pre teaching vocabulary research

DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln

< Previous Article
Next Article >

Home > CEHS > Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education > Theses and Other Student Research > 110

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education

Department of teaching, learning, and teacher education: theses and other student research, how does pre-teaching of vocabulary and the use of technology increase student learning in science.

Jennefer A. Hilgenkamp , University of Nebraska-Lincoln Follow

First Advisor

Dr. Wendy Smith

Second Advisor

Dr. Amanda Thomas

Date of this Version

Document type.

Hilgenkamp, J. A. (2019). How Does Pre-teaching of Vocabulary and the Use of Technology Increase Student Learning in Science. (Master's Thesis, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE, United States). Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.unl.edu

A THESIS Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate College at the University of Nebraska In Partial Fulfillment of Requirements For the Degree of Master of Arts, Major: Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education, Under the Supervision of Professor Wendy Smith. Lincoln, Nebraska: August 2019

Understanding science vocabulary is one of the key components leading to student success in mastering science content. This study looks at the research surrounding pre-teaching vocabulary and the use of technology in the classroom. The purpose is to further investigate and deepen knowledge of science vocabulary. This research will use mixed methods of data collection. The study reports aggregated data on twenty-seven students of varying academic levels and needs (Regular Education, English Language Learners (ELL), Special Education), within Team 6A, of the 6 th grade and data for seven students, who consented for the project, will be evaluated further, through a weekly vocabulary pre- and post-test, content tests, and with the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) Measure of Academic Progress (MAP) Science Growth test to be taken in the fall, winter, and spring. Vocabulary will be presented to students through the use of a Keyword/Information/Memory clue (KIM) chart for pre-teaching, technology programs for investigating meanings and deepening knowledge, and review practice.

Advisor: Wendy Smith

Since August 14, 2019

Included in

Educational Methods Commons , Elementary Education Commons , Special Education and Teaching Commons

Advanced Search

Search Help

Notify me via email or RSS
Administrator Resources
How to Cite Items From This Repository
Copyright Information
Collections
Disciplines

Author Corner

Guide to Submitting
Submit your paper or article
Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education Website

Home | About | FAQ | My Account | Accessibility Statement

Privacy Copyright

Five Research-Based Ways to Teach Vocabulary

Did you know that typically, only 5% to 10% of instructional time is devoted to vocabulary instruction, yet students, especially struggling students and English learners (ELs), need between 12 and 14 exposures to words and their meanings to fully learn them (Durkin, 1978/79; Roser & Juel, 1982; Scott, Jamieson, Noel, & Asslin, 2003)? Teaching the meanings of important words before learning new content activates students’ background knowledge and prepares them for learning and comprehending. In other words, teaching vocabulary provides the “Velcro” for new information to “stick to.”

What Research Says About Effective Vocabulary Instruction

Vocabulary instruction must be explicit . Explicit vocabulary instruction includes an easy-to-understand definition presented directly to students along with multiple examples and nonexamples of the target word, brief discussion opportunities, and checks for understanding.

Vocabulary instruction must include multiple practice opportunities for using words within and across subjects . That is, instruction must be extended over time with opportunities for students to hear, speak, read, and write words in various contexts. This builds students’ breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge.

Vocabulary should be taught schoolwide and across all subject areas . Each subject has a unique set of vocabulary terms, and students need to know their meanings and how to use them in various contexts.

Word Selection

Instructional time is precious, and teachers are not able to address every unknown word students might encounter, so careful word selection is key . When deciding which words to target for explicit instruction, consider words that are

essential to understanding the main idea of the text or unit,
used repeatedly or frequently encountered across domains, and
not part of students’ prior knowledge.

ELs may require even more careful word selection and extensive vocabulary instruction because they may be learning conversational language and academic language at the same time. Colorín Colorado provides additional information about selecting vocabulary words to teach ELs .

Some of Our Favorite Vocabulary Instructional Activities for ALL Content Areas

The five activities described below are effective ways to teach vocabulary for all students, but especially for struggling students, students with learning disabilities, and ELs.

1. Essential Words Routine

Teachers use a simple graphic organizer to preteach the meanings of important words in about 5 minutes per word. During this routine, teachers introduce target words with definitions, visual cues, and examples. Students engage in immediate practice using the words through collaborative student turn-and-talk activities.

Vocabulary Maps Toolkit from Middle School Matters
Reading Instruction for Middle School Students: Developing Lessons for Improving Comprehension (see page 11)

2. Frayer Model

One way to have students extend their knowledge of important words is through a Frayer model. This graphic organizer builds vocabulary and conceptual knowledge across content areas. The strategy requires students (not the teacher) to define a vocabulary word and then list its characteristics, examples, and nonexamples. Frayer models can be completed in collaborative groups using textbooks and other subject-matter materials while the teacher circulates around the classroom and assists students.

Online module, examples, and templates from the IRIS Center

3. Semantic Mapping

Semantic maps visually display and connect a word or phrase and a set of related words or concepts. Implementing semantic map activities in your classroom will help students, especially struggling students and students with learning disabilities, recall the meanings of words and understand how multiple words or concepts “fit together.” Teachers will find that using a semantic map, combined with explicit instruction and practice opportunities, is an effective way of expanding students’ vocabulary and supporting their content knowledge.

Introduction to semantic maps and sample lesson plans from the Developers of PowerUp What Works
Semantic mapping teaching strategy guide from PowerUp What Works

4. Vocabulary Review Activities

Multiple opportunities to practice using new words is an important part of vocabulary instruction. In previous TCLD research studies, brief review activities were built into novel unit lesson plans to help students practice (and remember) the meanings of important words. Each of these activities takes 5 to 10 minutes and is easy to prepare.

Partner Review Routine: Partners work together to quickly review words learned the previous day.
Sentence Review Routine: Partners create sentences using words assigned by the teacher.
Examples and Nonexamples: The teacher tells students scenarios or shows pictures and students respond chorally to each scenario, indicating whether it is an example or nonexample.
What Word Fits? The teacher asks a question and student partners hold up an index card with the word that fits or answers the question.

Each activity is described in more detail beginning on page 33 of the TCLD booklet Reading Instruction for Middle School Students: Developing Lessons for Improving Comprehension

5. Morphemic Analysis Routine

Explicit instruction of words is important, but it is impossible to teach all the unfamiliar words students will encounter. One way to help students develop strategies for approaching unfamiliar vocabulary is to teach morphemes (prefixes, roots, and suffixes). Students can be taught the following morphemic analysis routine to help them engage in independent word study.

Learn more about the morphemic analysis routine by reviewing this online learning module from the Texas Adolescent Literacy Academies.

Have questions? Feel free to drop us a line !

What is Pre-Teaching (and is it just about Vocabulary?)

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

Learn about our Editorial Process

Pre-teaching is the teaching of knowledge, vocabulary, and skills required for an upcoming lesson. It is most commonly used for English Language Teaching (ELT) but can be used by any teacher for any lesson.

Before diving into some examples, it’s important to set the parameters for what pre-teaching is and isn’t.

Generally, pre-teaching refers to the teaching of knowledge shortly before a main lesson or unit of work so that students will be able to complete the main unit of work successfully.

It’s not the use of ‘ prior knowledge ‘ or a staged curriculum. These are longer-term concepts that are structured to help students in their overall educational trajectory. Pre-teaching, on the other hand, is a one-off event designed to lay the foundations for a single lesson or unit of work.

Here, we’re just referring to the idea of identifying students’ gaps in knowledge in the lead up to a lesson, and attempting to bridge that gap so that the upcoming lesson will be successful.

Let’s jump into some examples.

7 Examples of Pre-Teaching

1. vocabulary lists.

Vocabulary lists are the most common form of pre-teaching the help English language learners prepare for an upcoming lesson. The teacher gives the students a list of words that need to be used in the upcoming unit of work. The students study the words so that they will be able to use them in the lesson.

But it’s not just English language teachers who use this strategy.

It’s so commonly used in classrooms that teachers don’t even give it a term: we just do it naturally! When I’m about to start a unit on shapes with my Grade 1 class, you bet “triangle”, “hexagon” and “pentagon” are going to be in our words list for the week!

One of the downsides of this method is that you teach the word “out of context”. This means students might know the words but not know how to use and apply them. So, when we go into the main lesson, there might still be a learning curve as students may still struggle to comprehend the words in context.

2. Flipped Learning Homework

Flipped learning is an approach to education where lesson content is presented at home for homework before the main lesson occurs. What we used to teach in the classroom is now presented for homework . This model came about because we realized that we spent far too much of our time talking at students in the classroom. We can just give them a video! Then, in the classroom, we can actually discuss the ideas.

You could consider flipped classrooms to have a strong element of pre-teaching in them. The idea is to present all the ‘knowledge’ before hand, so in the classroom the main event can be student-centered activities !

It’s reasonable that some people might say this isn’t really pre-teaching because the content taught in the homework section is the “main event” knowledge for the unit of work.

But, I’d argue it’s still a form of pre-teaching. Let me know what you think – tweet me your thoughts! @helpfulprof

Related: 27 Pros and Cons of Homework

3. Preparatory Research

I’ll often ask my students to interview their family about an upcoming classroom topic. If we’re studying “immigration”, I might ask them to go home and gather some information about when their family migrated to the country and which country they came from originally.

