books boxes Allowing students to choose the focus of learning without me directing them I would love to hear how you manage these components in your upper elementary classroom.
Get details about my SoR-aligned, NO PREP, weekly Word Study Units for kindergarten, first, second and third-grade students.
Anchor chart inspiration for elementary teachers. Use my Not-So-Pinteresty Anchor Charts for Reading, Math, Grammar, and Writing.
I am linking up with Schroeder Shenanigans in 2nd and Lucky Little Learners for this month's #2getherwearebetter. Today we are talking all things bulletin boards. Now, if keeping bulletin boards fresh and exciting doesn't come easy to you - don't worry - you are not alone! I am not a fan of constantly changing my bulletin boards, but, I don't want to keep the same thing up all year long either. So, here are a few of my tips for making life easier on you when it comes to bulleting boards. Set-Up - When you start the beginning of the year, get your boards ready with a background that you can use all year long. I suggest using fabric or better yet, sheets from Wal-Mart. I used the Wal-Mart sheets and it was under $5. The first time I put them up, I ironed them, but this year, I left them up at the end of the school year, and I am leaving them as is. Because really, who has time for that at the beginning of the year?!? I also like to layer two different types of borders to give it some extra oomph. I have also used ribbons and scrunched up tissue paper as borders. Make Your Bulletin Boards Useful & Interactive- I like to have at least one bulletin board that we add pieces to throughout the year. Above is a picture of my BIG KIDS word wall, which focuses on prefixes, suffixes, vocabulary, spelling rules, and root words. Right up my 4th graders alley. I will start the year with just the headings up, and we will add each piece as we learn it. You can find this Word Wall for Upper Elementary Kids here. Calendar Walls and Daily 5/CRAFT/CAFE walls are also some other ideas of bulletin boards you can add to. Anchor Charts- The other way that I like to change out my bulletin boards is by hanging anchor charts to them. You can see a few of our Writer's Workshop anchor charts on the wall behind this lovely birthday girl. Before you go, head on over to our giveaway page to enter our current giveaway! Every week one lucky winner gets a $25 Teachers pay Teachers gift card! I hope you have garnered a few ideas for keeping it simple when it comes to bulletin boards. If you have any other great ideas, please share in the comments below! Then head on over to read some of the other great ideas from other bloggers here.
Take the guess work out of spelling practice. This resource includes spelling pages to use with any spelling list. These activities are easy-to-prep, FUN for students, and provide additional practice for studying spelling words each week! Activities Included: Spelling Comic Strip Spelling Scrabble Spelling Messages Spelling Fractions Make Your Own Word Search Spelling Sketches Ten Tongue Twisters Spelling Scramble Spelling Pyramid Spelling Staircase Parts of Speech 8 Great Sentences Uppercase & Lowercase Spelling in Color Vowels & Consonants Spelling Sort Synonyms & Antonyms Silly Sentences Spelling Rhymes Spelling Syllables Cursive Spelling Spelling Patterns Spelling Stories Forward & Backward Spelling Rainbows **Perfect for Word Work, Homework, Classwork, & Literacy Centers!! Please feel free to email me at [email protected] with any questions or comments!
Word work activities for ANY words! Word work is an essential part of language learning in the primary grades. Make word work FUN while LEARNING takes place! There are seventeen different word work activities included in this pack. They can be used for absolutely ANY word learning! Perfect for literacy centers or sub plans. A must have for Kindergarten- Third Grade! #wordwork #wordworkactivities #spelling #1stgrade #2ndgrade #kindergarten
Word work is a great way to get students working with words in engaging ways. Learn new word work activities that you can use to engage your students.
Download FREE Words Their Way word study activities and resources for upper elementary. The activities, resources, tips, and more included in this blog post will help you get your word study routines and schedule ready and organized!
Students love playing games and solving puzzles. With these vocabulary activities, students won't even realize how much they are learning.
