World History T eachers S ummer I nstitute - 2012

1. World History Teachers Summer Institute - 2012 The Challenge of Vocabulary

2. Why Vocabulary? Isn’t this the English/Language Arts Teacher’s job? • Vocabulary is the great discriminator in our school system. • From the third through the ninth grade a student will encounter 88,600 word types. • The language of books is so different in vocabulary, sentence structure, and communication that it is like a second (or third) language for our students.

3. What Sisyphus can teach us about vocabulary: Vocabulary is not a skill that can be checked off as complete. Ever. The depth of word meaning “dictates” that the nature of vocabulary is incremental.

4. Our job is huge! Isabel Beck’s 3 Tiers of Vocabulary: • Tier 1: Everyday vocabulary • car, desk, book, laws. • Tier 2: General academic vocabulary • poverty, relegated, substantial, esoteric. • Tier 3: Content vocabulary • bourgeoisie, Taiping Rebellion, imperialism, migration.

5. So, how do we decide which words to teach?

6. Labels and Concepts • If an unfamiliar word can be introduced as a new label for a familiar concept it can be taught quickly. • Officials: people who worked for the government • Policies: rules and laws • Choose to teach labels that are most essential to the comprehension of the passage. • Avoid pre-teaching a long list of words prior to reading.

7. Teaching a New Concept • Students need to be given multiple examples of a new concept. • Colonial rule • Modernize/modernizing • Students should have repeated exposure to the new concept in a variety of meaningful contexts. • Direct instruction with specific examples • Attach the word or phrase to a related concept like Colonial America. • Students write and speak the word or phrase • Write five sentences describing a modernized classroom. • Graphic organizer

8. 4 Square Vocabulary or Frayer Model

9. If our students know less, they remember less and care less… Thus, lack of interest is a result, not a cause.