This preparatory research gets students into the mindset needed for the main lesson. They come to class with a little bit of the necessary knowledge: that 99% of us are immigrants, that we’re a diverse bunch of people, and we all have different experiences and cultures to draw upon in our past.

Here’s another example: once, I asked my students to go home and take note of how many hours they spent playing outside and how many hours they spent watching TV – every night for a week! They didn’t know it, but I was making sure they had the skill of survey research so when it came to teaching about it in class, I knew they all had experience doing it. It warmed them up for the main event so it was easier to teach.

4. Literature Analysis

I love teaching Grade 6. My favorite part about it is reading novels together. We’ll spend afternoons for weeks on end reading our novels together in class. And sure, part of this is so they can improve their reading skills .

But it’s more than that.

We have to read the book before we can start doing our literature analysis of it! Here, the act of reading the book together is the “pre” part of the teaching, and the main event is the subsequent analysis of the characters , plot, moral of the story, etc. But without that preparatory work of reading the book, the teaching can’t happen at all!

5. Preview Lessons

I love a good preview lesson. This is the sort of lesson that we have on Friday in preparation for the week ahead. During these lessons, I give students the baseline knowledge required.

That might be some vocabulary, but it could be other things too – like knowledge of history, or some math skills that might be required in order to complete the lesson next week.

By presenting those baseline skills before hand, the students come to class on Monday with the knowledge and skills required to really dig into the lesson content.

6. Guest Presenters

Inviting in a Guest Presenter into the class can be a great way to inspire students in preparation for a unit of work. At our school, we like to ask in a first nations presenter prior to teaching about first nations issues.

This does two things: it provides some base knowledge required for the lesson, and creates a buzz around the lesson.

We can often then refer back to the knowledge the guest presenter provided during the unit of work. We can talk about when the guest showed us something, used certain words, or talked about an idea, to help students to create connections in their minds.

Here again, the preparatory session sets students up for success in the lesson.

7. Assigned Readings

As a university professor, I assign readings to my students all the time. That’s because I need them to go home and learn about the ideas we’re going to be talking about. I want my students to come to class ready to talk, debate, argue, and present their ideas!

An assigned reading might be considered part of the ‘core curriculum’, but it’s not – or at least, not for me. I want my students to know about the ideas in the readings, but in reality what’s most important in my classes is my students’ ability to critically examine ideas and talk to each other about them.

That’s the main event!

Criticisms (and Defenders)

Pre-teaching is the subject of significant criticism. Some examples include:

Students need Ambiguity. Chia Susan Chong believes that it’s okay for students to not know every word in the text. The point of reading is for comprehension, and by focusing too hard on every single word you’re drawing attention away from the main goal of reading.
It Crowds the Curriculum. You might be adding too many lessons and more content into your course and unnecessarily burdening students with more homework. Don’t add information that’s not necessary!

But some defenders highlight its benefits:

It’s our job to Prepare Students. A lesson that has too much new information is too steep of a learning curve. By pre-teaching, we’re preparing students for what’s to come, giving them the best chance to succeed.
It’s better to Teach it Right the First Time. If you don’t spend time preparing students and putting them in the best situation to succeed, you’ll end up having to return to the content to re-teach it and implement remedial education strategies.

Some people might argue I’ve significantly expanded the definition of pre-teaching in this article. But I’ve tried to be consistent with the core premise of the concept. I tried to identify examples of when we get students prepared and give them baseline knowledge and skills before the main event . For me and my teaching, anything I get my students do in the lead-up to the lesson itself to prepare my students is still teaching – it’s just a different type of teaching we might refer to as ‘pre-teaching’.

Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Green Flags in a Relationship
Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Signs you're Burnt Out, Not Lazy
Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Toxic Things Parents Say to their Children
Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Red Flags Early in a Relationship

Pre-teaching Content and Vocabulary

Pre-teaching content and vocabulary can help prepare students for content-area instruction by giving them a chance to get familiar with the material prior to the lesson. This strategy is part of Colorin Colorado's ELL Strategy Library and can be used to support academic language development for all students.

Strategy Overview

How this strategy supports language development.

Pre-teaching gives students an entry point when learning new content or new vocabulary words. Rather than "starting from scratch" during a new lesson, they will already have some familiarity with the target information and language — a foundation on which to build. This can also improve their engagement and confidence when participating in class discussions.

Pre-teaching can be embedded in the beginning of the lesson. It can also be introduced during small group work, in collaboration with another teacher or specialist, as part of an intervention, or during another part of the day.

For example, ESOL specialist Katy Padilla created a " Super Secret Science Club " at lunch and used the time to preview the science lessons that the students would be seeing in the afternoon with images on slides and videos. She has found success with pre-teaching, which she says makes kids "experts" in the new content before they see it in the larger classroom setting.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Before the lesson.

Identify some key vocabulary words and/or concepts that you wish to highlight, with a special focus on the main objectives of the lesson or what the students may not be familiar with. (If another teacher will be teaching the lesson, get their input on key objectives and vocabulary for the lesson and then be sure to share what you have previewed with students.)
Look for different ways to present the new content and vocabulary, such as the use of images, videos, student glossaries, realia, and short text summaries.
Give students lots of chances to practice hearing, reading, speaking, and saying new words, as well as discussing new content, so that they feel comfortable with what they are learning. If possible, preview some examples of what students might see in the lesson.

During the lesson

If you are teaching or co-teaching the lesson, get students to "show what they know" during the class period through their participation, discussion, and classwork. Pay close attention to how comfortable students feel with the content and their new vocabulary words.
If you aren't in the room during the lesson, ask the teacher who is delivering the lesson to pay attention to how students are engaging with the content and share their observations with you.

After the lesson

Make note of how much students participated, whether they used their new target words, and what impact the pre-teaching had on their engagement.
Reflect on what worked or what didn't work so that you can continue to make the most of your pre-teaching time.

Differentiation

Use scaffolds such as visuals, video/audio transcripts, graphic organizers, resources in students' home languages, and realia.
Give students an opportunity to discuss content with partners before sharing with the whole group, including with peers who speak the same home language.

Lessons Learned

Select 3-5 essential concepts and terms for pre-teaching. Give students confidence with a few items rather than overwhelming them with pre-teaching the entire lesson.
Always teach the new vocabulary words in connection with the content students will be learning, rather than as a list of words. Use the visuals, videos, experiments, etc. to connect the words to the content.
Explicitly connect the new content and concepts with the students' existing background knowledge. Build on what they already know.
As you figure out how to make the most of your pre-teaching time, shared your lessons learned with colleagues so that they can try this strategy too.

Co-Teaching Considerations

Content or grade-level teacher.

Identify key concepts and vocabulary words for your lesson.
Look for resources that present and highlight this content that can be used for teaching and previewing.

English Language Development Teacher

If needed, collaborate with your co-teacher to select vocabulary and main ideas that will support understanding of the lesson.
Identify some different ways to introduce the new content and words to students, as well as to practice using the new language.

Science (Gr. 3-5)	Why Daylight Changes in the Seasons
	is an upper elementary science lesson from PBS Learning Media. Here are some different ways you could pre-teach this content before the lesson.
	Look for ways to make connections to students' prior experience and background knowledge. See the lesson plan's Teaching Tips for prompts.
	(Molly of Denali) This short video from the PBS Kids series features two Iñupiaq young people in Utqiagvik, Alaska, a town above the Arctic Circle. The young people describe the phenomenon of the sun never setting in the summer and never rising in the winter. The clip also includes some words in Iñupiaq (available in the captions).
	Show students "Illuminating Earth in June and December," an image included in the lesson plan materials. Use the image to teach students the following vocabulary words, providing student-friendly definitions: Then ask students to describe the image with a partner using their new vocabulary words. How does the image relate to the video of the young people in Utqiagvik?
	This lesson plan is available in Spanish. For Spanish-speaking students who need additional scaffolding, you may wish to have them look at the materials or view the videos in Spanish first. Students can also discuss the content in their home language and then report what they learned in English.
	The lesson plan includes a number of materials that you can use before viewing the videos, including:

Videos: Pre-teaching Content and Vocabulary

This video showcases a 5th-grade team planning a science lesson about the difference between vascular and non-vascular plants. ESOL specialist Katy Padilla plays a key role in advocating for ELLs throughout the lesson planning process and sharing her strategies for engaging and supporting students. In the bonus interview clips, she also talks about her "Super Secret Science Club," an informal lunch activity for 5th-grade ELLs where they see a preview of the afternoon's lesson. In the video below, ELL expert Susan Lafond offers some ideas for pre-teaching concepts before a lesson.

Part II: Strategy: Pre-teaching science content and vocabulary

Strategy: Pre-teaching content

Disciplinary literacy

What is pre-teaching?

By Oliver Shrouder

19 Dec 2022

In this article:

How does pre-teaching vocabulary work?

Why is pre-teaching vocabulary important, are there challenges to pre-teaching, what does pre-teaching look like inside the classroom, how can bedrock support pre-teaching in your classroom.

Pre-teaching is a strategy that involves teaching learners about concepts or skills before they encounter them in the classroom. This technique aims to provide the language and skill building blocks to ensure every learner is prepared for new concepts before the next topic takes place. Pre-teaching differs from other types of self-led learning, as the subject matter will always be explored in the subsequent lesson. This reserves the classroom for the application or deepening of knowledge rather than the introduction of it.