Engaging word work activities for upper elementary grades can be hard to find. On this post, I will share three free word work activities to use with Jenga
Are you interested in getting your upper elementary students to spell more words correctly, understand the meaning behind more words and read more words independently? If so....then code based instruction must continue in the classroom. What is code based instruction?? This is when students are taught phonics skills in an explicit and specific sequence. Research tells us, code based instruction is the most effective way to teach students to read and spell. If a student is taught using this approach they will have the skills needed to apply learned patterns when spelling or encountering the unknown word in text. According to international literacy expert and co-author of LETRS, Dr. Carol Tolman, orthographic learning should continue beyond phonics concepts into morphology and etymology. Morphology is the study of morphemes. Morphemes are units of meaning in language (i.e. prefixes, suffixes and root words). Etymology is study of the historical development of words (i.e. identifying if the morpheme is of Greek, Latin or Anglo Saxon origin). Typically instruction on morphemes and etymology would happen at the end of third grade progressing into middle school and beyond, although younger students can easily learn basic morphemes. Dr. Tolman uses the hourglass figure below to clearly illustrate the multiple layers of direct instruction teachers should provide, progressing from phonological skills all the way into etymology. The video is about 20 minutes in length, but well worth the watch if you want to learn more about all of the layers. There is a sort of natural progression of instruction with morphemes. You will notice the progression goes from easier to understand to more difficult concepts that require background knowledge. One might first start with Anglo Saxon and Latin compounds which are free morphemes. A free morpheme is a morpheme that can stand alone and have meaning (i.e. dog and house alone mean one thing, but combined make doghouse, which means something else). Compounds are a great introduction to illustrate word chunks are meaningful. Next, one might progress to inflectional morphemes. Inflectional morphemes change what a word does, but doesn't change its meaning (i.e. ing, ed, etc.). Then, one might progress to irregular past tense plurals (i.e. catches, catch and caught). After that, one might teach common prefixes (un, re, pre, etc.) and then move to less common prefixes (macro, mono, fore, etc.) Next, one might instruct on derivational suffixes, which are suffixes that make a word change a grammar class. For example this means a word can go from being a noun (ex: pore) to being an adjective (ex: porous) by adding a derivational suffix (in this cause -ous). Finally one might teach Greek and Latin roots. Greek roots are not as common as Latin roots and are more scientific and technical. After a prefix, suffix or root word is explicitly taught there needs to be multiple exposures and chances to engage with the learned morpheme. Some great ways to further explore taught morphemes are by creating word webs, thinking of a visual or action that represents the morpheme, word hunts, graphic organizers, cloze activities or playing games. Ready to better instruct on morphology? Prefix, suffix and root word graphic organizers are a great way to deepen understanding of morphemes! Send me morphology graphic organizers!! We respect your privacy. Unsubscribe at any time. Powered By ConvertKit > Bottom line--the more students understand about the structure of words, the better they will be at reading them independently, understanding their meaning and how to correctly spell.
So I came up with some fun ELA Word Work ideas that my students LOVE. You can use a special space in your classroom, "Word Work Station," or you can just allow students to work at their desk to complete these different activities. Take a peek at these fun ideas to make spelling words F-U-N!
Word morphology activities are great ways to boost vocabulary and decoding skills of primary grade readers!
Learning while playing games is an effective way for engaging the students with learning materials. Wordsearch has this role when it comes to kids learning.
This post features literacy center ideas and printables for 4th-grade classrooms. It includes reading centers for fourth grade.
Morphology walls are a great tool in 4th and 5th grade classrooms! Read more and sign up for free posters to make your own morphology wall!
So I came up with some fun ELA Word Work ideas that my students LOVE. You can use a special space in your classroom, "Word Work Station," or you can just allow students to work at their desk to complete these different activities. Take a peek at these fun ideas to make spelling words F-U-N!
Grab all these resources HERE! Several years ago, I started digging into Greek and Latin roots and how they can make such a HUGE difference in students’ academic lives. Seriously. Understanding words by applying their knowledge of roots has been a game changer with spelling, comprehension, and vocabulary development. Over time, I created pieces and ... Read More about Greek and Latin Roots in Upper Grade
A fun and engaing, problem solving spelling word game. No prep - simply print and play to learn. Use with any spelling word list.
Engage your upper elementary students in working with words and sounds with these 5 fun word work activities.
Today, a Work on Words topic that I am extremely passionate about... Small Groups! The question I have been asked the most over the yea...
Having a wide vocabulary is a huge part of what helps students to be successful in both reading comprehension and writing. This is why vocabulary is one of the National Reading Panel’s five core elements
Today I’m sharing more details about my word study schedule and how I make it run more smoothly. If you didn't catch the previous post about my 7, 8, or 9 day word study routine and the word study activities I include, you may want to visit that post first before reading about how I set up my sche
Old school memorization of spelling words and regurgitation on spelling tests is no longer the only way spelling is taught in schools. Teaching students the why and practicing word work and spellin…
When I was planning word work for my kiddos, I was struggling to find things that were upper elementary. I wanted students to practice their vocabulary words while thinking and analyzing each word. My other goal was to have my students completely independent. I have learned that to create completely independent children in daily 5 you need to have it overly organized and teach them well.
Ideas and resources for independent word work centers in grades 2-4.
