Transcript 2012-03-09 TESOL A Word about Vocabulary

A few Words about Academic
Vocabulary development
Mary Lou McCloskey
www.mlmcc.com
TESOL 2012
Philadelphia PA
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Academic Language is needed
to prepare learners for careers
and higher education.
• Social/interpersonal language can be acquired.
• Academic language must be learned especially for ELLS
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English isn’t spoken in the home
Often poverty influences opportunities
Parents may not have formal education
Learners may have interrupted education
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Developing Academic Language
Outline:
A
Teacher knowledge about vocabulary:
• What is vocabulary?
• What does it mean to know a word?
• What words should we learn?
B. Elements of a successful academic vocabulary program
C. Effective vocabulary teaching practices and strategies
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A. Knowledge about
vocabulary:
What is
vocabulary?
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Words (General Service List)
1 69975
2 39175
3 36432
4 28872
5 26800
6 26190
7 21338
8 20033
9 12458
10 11247
the
be
of
and
a
to
in
he
have
it
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12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
10790
9495
8555
8516
7289
7254
6976
6742
6164
5377
that
for
they
I
with
as
not
on
she
at
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Word families
BLACK
• blacker
• blackest
• blackly
• blacken
• blackness
• blacks
• blackish
HOPE
• hoped
• hopeful
• hopeless
• hopelessness
• hopes
• hoping
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Idioms
back seat driver
back to basics
back to square 1
baker's dozen
bad hair day
ball and chain
big apple
blind leading the blind
blue moon
blue sky
break a leg
brownie points
http://www.idiomsite.com/
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Phrasal verbs
call off
call on
calm down
catch on
catch up (with)
check in (to)
check off
check out (of)
check out
cheer up
chew out
chicken out
chip in
clam up
come across
come down with
come to
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http://www.eslcafe.com/pv/pv-list.html
What does it mean
to learn a word?
• Multiple meanings
mixing bowl, go bowling, bowled over, superbowl
• Multiple forms
cut, cuts, cutting, undercut, haircut, shortcut
• Collocations
(give/make) a suggestion (take/make) a telephone call
(do/make) an attempt (win/beat) a match
• Grammatical patterns an apple, some flour
• Constraints on use (register)
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Multiple meanings. Multiple forms, and Collocations of
Run
I hate it when my nose runs, because I
always run out of cold medicine and I have to
run out for more. Plus I run the risk of catching
pneumonia and I feel too run-down to go for
my daily run. One time I ran to the pharmacy in
my hybrid (you know it runs on both gasoline
and electricity -- and it really runs like a
charm!). I also needed to run by the office to
run off some copies. Anyway, it was raining so
hard the rain was running off the roof so my
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jacket got all wet in the rain and the colors ran.
Multiple meanings. Multiple forms, and Collocations of
Run
Then I tripped on the wet sidewalk (I really
think clumsiness runs in my family) and got a run
in my stocking and had to change it so I was
running late and then I discovered I’d run low on
gas. I was so nervous I ran a red light and ran
right into a Lincoln Navigator. The guy I ran into
was that baseball player who scored a winning
home run for the Braves last Saturday. When I
told my kids, they were so impressed that I was
running around with a celebrity -- even if what I
really did was run across – or was it run into him.
But I do run on…
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What words need
to be learned?
• Frequent words
where much should
well
people down
just
because
• Academic words (Coxhead, 2002)
own
analyze context define economy formula require
similar source
• Essential words for topic/content
biosphere photosynthesis decomposer
nitrogen fixation transpiration food web
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How many words do
our students need to
learn?
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Estimates about the number of words a
learner needs to know
• Webster’s 3rd has about 54,000 word families
(250.000 words!).
• A native speaker knows about 4000-5000 word
families at the start of school at age 5
• Native speakers add about 1200 word families
a year.
• A high school graduate knows about 11,000
word families; university graduate knows at
least 20,000 word families.
• Can we possibly teach all these words?
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NO! We must:
• Choose important words to teach
directly and thoroughly.
• Help learners to develop their skills in
solving words on their own.
• Make sure students are widely and
richly exposed to words through
• instructional conversations,
• read aloud, and
• free choice reading.
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Knowing Highfrequency
words can
get learners
a long way
Words
Text coverage
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
15,851
72.0%
79.7%
84%
86.8%
88.7%
89.9%
97.8%
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Selecting Vocabulary: Places to
start
• First 100, 500, 1000 words
• Words, phrases and patterns for
instructions and management
• Words for age-level content
• Words to teach reading patterns
• Academic words
• Words learners want/need to know
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B. Elements of a successful
vocabulary program? We must:
1. Expand exposure through speaking,
listening, writing and choice reading
2. Develop word awareness
3. Teach important words directly
4. Analyze and explore words
5. Build learner control
6. Practice and apply new words
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Element 3:
Teach important
words directly
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Teaching Vocabulary Directly:
“Rich” Vocabulary
Instruction (Beck 2003)
• contextualizing each
target word
• providing student friendly
explanations
• giving many examples
• asking learners to provide
their own examples
• posting & using the target
words
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Teaching Important Content
Words Directly: Meter
• Here is a meter stick. How long is a
meter? What else might be a meter long?
• What can you measure with
meters?Distances? Size of a building? Your
height? A paper clip? A grain of salt? An
atom?
• What is not a meter? Is a yardstick a
meter? Is a ruler a meter? Is a tape
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Sentence Frames
• When we ask a question, we should be sure
we’ve provided ELLs the language needed to
answer it. Sentence frames serve this purpose.
Process for using sentence frames:
• Explanation
• Listen to & repeat example.
• Create& share oral sentence using frame.
• Write sentence using frame.
• Read and recite sentence.
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Sentence Frames
• What is something that is about 1
meter long?
• A three year old is about 1 meter high.
• The distance from my nose to the end of
my finger is about one meter.
• ______________ is about 1 meter high.
• The distance from _______to
______________is about one meter.
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Vocabulary Development
Practices and Activities
• Teaching Vocabulary
Directly
• Build Word
Awareness
• Vocabulary Journals
• Semantic Mapping
• Word Wall
• Word Squares
• Sentence Machine
• Word Sort
• Conga Line
• I have, who has?
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clay
bark
Semantic
Mapping
First
Ts’ai
Lun
from
China
Who
Materials
Record
Ideas
Why
Important
Paper
drawing
To
communicate
writing
Uses
wrapping
things
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Word Square
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Word Sort
proposition
endure
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We must bring
academic words to
life to prepare ELLs
for college and
careers
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A word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day.
Emily Dickenson
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Thank you!
Online
Handout,
Resources
& Links:
www.mlmcc.com
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