The primary objective of pre-teaching is to establish the foundations for a single lesson or unit of work. This helps to identify the gaps in knowledge for your learners before its application, and bridging this gap ensures the upcoming lessons will be successful for both them and the teachers involved.

Often pre-teaching is approached through flipped learning, in which lesson content is given to learners as homework to allow them to prepare for the upcoming lesson. This allows the classroom to be a space where ideas are discussed and explored. Vocabulary is understood in advance through set videos or word lists.

Flipped learning can be an engaging way for older learners to explore terms outside of the classroom: you can set research tasks about broader topics and prepare them for a deeper discussion during the next lesson.

Alternatively, pre-teaching can be done in the classroom. On a Friday you could preview the upcoming topics for the next week and provide any essential knowledge and vocabulary for them to practise. This can be provided through a list of new words, some of the history behind a topic, or revising previously learned skills which are necessary for upcoming tasks.

Limited vocabulary is one of the biggest obstacles to learners’ writing and reading comprehension . A lack of varied and academic vocabulary directly affects a learner’s ability to understand a subject and, as a result, they can begin to fall behind their peers in the classroom. Pre-teaching provides learners with an understanding of concepts before they are discussed in the classroom and, as they learn more vocabulary, they will become more fluent. Rather than stopping to figure out words as they read, they will begin to recognise terms and understand contexts when encountering new ones.

Pre-teaching often employs vocabulary lists to help learners prepare for any upcoming new words. Learners can spend time understanding their meaning before the class begins. This encourages greater comprehension of a text as they face fewer unfamiliar words and experience a lower cognitive load when reading. Pre-teaching is also a method of scaffolding , as it creates a structure of support for learners when they first experience new vocabulary.

It is important to note that these vocabulary lists are not exclusive to English classes: pre-learning can be used for any subject which uses subject-specific language . For example, if you are introducing a new topic in a maths lesson, Tier 3 words such as “radius” and “circumference” should be included in a pre-teaching vocabulary list to ensure every learner is prepared and able to fully engage in the lesson.

Pre-teaching allows prior knowledge to be revised before the content is explored within the classroom, and the more prior knowledge a learner has, the better equipped they will be to understand its application in subject-specific settings. It also provides an alternative to homework and testing: rather than giving learners homework after the lesson, you could ask them to research in advance for a new topic online or by watching a specific video.

Pre-teaching allows learners to improve their reading comprehension too. For lessons such as English, learners can read a chapter or a text in advance at home. This makes the classroom a space for the analysis of a book rather than simply reading it. As reading comprehension is an essential skill for learners, this use of pre-teaching ensures each of them receives the maximum amount of time when analysing and understanding texts.

This means learners become less intimidated by unfamiliar words they encounter in the classroom. Instead of having to put their hand up in the classroom and ask what certain terms mean, they can first encounter them in a place where they feel most comfortable: younger learners can ask a parent or guardian for definitions, and older learners can look them up online.

Vocabulary lists can be used to introduce academic definitions for everyday words. There are many concepts that learners will have encountered outside of the classroom that they have been unable to describe. Providing essential and varied vocabulary ensures every learner has the building blocks necessary to both describe the world around them and succeed within the classroom.

Pre-teaching has been seen to improve overall academic achievement. Learners are given space to explore essential language and vocabulary outside of school, and this means they can understand the language used within the classroom before it is introduced. This allows learners to make accelerated progress when encountering new concepts. Many learners, when returning to school, will begin to feel more in control, and this confidence allows them to be more actively involved in their learning.

Although there are many benefits to pre-teaching, you may encounter some challenges when implementing it in the classroom.

Pre-learning can be time-consuming for both teachers and learners: teachers could spend a significant amount of time providing vocabulary lists or tasks for learners to complete at home, and this leads to learners spending much more time doing homework. Some learners may find it difficult to complete this amount of work at home, which could lead to these learners falling behind.

To implement pre-teaching, ensure that lessons are balanced so that only the essential vocabulary or reading is done at home, and every learner returns to school with the same preparation. This can be simplified for both teacher and learner by utilising Bedrock Mapper's pre-made vocabulary resources .

Additionally, some teachers may find themselves introducing unnecessary words when setting up pre-teaching work. This can become confusing for some learners, as they can become unsure about when to use certain words within the classroom. Additionally, some learners could begin to forget some of the less relevant terms if they are not scaffolded within the classroom. To ensure these words are memorised, only include the most important words in a vocabulary list, and scaffold them through in-person teaching .

It is important to remember that some learners may struggle with the new terms when learning them out of context. For example, if you include subject-specific words such as “radius” before you have explored the application of the word in the classroom, learners can become confused. Any pre-teaching vocabulary solution should embed definitions of new terminology in relevant applications, linking it to prior knowledge - Mapper's vocabulary instruction links definitions to examples, formulae and image activities to reinforce this.

When introducing pre-teaching in the classroom, it is crucial to identify any essential words your learners will need to understand a topic. Words such as “subtraction” or “tempo” are essential for maths or music, so learners will need to understand them to excel in the classroom.

Tiered vocabulary is also beneficial for learners when exploring new subjects. Tier 1 words are everyday words which learners are likely to hear outside of the classroom. However, Tier 2 words , which are more complex, and Tier 3 words , which are subject-specific, are less likely to be spoken aloud. This means it is important to select relevant words when planning lessons, as these more words can help comprehension skills across all subjects, not just the text being analysed in the classroom. Tier 1 words play a role in enveloping new Tier 2 and 3 vocabulary, making it accessible for learners to comprehend more ambitious terminology.

There are also many methods of putting pre-teaching into practice. You could introduce vocabulary lists so learners can discover definitions and meanings outside of class. In addition to this, you could use visual representations to help learners conceptualise vocabulary that they have not yet encountered; many learners find reading more engaging if there are images alongside the text.

Alternatively, you can read out new vocabulary to your learners and ask them to repeat the words back to you. Some learners can be nervous about using new words, especially if they do not know how to pronounce them, so this repetition in the classroom encourages them to use more varied language out loud as well as in their writing. This can also be completed at home, with your learners practising pronouncing new vocabulary with their parents - or, after a bit of practice, using new terminology in a sentence.

To reap the benefits of pre-teaching, teachers across the curriculum should have a consistent, explicit vocabulary curriculum . For a time-poor teacher, fitting this strategy amongst a content-heavy lesson plan can be difficult and time consuming.

To support teachers in facilitating pre-teaching, Mapper’s new sequencing algorithm allows teachers to plan and sequence their bespoke vocabulary curriculum quickly and easily. Teachers in every subject can draw from a wealth of Bedrock-created content, optimised to multiple exam boards, in order to combine a digital Tier 3 vocabulary curriculum with success in the classroom.

Sequenced correctly - and Mapper’s algorithm makes this simple to achieve - learners are pre-taught the subject-specific Tier 2 and Tier 3 vocabulary they need for each topic before the lesson starts, ensuring they enter the classroom enriched with the necessary prior knowledge.

Disciplinary literacy: what it is and why it is important.

Education Researchers

Benefits of using Rosenshine's Principles of Instruction in your classroom

Digital tier 3 vocabulary curriculum, the uk's #1 literacy solution.

Vocabulary, grammar, disciplinary literacy and GCSE English, taught for mastery

Don't forget to share:

You might also discover…

Two desks with literacy work and bags on the seats.

08 Mar 2022

A teacher talking to a class of students about phonics

12 Aug 2022

Instructional strategies for words learning: the case of preschool children

Published: 21 August 2024

Cite this article

Yan Yao 1

Effective word-learning strategies are essential for the development of language skills, cognitive processes, and learning success in young children. This paper describes a study conducted to compare the effectiveness of three different methods of teaching words at preschool age. The study used the C-LWAT (Complex Test for Word Acquisition in Preschool Children) methodology. Three hundred children aged 4 to 6 years from preschool institutions in China took part in the study. The authors of the study randomly divided the children into three groups: a contextual learning group, a game approach group, and a multimedia approach group. Each group underwent the appropriate training methodology for 8 weeks. The results of the study strongly suggested that all three learning strategies contributed to improving vocabulary and speaking skills in children. The pre-test initial scores were comparable in all three groups. However, all groups progressed after the intermediate and final tests. Although the multimedia approach group and the game approach group achieved the highest scores, demonstrating a significant improvement compared to the contextual learning group. These results confirm the effectiveness of using multimedia materials and game approaches in an educational context for the development of vocabulary and speaking skills in children. The obtained results offer new ideas and contexts for the development of word-learning programs in preschool institutions. They are important for educational practices in China and can be used to improve the quality of education and develop speech skills in pre-schoolers from different countries.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Subscribe and save.

Get 10 units per month
Download Article/Chapter or eBook
1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
Cancel anytime

Price includes VAT (Russian Federation)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Institutional subscriptions

Explore related subjects

Artificial Intelligence

Data availability

All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article.

Almanza Pérez, L. (2002). Actividades para favorecer el lenguaje oral y escrito, vinculado con la música en tercer grado de educación preescolar . Edugem. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://ade.edugem.gob.mx/bitstream/handle/acervodigitaledu/56893/MLNIDPED2084_Actividades%20para%20favorecer%20el%20lenguaje%20oral%20y%20escrito,%20vinculado%20con%20la%20m%C3%BAsica%20en%20tercer%20grado.PDF?sequence=2

Barton, D., Hamilton, M., & Ivanič, R. (2000). Situated literacies: Reading and writing in context . Psychology.

Google Scholar

Burger, K. (2010). How does early childhood care and education affect cognitive development? An international review of the effects of early interventions for children from different social backgrounds. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 25 (2), 140–165. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2009.11.001

Cameron, L. (2001). Teaching languages to young learners . Cambridge University Press. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://www.academia.edu/download/34744867/class-discussion-PDF-document1.pdf

Cao, X., & Li, W. (2017). Literature review on the study of preschool education in China. Journal of Economics and Business, 20 (2), 49–55.

Chien, H. Y. (2020). Effects of two teaching strategies on preschoolers’ oral language skills: Repeated read-aloud with question and answer teaching embedded and repeated read-aloud with executive function activities embedded. Frontiers in Psychology, 10 , 2932. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02932

PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar

Coyle, Y., & Gómez Gracia, R. (2014). Using songs to enhance L2 vocabulary acquisition in preschool children. ELT Journal, 68 (3), 276–285. https://doi.org/10.1093/elt/ccu015

Demangeon, A., Claudel-Valentin, S., Aubry, A., & Tazouti, Y. (2023). A meta-analysis of the effects of Montessori education on five fields of development and learning in preschool and school age children. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 73 , 102182. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2023.102182

Dore, R. A., Shirilla, M., Hopkins, E., Collins, M., Scott, M., Schatz, J., Lawson-Adams, J., Valladares, T., Foster, L., Puttre, H., Toub, T. S., Hadley, E., Golinkoff, R. M., Dickinson, D., & Hirsh-Pasek, K. (2019). Education in the app store: Using a mobile game to support US preschoolers’ vocabulary learning. Journal of Children and Media, 13 (4), 452–471. https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2019.1650788

Drigas, A., Kokkalia, G., & Lytras, M. D. (2015). Mobile and multimedia learning in preschool education. Journal of Mobile Multimedia, 11 (9), 119–133. https://journals.riverpublishers.com/index.php/JMM/article/view/4547

Dwyer, J., & Schachter, R. E. (2020). Going beyond defining: Preschool educators’ use of knowledge in their pedagogical reasoning about vocabulary instruction. Dyslexia, 26 (2), 173–199. https://doi.org/10.1002/dys.1637

PubMed Google Scholar

Dwyer, M. C., Chait, R., & McKee, P. (2000). Building strong foundations for early learning the US Department of Education’s guide to high quality early childhood education programs . DIANE Publishing. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://books.google.com/books?hl=uk&lr=&id=WRsehWuL8MIC&oi=fnd&pg=PT6&dq=preschool+education+in+the+usa+learning+new+words&ots=k6Wy6MxKB-&sig=wGwNufAR-7zWKAQQOOiLRUwDKAA

Erdemir, E., & Brutt-Griffler, J. (2022). Vocabulary development through peer interactions in early childhood: A case study of an emergent bilingual child in preschool. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 25 (3), 834–865. https://doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2020.1722058

Fan, M., Antle, A. N., & Warren, J. L. (2020). Augmented reality for early language learning: A systematic review of augmented reality application design, instructional strategies, and evaluation outcomes. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 58 (6), 1059–1100. https://doi.org/10.1177/0735633120927489

Forbes, S. H., & Plunkett, K. (2020). Linguistic and cultural variation in early color word learning. Child Development, 91 (1), 28–42. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13164

Garnier, P. (1999). L’éducation préscolaire en France: classements d’âge et logiques éducatives. In G. Brougère, & S. Kayna (Eds.), Culture, Enfance et éducation préscolaire (pp. 119–132). UNESCO.

Geudens, A., Schraeyen, K., Bellens, K., Taelman, H., & Trioen, M. (2022). Les in lezen: Effectief leesonderwijs voor het basis- en secundair onderwijs in Vlaanderen . Vlaanderen. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://data-onderwijs.vlaanderen.be/documenten/bestanden/Les%20in%20Lezen%20Onderzoekslijn%201%20Rapport.pdf

Gordon, A., & Browne, K. W. (2016). Beginnings & beyond: Foundations in early childhood education Boston: Cengage Learning. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://pdfuni.com/sample/PoliticsSociology/PS701-800/PS795/sample%EF%BC%8DBeginnings%20and%20Beyond%2010th%2010E%20Ann%20Miles%20Gordon.pdf

Grisham-Brown, J., Pretti-Frontczak, K., Hawkins, S. R., & Winchell, B. N. (2009). Addressing early learning standards for all children within blended preschool classrooms. Topics in Early Childhood Special Education, 29 (3), 131–142. https://doi.org/10.1177/0271121409333796

Hadley, E. B., & Dickinson, D. K. (2019). Cues for word learning during shared book-reading and guided play in preschool. Journal of Child Language, 46 (6), 1202–1227. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0305000919000552

Hadley, E. B., Dedrick, R. F., Dickinson, D. K., Kim, E., Hirsh-Pasek, K., & Golinkoff, R. M. (2021). Exploring the relations between child and word characteristics and preschoolers’ word-learning. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 77 , 101332. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appdev.2021.101332

Havy, M., Bertoncini, J., & Nazzi, T. (2011). Word learning and phonetic processing in preschool-age children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 108 (1), 25–43. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2010.08.002

Hindman, A. H., Wasik, B. A., & Erhart, A. C. (2012). Shared book reading and Head Start preschoolers’ vocabulary learning: The role of book-related discussion and curricular connections. Early Education & Development, 23 (4), 451–474. https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2010.537250

Kan, P., & Kohnert, K. (2012). A growth curve analysis of novel word learning by sequential bilingual preschool children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 15 (3), 452–469. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728911000356

Kucker, S. C. (2021). Processes and pathways in development via digital media: Examples from word learning. Infant Behavior and Development, 63 , 101559. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2021.101559

Law, F., Mahr, T., Schneeberg, A., & Edwards, J. (2017). Vocabulary size and auditory word recognition in preschool children. Applied Psycholinguistics, 38 (1), 89–125. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0142716416000126

Lawson-Adams, J., Dickinson, D. K., & Donner, J. K. (2022). Sing it or speak it? The effects of sung and rhythmically spoken songs on preschool children’s word learning. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 58 , 87–102. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2021.06.008

Lennox, S. (2013). Interactive read-alouds—An avenue for enhancing children’s language for thinking and understanding: A review of recent research. Early Childhood Education Journal, 41 , 381–389. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-013-0578-5

Leonard, L. B., Karpicke, J., Deevy, P., Weber, C., Christ, S., Haebig, E., Souto, S., Kueser, J. B., & Krok, W. (2019). Retrieval-based word learning in young typically developing children and children with developmental language disorder I: The benefits of repeated retrieval. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research, 62 (4), 932–943. https://doi.org/10.1044/2018_jslhr-l-18-0070

Li, K., Zhang, P., Hu, B. Y., Burchinal, M. R., Fan, X., & Qin, J. (2019). Testing the ‘thresholds’ of preschool education quality on child outcomes in China. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 47 , 445–456. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2018.08.003

Liu, C., Chung, K. K. H., Wang, L. C., & Liu, D. (2021). The relationship between paired associate learning and Chinese word reading in kindergarten children. Journal of Research in Reading, 44 (2), 264–283. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12333

Lund, E., & Schuele, C. M. (2014). Effects of a word-learning training on children with cochlear implants. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 19 (1), 68–84. https://doi.org/10.1093/deafed/ent036

Lynch, K., Lee, M., & Loeb, S. (2023). An investigation of Head Start preschool children’s executive function, early literacy, and numeracy learning in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 68 , 102182. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2023.04.002

Marulis, L. M., & Neuman, S. B. (2010). The effects of vocabulary intervention on young children’s word learning: A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 80 (3), 300–335. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654310377087

Midway, S., Robertson, M., Flinn, S., & Kaller, M. (2020). Comparing multiple comparisons: Practical guidance for choosing the best multiple comparisons test. PeerJ, 8 , e10387. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.10387

Nielsen, B. (2003). A review of research into vocabulary learning and acquisition . Academia. Retrieved October 7, 2023, from https://www.academia.edu/download/58721763/Brian.pdf

Palomino, C. I., & Brudvig, A. (2022). Examining the role of demographic characteristics, attachment, and language in preschool children’s executive function skills. Early Child Development and Care, 192 (12), 1967–1981. https://doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2021.1958803

Pateşan, M., Balagiu, A., & Alibec, C. (2018). Visual aids in language education. In N. Balcescu (Ed.), International Conference Knowledge-Based Organization (Vol. 24, No. 2, pp. 356–361). Nicolae Balcescu Land Forces Academy. https://doi.org/10.1515/kbo-2018-0115

Peters-Sanders, L. A., Kelley, E. S., Biel, C. H., Madsen, K., Soto, X., Seven, Y., Hull, K., & Goldstein, H. (2019). Moving forward four words at a time: Effects of a supplemental preschool vocabulary intervention. Language Speech and Hearing Services in Schools, 51 (1), 165–175. https://doi.org/10.1044/2019_lshss-19-00029

Phillips, B. M., Clancy-Menchetti, J., & Lonigan, C. J. (2008). Successful phonological awareness instruction with preschool children: Lessons from the classroom. Topics in Early Childhood Special Education, 28 (1), 3–17. https://doi.org/10.1177/0271121407313813

Pushkina, A., Krivoshlykova, L., & Afanasyeva, M. (2021). The role of audiovisual techniques in teaching English to preschoolers. In L. G. Chova, A. L. Martínez, & I. C. Torres (Eds.), 15th International Technology, Education and Development Conference (pp. 1101–1106). IATED. https://doi.org/10.21125/inted.2021.0264

Saylor, M. M., & Sabbagh, M. A. (2004). Different kinds of information affect word learning in the preschool years: The case of part-term learning. Child Development, 75 (2), 395–408. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2004.00682.x

Scofield, J., Miller, A., & Hartin, T. (2011). Object movement in preschool children’s word learning. Journal of Child Language, 38 (1), 181–200. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0305000909990249

Silverman, R., & Hines, S. (2009). The effects of multimedia-enhanced instruction on the vocabulary of English-language learners and non-english-language learners in pre-kindergarten through second grade. Journal of Educational Psychology, 101 (2), 305–314. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0014217

Su, Y., Rao, N., Sun, J., & Zhang, L. (2021). Preschool quality and child development in China. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 56 , 15–26. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2021.02.003

Sun, Z., Zhang, N., & Guo, K. (2023). Preschool children’s dispositions of collaboration: A Chinese study. Children & Society, 37 (3), 820–839. https://doi.org/10.1111/chso.12631

Tang, J. T. (2023). Comparative study of game-based learning on preschoolers’ English vocabulary acquisition in Taiwan. Interactive Learning Environments, 31 (4), 1958–1973. https://doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2020.1865406

Voltmer, K., Hormann, O., Pietsch, M., Maehler, C., & Von Salisch, M. (2021). Teaching the teachers about language support strategies: Effects on young children’s language development. Frontiers in Psychology, 12 , 660750. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.660750

Walter-Laager, C., Brandenberg, K., Tinguely, L., Schwarz, J., Pfiffner, M. R., & Moschner, B. (2017). Media‐assisted language learning for young children: Effects of a word‐learning app on the vocabulary acquisition of two‐year‐olds. British Journal of Educational Technology, 48 (4), 1062–1072. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12472

Williams, S. E., & Horst, J. S. (2014). Goodnight book: Sleep consolidation improves word learning via storybooks. Frontiers in Psychology, 5 , 184. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00184

Xiao, N., Che, Y., Zhang, X., Song, Z., Zhang, Y., & Yin, S. (2020). Father–child literacy teaching activities as a unique predictor of Chinese preschool children’s word reading skills. Infant and Child Development, 29 (4), e2183. https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.2183

Yilmaz, R. M., Topu, F. B., & Takkaç Tulgar, A. (2022). An examination of vocabulary learning and retention levels of pre-school children using augmented reality technology in English language learning. Education and Information Technologies, 27 (5), 6989–7017. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-022-10916-w

Download references

The research received no funding.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

School of Humanities, Changzhou Vocational Institute of Textile and Garment, Changzhou, Jiangsu, China

You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yan Yao .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval.

The authors declare that the work is written with due consideration of ethical standards. The study was conducted in accordance with the ethical principles approved by the Human Experiments Ethics Committee of Changzhou Vocational Institute of Textile and Garment (Protocol No. 3 of 12.04.2023).

Informed consent

The parents/guardians of all the participants gave their written informed consent.

Competing interests

The research has no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher’s note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Materials and software used.

The researchers used the following software applications in the study:

ABC Kids: This application provided interactive games and tasks for learning letters and words. Children could play various games such as “Find a Letter”, “Compose a word” and “Guess a word”. Each game included visual stimuli, audio effects and allowed the children to practice pronunciation of words. The interface of the ABC Kids application:

Word Bingo: This application was specially designed to develop children’s vocabulary through playing bingo. Instead of numbers, the children used words on their playing cards. An illustration accompanied each word to help the children visually connect a word with its meaning. The interface of the Word Bingo application:

Picture Match: This application offered the children tasks to compare pictures with corresponding words. The children had to choose the correct word corresponding to an image from several options. This exercise helped the children improve their ability to identify and connect words with visual representations.

Regarding the sound effects and melodies used in the application, the researchers used the following sound effects in the study:

Animal Sounds: They used sounds of cats, dogs, birds, lions and other animals to associate with corresponding words. For example, the children listened to some sound of a cat and learned to name this animal by its sounds.

Sounds of nature: The researchers used sounds of rain, wind, sea surf and other natural phenomena to create an atmosphere and invite the children’s attention. These sound effects helped create context for the words being studied and improved the perception and memorization of new vocabulary.

Sounds of transport: The authors used some sounds of cars, trains, planes and other modes of transport to associate words with specific objects and situations. The children listened to these sounds and learned to name the appropriate vehicles.

The researchers used the following games in the study:

Make up a word: In this game, the children had to make words from several available letters. They moved letters across the playing field to create some right words related to the topics being studied.

Guess a word: In this game, the researchers showed the children a picture, and they had to guess which word it represented. The game helped the children to link visual images with the corresponding words expanding their vocabulary.

Find a Letter: In this game, the children were shown a picture, and they had to find and click on the letter that corresponded to the first letter of the name of the object in the picture. This developed letter recognition skills and association with specific words.

The researchers chose each of these games considering its pedagogical value, the ability to develop children’s vocabulary and provide them with the opportunity to use the studied words actively in the context of the games.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Yao, Y. Instructional strategies for words learning: the case of preschool children. Curr Psychol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-06454-y

Download citation

Accepted : 21 July 2024

Published : 21 August 2024

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-06454-y

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

Cultural environment
Development of speech skills
Interactive educational environment
Pre-schoolers
Word learning
Find a journal
Publish with us
Track your research

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Publications
Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

Advanced Search
Journal List
Lang Speech Hear Serv Sch

Effective Vocabulary Instruction Fosters Knowing Words, Using Words, and Understanding How Words Work

Margaret g. mckeown.

a Department of Instruction and Learning, University of Pittsburgh, PA, Emerita

This clinical focus article will highlight the importance of vocabulary instruction, in particular, thinking about instruction in terms of focusing students' attention on words and their uses. Vocabulary knowledge that supports literacy and academic learning is extensive and multidimensional. Many learners accumulate high-quality vocabulary knowledge independently, through wide reading and rich language environments that provide abundant practice with words and language forms. However, instruction in vocabulary provides a more efficient way of getting that job done, especially for learners who are less likely to be experiencing rich language interactions, for example, because they struggle with reading and do little of it on their own.

Three aspects of vocabulary instruction, choosing words to teach, the inclusion of morphological information, and the importance of engaging students in interactions around words, will be explored. Considerations in choosing words include their role in the language and their utility to students. Morphology will be discussed in terms of using Latin roots in instruction as a resource for unlocking new word meanings and a framework for understanding language.

How many words do you know? You deal with an abundance of words every day, comfortably and fluently. You are breezing along in this text right now with hardly a thought to what you know about each word. However, you have no idea, no way of knowing, just how many words you know. So many words are available to us to process with ease, yet an accounting of those words is beyond our reach. This illustrates why it is hard to get a handle on the role and importance of vocabulary learning. Just as the extent and depth of one's knowledge remains elusive, it is hard to understand the extent and depth of knowledge that needs to be acquired by students for them to experience literacy and academic success. Learning—and teaching—vocabulary is a bit of a stealthy process.

The most obvious aspect of a word's meaning is its definition. However, knowing a definition is by no means the essence of word knowledge. A rich variety of information is needed about each word in order to support high-quality literacy and academic learning. Useful theoretical perspectives on word knowledge have been offered by many scholars (e.g., McKeown, Deane, Scott, Krovetz, & Lawless, 2017 ; Nagy & Scott, 2000 ; Perfetti, 2007 ). The emphases in their perspectives differ, but three key characteristics are clear in all three:

There are many aspects to know about a word, including features of its meaning, situations in which it is used, associations with other words, and how it behaves syntactically in context.
Words are polysemous; their meanings are not static but shift according to context. These shifts may be large or subtle; for example, accommodate can mean physically providing room for someone and providing for someone's need or request, or it can take a more metaphorical sense of being able to understand a new idea that may challenge your perspective.
Word knowledge is incremental, gradually developing over multiple encounters.

Given the complex nature of word knowledge, learners need to develop knowledge that allows them to access meaning rapidly when reading and to use that meaning to make sense of the various contexts in which a word might be encountered. Rapid access to word meanings that are relevant to a given context is necessary to keep comprehension from slowing down and eventually breaking down. Making sense of the range of contexts in which any word might appear requires flexible knowledge that can adapt to different uses of words.

Many learners accumulate high-quality vocabulary knowledge independently, mainly through extensive reading and rich language environments that provide abundant practice with words and language forms. However, instruction in vocabulary provides a more efficient way of getting that job done. A more efficient route to vocabulary knowledge is especially critical for learners who are less likely to be experiencing rich language interactions, for example, because they struggle with reading and do little of it on their own. Lack of adequate vocabulary knowledge can too easily cause these students to be left behind in developing literacy, and many of them will never catch up. The consequence is that a great deal of individual and societal potential goes unrealized.

However, all students can benefit from high-quality vocabulary instruction. Even students who have a large vocabulary repertoire can enrich their knowledge in ways that make it more accessible and productive. For example, it is well accepted that words can be known to different levels of knowledge. As Carey (1978) pointed out in her seminal research on fast and extended mapping of word knowledge, every learner is working on as many as 1,600 word meanings that are in various stages of being known. It seems reasonable that instructional interactions around language can have benefits for a range of learners, even though the words being learned and the pace at which learning accumulates vary for different learners. Instruction may be initiating knowledge for some learners, whereas it may be reinforcing, clarifying, and extending knowledge for others.

As educators take on the responsibility of teaching vocabulary, issues of how to proceed center on which words to teach and the nature of the instruction. This clinical focus article first focuses on selecting which words to teach, based on their utility and role in the language. The focus then turns to an aspect of language that is both a feature of words and a potential aspect of instruction, morphology, which is the structure of words and word parts. The third focus of the clinical focus article is the nature of vocabulary instruction itself, in particular, features that make instruction most effective.

Which Words to Teach?

A starting point in considering which words merit instructional attention is the nature of the English language. Language is a dynamic human creation and, thus, inherently a bit of a mess.

Ancestry of English

English, even more than most other languages, is a mishmash, because of historical influences on how the language developed into the English we know today. English began as a Germanic language, Anglo-Saxon or Old English. However, this early language mingled with other languages, with the biggest influence being Latin. Latin influenced English over centuries, either directly or through other Romance languages, especially French. The greatest influence began with the Norman conquest of 1066, which brought French, as spoken by the upper classes, and Latin as the language of books and official documents. In fact, English mingled with Latinate vocabulary to such an extent that modern English seems as much a Romance language as a Germanic language, as far as its word-stock ( Baugh & Cable, 1978 ).

The Germanic versus Latinate divide is significant in how our language is used. The Germanic segment of our word-stock mainly consists of simple, concrete words that typify oral, conversational language. The Latinate portion includes more abstract words that characterize more academic language as found in texts. Of course, the common, high-frequency words are found in text as well. In fact, they make up the majority of words found there. However, the portion of words that particularly characterize text is key to comprehending text. Those words carry the semantic burden in written language.

Consider, for example, the text segment below from the New York Times ( Casey & Escobar, 2018 ). In this 49-word segment, the majority—about 38—of the words are high frequency. Yet, without the lower frequency, italicized, and bolded words, it would be difficult to make sense of this passage. The italicized words are considered academic words; the bolded words are more common, but are used here in a metaphorical sense:

“The peace accords …were meant to bring an end to five decades of fighting that left at least 220,000 dead. Behind the agreement, though, loomed a fear: That many of the thousands of fighters granted amnesty might sour on civilian life and pick up arms again.” (NY Times, Sept 19, 2018; front page)

The divide between conversational and written aspects of English has been labeled the lexical bar ( Corson, 1985 , 1995 ). Corson emphasizes the need for learners to cross this lexical bar or move from using everyday language to mastering text language. This move can be difficult but is crucial to academic success. Crossing the lexical bar requires understanding and using sophisticated, literate vocabulary.

The divide between everyday words and the language of text was the starting point for the notion of word tiers ( Beck & McKeown, 1985 ; Beck, McKeown, & Kucan, 2002 , 2013 ). The concept originated when colleagues challenged our recommendations for direct vocabulary instruction, saying that there were too many words in the language to teach them all. We countered, saying that there was no need to teach all the words. We conceptualized a three-tier heuristic by considering that different words have different utility and roles in the language. Tier 1 words characterize everyday oral language, and children learn these readily when hearing them in context. Tier 3 includes words that tend to be limited to specific domains (e.g., chromosome) or extremely rare ( abecedarian ) and are best learned within their domains.

Tier 2 comprises words that are characteristic of written language (e.g., coherent, diminish, or eloquent) and not so common in conversation ( Hayes & Ahrens, 1988 ). These are words of high utility for literate language users. Tier 2 words overlap to a great extent with general academic words, that is, words that are common across various domains of academic texts. Good databases of academic words include Coxhead's (2000) Academic Word List (AWL) and Gardner and Davies' (2013 ) more recent Academic Vocabulary List. Each of these lists is based on a large corpus of words from sources such as academic journals and university textbooks across broad academic areas. A difference between academic words and Tier 2 words is that Tier 2 includes words from fiction, whereas academic words are drawn from nonfiction, disciplinary texts. Thus, Tier 2 includes words that typically apply to characters and emotions, such as sinister, mutter, and obsessed . We think these kinds of words are good candidates for instruction, for several reasons. They can help students read and enjoy fiction, they provide students with interesting words to use in describing people and human interactions in writing, and they are rather delicious and fun! Students enjoy, for example, imagining what sinister characters might do or demonstrating muttering versus murmuring.

Children typically have a rather small repertoire of Tier 2 words when they enter school but increase Tier 2 knowledge as they become readers. Tier 2 words are more difficult to learn than Tier 1 words, partly because they are less frequent in the language as a whole—thus the frequent repetition that aided learning Tier 1 words is gone—but also because written context in which Tier 2 words typically appear provides less information about a word's meaning than the immediate oral contexts in which Tier 1 words are found. Think of it this way: When children hear words spoken every day, they have the physical surroundings, gesture, intonation, and familiarity of their everyday life to support figuring out word meaning. However, when they read, or are read to, they have only other words to glean information from.

An important caveat about word tiers is that it is an imprecise concept. It was meant as a heuristic to help bound the selection of words to teach and also to draw attention to properties of words and their roles in the language that make some words more useful to know. Classrooms are typically inundated with words from the various curricular materials that teachers and students deal with. The tiers concept can support teachers in selecting from among that sea of words those words that are most beneficial to attend to and keep around. Tier 2 words are beneficial to learn because they are found in a variety of texts and can thus provide access to a range of contexts.

Yet, the fact that Tier 2 words can apply to varied contexts also means that these words have multiple related senses or nuances—they are polysemous. Negotiating these shades of meaning can be tricky for learners. A typical sticking point in learning vocabulary is that, when we learn a word, we initially learn a particular sense and then we tend to use that sense to understand subsequent contexts we meet. Thus, if we learn the word foundation as an organization that provides funding and then meet a context about people building a “foundation of friendship,” we might think it means an organization that provides funding for friendships.

Rampant polysemy is, then, another reason for giving students supported practice with using these kinds of words. By providing varied contexts and supportive interactions around them, students become able, for example, to understand that a student with academic potential is one who has the ability to be a good student and a merchant's potential customer is someone who might buy from them. Probing two such contexts also helps students to see that at the core of potential is a meaning of “possibility of becoming something in the future.” Word knowledge needs to become decontextualized—generalized beyond specific contexts—to provide the kind of flexibility learners will need as they meet words in new contexts.

As the above discussion of polysemy suggests, it is important to give attention to different senses or nuances of word meaning in instruction. However, it is not necessary to try to include every sense that a word might have—that could get way too confusing! Part of the reason for focusing on different senses is to help students build a general understanding that words can shift their meaning in different contexts and to understand the limits of that. The way my colleagues and I have handled polysemous senses is to provide a definition that describes the core concept of a word, which is broad enough to cover various senses. We employed these kinds of definitions in the middle school vocabulary program we developed called RAVE (Robust Academic Vocabulary Encounters; McKeown, Crosson, Beck, Sandora, & Artz, 2012 ). For example, the definition of approach applied to getting physically closer to something and a way to deal with or solve an issue: “If you approach something, you get closer to it in order to reach it or to deal with it.” Then, we presented contexts that used the word in both ways and asked students to explain what the context meant. So, for example, for a context such as “Our group had to come up with a new approach for our science project,” the teacher would guide students to understand that the group was trying to figure out a new way to create a science project.

It is important not to confuse polysemy, multiple senses or nuances of related meaning, with words that have multiple unrelated meanings. The latter are actually homographs, words that are spelled the same but with no similarity in meaning. Examples would be fast as in speed and fast as in to forego food. There is no reason to make a habit of introducing homographs of instructed words. That is likely to breed confusion. The only circumstances for introducing a homograph would be to avoid confusion with an already known word. So, for example, if fast , meaning to forego food, is being taught, mention that students probably already know fast as meaning a high rate of speed but that this is another word that sounds and looks the same and has a different meaning.

Consideration of Tier 2 words can provide a focus and a mindset, but it still may not make it easy to find and select precisely which words to teach. It can seem that there are, at once, too many words to choose from and not enough “really good words” to share with students. Which are the right ones? First of all, there is no definitive list of words that students must know. The best guide is to choose from texts students are reading in the classroom, which already come with attached contexts to launch from. Thinking about how to choose among words that appear in texts and curricular materials can be spurred by inspecting lists such as the AWL and the Academic Vocabulary List. Other resources for lists of words include Stahl and Nagy (2006) and Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2008) , which present sets of lists for particular texts and websites that offer word lists for particular content areas, texts, and grade levels (see, e.g., https://www.vocabulary.com and https://www.spellingcity.com ). However, all of these lists should be used along with one's own prudent judgment, which should include considerations of the word's general utility and, specifically, if it seems useful to one's particular students—can you imagine your students finding a way to use the words?

A special case of selecting words can occur when students are reading at levels below their thinking or language comprehension levels. This can occur with both younger and struggling readers. Materials for these students may not offer abundant useful words to teach as far as vocabulary development. A strategy we have used is to select “words about” the text. For example, a simple story may tell the tale of a boy and his dog. You could introduce the word companion . Or a story might portray a child's excitement about an upcoming birthday. You could introduce anticipate or eager. The best overall strategy for selecting words is to tune your attention to be on the lookout for good words in texts or in experiences that students will interact with. Go for words that are important to a text and frequent enough in the language that learning them is worthwhile.

As far as appropriateness for students of different ages and reading levels, when focusing on increasing students' knowledge of word meanings, Tier 2 words are appropriate for every level. For example, here are some words we have taught—and students have learned and used—in kindergarten: extraordinary, commotion, inseparable, cautious, reluctant, delicate, stingy, and remarkable. Note that these words, although considered Tier 2, are not highly polysemous and not as abstract as many on the AWL. The point is to prepare students for language they will be meeting as they go up the grade levels and encounter increasingly academic language. Even if students are not mastering all words that are introduced, the initial experiences are valuable for this preparation.

Why Include Morphology?

One aspect of vocabulary instruction universally understood in the field is that not only would it be an impossible task to teach every word but it would also be impossible to teach even a majority of agreed-upon, important-to-know words. One way to leverage instruction is to attend to general patterns of language, with morphology being the most prominent among those.

What Are Morphemes?

Morphology is the study of morphemes, the smallest units of language that have identifiable meaning or function. Types of morphemes include prefixes, suffixes, and roots. So, for example, unthinkable has three morphemes: un, think, and able . Think is the freestanding root; that is, it can stand on its own as a word. However, our language also contains bound roots, which are word parts that have meaning across words but cannot stand by themselves, such as nov in novel and renovate or voc in vocabulary and advocate . These bound roots are mostly from our Latin heritage, although there are some Greek roots as well.

There are several ways to categorize morphemes:

Bound or free: Free are basically single-morpheme words, whereas bound morphemes are either affixes or Latin roots.
Inflectional or derivational: Inflectional morphemes are suffixes added to a word to change number or tense, for example, the – s in dogs or – ing in many verbs. Derivational morphemes are prefixes or suffixes that change the meaning of a word, such as prefixes un – and re– or suffixes –tion and – able .
Content or function: Content morphemes are morphemes that carry semantic meaning. These include words that are nouns, adjectives, adverbs, and verbs, as well as derivational morphemes and bound (Latin or Greek) roots. Function (also called grammatical ) morphemes are words or suffixes that serve a functional role, such as prepositions, pronouns, or inflectional morphemes.

What Does Research Say About Including Morphology in Vocabulary Study?

A strong and growing body of research shows that knowledge of morphology contributes to reading comprehension ( Anglin, 1993 ; Carlisle, 1995 , 2000 ; Nagy, Berninger, Abbott, Vaughan, & Vermeulen, 2003 ). However, evidence that instruction in morphology leads to enhanced comprehension is less clear. Results of morphological instruction show that students often learned the meanings for the word parts they were taught but rarely generalized that to the learning of new words ( Bowers, Kirby, & Deacon, 2010 ; Curtis, 2006 ). However, recent meta-analyses by Goodwin and Ahn (2013) and Bowers et al. (2010) provided evidence of enhanced spelling and vocabulary learning across 21 morphological interventions and some, albeit small, transfer to new words and to reading comprehension. Virtually, all research on morphology has focused on derivational morphology (prefixes and suffixes). In some instances, Latin roots were occasionally included in instruction, but their effects were not analyzed separately.

Understanding of Latin roots can provide students with some generative knowledge of language that they can use to unlock meanings of unfamiliar words and a way to give students some understanding of how English got to be the way it is. Providing information about English and its Latin layer can “take the lid off language” to help students see its inner workings. Teaching students about the patterns that words follow makes students aware of the connections within language, such as that duplicate and duplicity have double at the core of their meaning. Understanding patterns of language would seem to help students deal with language and its oddities and feel more in control of their language.

My colleagues and I first added a component of Latin root instruction when we developed our middle school RAVE program ( McKeown et al., 2012 ). We called that component Becoming Aware of Language and introduced it by presenting two key concepts about language: that languages are constantly changing and that all languages adopt words from other languages—with English adding a lot of vocabulary from Latin. The RAVE program then introduced several Latin roots in each weekly cycle of instruction. We selected roots that came from the target words and then introduced several more words with the same root. For example, manipulate was one of the target words, and in the Becoming Aware of Language lesson, we introduced the root man, meaning hand, and root-related words manicure, manager, and emancipate (a good resource for identifying roots of words is an online etymological dictionary found at etymonline.com ).

A potential downside of teaching Latin roots is that roots lack consistency phonologically and orthographically. For example, the root sed, meaning to sit, can also be spelled sid —as in preside . Additionally, the meaning of a Latin root within a word is not always transparent. Consider a set of words that contain the root voc, meaning speak or call. That semantic component is easy to understand in the words vocabulary, vocal, vociferous, and even advocate, meaning to speak for someone. However, that same root also occurs in vocation, which has a more metaphorical relation to the root: A vocation is a calling to some endeavor or profession.

Because roots may demonstrate lack of consistent form or lack of transparent meaning, one principle built into our instruction was flexibility: teaching students to be alert to variations and ready to adapt their thinking about the meaning of a new word they meet. We provided practice in this concept by having activities that asked students to problem-solve by working out meanings of words given contexts that contained an unfamiliar root-related word. For example, we presented a picture of a group of people painting a room, with the caption “These friends are renovating an old house.” Students had already learned that nov meant new and then used the visual and semantic context to figure out that the friends were working to make the house new again.

Despite potential downsides of teaching Latin roots, our view is that knowing about roots, and having some knowledge of specific roots and the words in which they appear, is a resource that students can draw on when encountering a new word in context. This knowledge provides a little extra boost to using context alone to puzzle out new word meaning. Even though learners learn most of the words they know from context, it is notoriously unreliable, as writers write to express ideas, not to teach words. Context may hold strong clues to a word's meaning, or little or no clue, and may even misdirect readers as to word meaning (see, e.g., Beck, McKeown, & McCaslin, 1983 ).

In our RAVE work, we did find evidence that students could use their knowledge of roots to unlock the meaning of unfamiliar words ( Crosson & McKeown, 2016 ). For this study, RAVE and control students were given a task that asked them to provide the meaning of root-related words in context. For example, RAVE taught the word diminish and the root min, and in the study task, we presented the sentence “Most of their conversations were about the minutiae of daily life” and asked “What is this saying about their conversations?” We found that RAVE students were significantly more able to provide an accurate interpretation of the word and context, saying, for example, that the conversations were about small details of life.

In a subsequent project, a vocabulary program designed specifically for English learners focused even more strongly on Latin roots. That program is discussed in another article in this forum ( Crosson, McKeown, Robbins, & Brown, 2019 ).

Full instruction in lexical morphology is likely not appropriate for students younger than upper elementary. However, teachers or clinicians can certainly take advantage of opportunities when working with young students. For example, if the words vocabulary and vocal have been encountered, you might mention that they both have voc in them, which means speak, and ask how that relates to each word. No need to go into language history or Latin, but just plant the seed about language having meaningful parts.

Keys to Effective Instruction

Effective instruction means bringing students' attention to words in ways that promote not just knowing word meanings but also understanding how words work and how to utilize word knowledge effectively in higher level tasks, such as reading comprehension. Research on vocabulary development, vocabulary instruction, and its relationship to comprehension has a long and rich history (see Baumann, 2009 ). Over several decades of investigation, a strong consensus has formed about features of effective vocabulary instruction, which can be summarized as follows: present both definitional and contextual information, provide encounters with words in multiple contexts, and engage students' active processing of word meanings. This research has included reviews of multiple studies and individual intervention studies that compare more traditional instruction to instruction that included broad information about words and activities to engage students with using words. Table 1 presents some of the key research milestones that were instrumental in leading to that consensus. More recent intervention research has confirmed that consensus in studies that focus on students as young as kindergarten ( Coyne, McCoach, Loftus, Zipoli, & Kapp, 2009 ; Coyne et al., 2010 ; McKeown & Beck, 2014 ; Silverman, 2007 ) and even preschool ( Wasik & Bond, 2001 ) and on English learners ( Carlo et al., 2004 ; Kieffer & Lesaux, 2012 ). Additionally, a recent meta-analysis confirmed that explicit instruction and depth of processing yield the strongest effects for children at risk ( Marulis & Neuman, 2013 ).

Research milestones in establishing consensus on vocabulary instruction.

Reference	Type of article	Features most effective for comprehension
	Review of eight intervention studies	More practice, breadth of instructional techniques, active processing
	Review of 41 intervention studies	Multifaceted instruction, multiple encounters, active processing
	Meta-analysis of 52 intervention studies	Both definitional and contextual information, multiple encounters, active processing
	Intervention with junior high students Words from context versus semantic mapping (focusing on and discussing word features)	Focusing on and discussing word features
	Intervention with fourth graders, compared definitional and rich instruction	Both definitional and contextual information, multiple encounters, active processing
,	Intervention with high school students with learning disabilities Compared three interactive approaches that involved focus on word features and associations to definitions (1990) Bilingual elementary and junior high students (1992)	Interactive approaches with focus on word features and relationships
	Intervention with high school students Definitions versus learning words through discussing their use in literature	Active discussion of word use
	Comprehensive overview of research in eight areas, including vocabulary	Multiple exposures, rich contexts, and active processing

To reiterate, these principles of effective instruction have been found to apply for teaching word meanings for all students—students of all levels, pre-K through high school; learners learning English as an additional language; and learners with learning disabilities. Note, however, that teaching word meanings differs from teaching students to read. Reading requires a different kind of instruction and practice. Although it is a good practice to at least familiarize students with the orthographic representations of words being taught for meaning, the emphasis and goals are different.

The need for instruction that focuses on definitional and contextual information, encounters in multiple contexts, and active processing stems from the nature of word meaning itself. Because word meaning is, as discussed earlier, multifaceted, polysemous, and flexible, it should be clear, first, that a definition of a word will not suffice for effective learning. A definition can only capture limited information, and although definitions can be a good starting point, or good shorthand for remembering a word's meaning, knowing definitions will not support comprehension ( McKeown, Beck, Omanson, & Pople, 1985 ; Stahl & Fairbanks, 1986 ).

The multifaceted, polysemous nature of word knowledge also means that vocabulary learning is incremental. It is virtually impossible to learn everything you need to know about a word from just one encounter. Experiencing words in multiple contexts leads learners to build rich networks of connections to a word and across similar words. A word's meaning becomes generalized across encounters, losing its connection to specific contexts, which allows it to be applied flexibly to new contexts. Flexible knowledge enables learners to bring the most relevant aspects of a word's meaning to bear in making sense of subsequent contexts in which the word is met ( Reichle & Perfetti, 2003 ).

However, simply encountering words in multiple contexts does not maximize learning. A learner needs to engage in active processing of the information in those encounters in order to reap top benefits. Active processing means interacting with words—manipulating ideas around words in order to extend and deepen knowledge of the word, its uses, and its connections to other words and situations. This is requisite for building the kind of rich and flexible knowledge that will support students in comprehending and using language.

The focus of this section is what effective interactions that engage students' active processing look like. The core of such interactions is really pretty simple—prompt students to do something with the words that encompasses thinking about features of a word's meaning and how the word can be used. The activities presented are generally examples of activities that teachers have used with whole classrooms, but they could easily be used or slightly adapted to be used in a clinical setting, such as by a speech-language pathologist and an individual student. The activities are appropriate for all levels as well. The same activity formats can be used with kindergartners or high schoolers; the words themselves and the responses of the students drive the maturity level of the discussions. The examples used here are from first grade, second grade, and middle school.

The following examples illustrate interactions that are intended to prompt student thinking about different aspects and features of word meaning. Experiencing this variety helps students build a flexible, reflective approach to words and their uses. This first activity helps students think about how different words can relate to the same contexts and to choose the word they would apply. The teacher would then follow up by asking the student to explain how their choice fits:

Try out a flying machine
Taste a new food made of seaweed
Taste a new kind of chocolate
Enter a singing contest

Interactions that ask students to make choices can prompt them to reflect on a word's features, for example, the extent of change that refine entails.

Making some small changes to your science project or starting all over with a new one?
Getting your hair trimmed or having your head shaved?

It is important to include interactions that prompt students to think about different senses of a word, such as the different senses of expose in the following:

How could middle school students be exposed to what it will be like in high school?
How could you expose someone who was mistreating his dog?

Interactions can and should be quick and fun! We have seen teachers turn up the fun quotient in various ways. One example is the way they ask students to indicate their response. A teacher we worked with told her first-grade students, “If you think I'm talking about something that is mighty, show me your muscles,” and then provided examples such as “a strong woman lifting up a tiger” and “a big river that floods nearby homes.”

Interactions should include providing feedback to students, for example, asking “why” when a student responds to the eager/reluctant prompts. Feedback helps to build and reinforce connections to a word in the student's mental lexicon.

Asking students to provide their own examples of a word is an interaction strategy that is easily implemented and potentially effective. For example, simply ask “What is something in your life that you would like to refine?” or “What is something you are always eager to do?” Asking students to create their own examples, however, should not be one of the first activities students are asked to do with a newly introduced word. Students often have difficulty coming up with their own ideas initially and often repeat the context in which a word has been introduced. So calling on students' creative use of words is best employed after students have been exposed to a number of uses and had time to reflect on how it might apply to them.

Feedback is especially important for interactions that prompt student-created examples, to monitor understanding and keep responses on the right track or redirect if necessary. A good way to build an effective habit of feedback is to think about the rule of thumb of improv comedy—“Yes, and…,” which involves acknowledging what someone has said and then expanding on it. In an improv troupe, this keeps the comedy rolling; in vocabulary instruction, it keeps the connections building. Note the “yes, and”-ing in the following exchange:

Teacher: What is something you'd want if you were famished? Student: Pizza. Teacher: Mm, pizza! And what would you do with that pizza if you were famished? Student: Gobble it all right up! Teacher: Oh, boy, yeah, because if you're famished, do you want just one piece of pizza?

Note in this next example that the teacher's “and” allows her to prompt students to generalize about entailments of the target word delicate .

Teacher: What are some things that are delicate ? … Student 1: A glass vase. Student 2: A brand new baby. Teacher: What is it about delicate things, like vases and babies? How do we have to act around them? Student 3: Be really, really careful….

Although the above examples of “yes, and” are from a classroom discussion, that technique is strongly applicable to clinical interactions between one child and a clinician. A clinician is in a good position to tailor feedback to a student's individual needs and interests.

Because vocabulary learning requires multiple exposures and because time with students is a precious resource, we need to seek ways to leverage attention to words, or figure out how to get more bang for the buck! Having a clinician coordinate with a student's classroom teacher could offer an ideal opportunity to leverage attention to vocabulary. A clinician can ask the classroom teacher for words that the class is focusing on or words that a particular student needs help with. The clinician is in a good position, then, to apply playful techniques, such as the activities exemplified above; to provide practice in vocabulary; and to build enjoyment with language. The clinician is also in a good position to provide extension and enrichment, for example, by introducing other words that associate with the classroom vocabulary. Because the activities suggested set a conversational, spontaneous tone, they might allow the clinician to identify gaps in a student's vocabulary repertoire and both directly help with those and inform the teacher about words that seem unfamiliar to a student or difficult for a student to use.

Another way for clinicians to enhance vocabulary attention is through their own word use. This can start with awareness of their own language use, deliberately using sophisticated words—both those that are being taught and others that are appropriate to situations—in interactions with students. Challenge students to “catch” you using target words and then turn it around—challenge students to use target words during lessons and provide some sort of points or simple rewards when they do.

Another important leverage point in vocabulary instruction is prompting students to use and be aware of words outside formal instruction. Such prompting can start with informal coordination among school professionals—classroom teacher, clinician, and beyond. This might begin with posting a list of target words on the classroom door and privately encouraging other adults to use the words when they visit or when students work with them. A next level of increased attention could include a vocabulary bulletin board, posting interesting uses of target words, both those found in written materials and those that students have generated.

Going beyond instructional sites for vocabulary should also include going beyond school, motivating students to take their vocabulary awareness home with them. Clinicians can easily take a lead role in this and then prompt the classroom teacher to join in. Challenge students to find target words in books they are reading, in menus, music, and video games, and to use the words with their families. My colleagues and I have promoted these kinds of activities in two studies and found that students respond with enthusiasm! However, best of all, we found that it affects the outcomes. In a fourth-grade study, when students were offered the opportunity to find words outside class through an activity we called Word Wizard , we found increased comprehension effects over instruction that did not include the Wizard component ( McKeown et al., 1985 ).

In a study with sixth graders, we invited them to engage through In the Media , an activity that challenged them to find their words in any media outside school. We received great response, including students finding words in sports broadcasts— dynamic players—and in Sunday school verses! In that study, we found that students who engaged with In the Media had greater learning gains on a vocabulary posttest ( McKeown, Crosson, Artz, Sandora, & Beck, 2013 ). Although our direct experiences have involved fourth grade and middle school students, we have worked with teachers who have had success with such activities with students from kindergarten through high school.

If students do not respond at first to the idea of finding words, that activity can be seeded with some specific directions to spur students on. For example, ask them to notice in something they read, hear, or see, such as

someone who does something voluntary
someone who needs to adapt to a new situation
someone who had to consult with another person.

Or you might ask them to choose one of their vocabulary words to describe

a character in a book they are reading
someone on the news or in the newspaper
someone in a commercial
an actor in a video or movie.

As a final point, it is necessary to include a caveat to clinicians: You may be disappointed to find that teachers you work with devote little, if any, time to vocabulary. Even if they do, the words they work with may not be the best choices for generative vocabulary building, but words with specific and narrow use in curricular materials. If that situation is in play, you are on your own—so I implore you to take up the mantle of vocabulary progenitor! This can flow from a cultivated interest and attention to words and word use. Choose words that appear in student materials or that emerge from current school or community events, for example. Use newspapers, websites, word lists such as the AWL ( Coxhead, 2000 ), or words you bump into in your own reading to create a set of words to use with students. Included in the Appendix are the words we taught in RAVE, all of which are taken from the AWL.

Wrapping Up

Always keep in mind that language is a strange, fascinating, vibrant human creation. Exploring its puzzlements and figuring out its patterns should be endlessly intriguing. Sparking that kind of attitude in students takes them a long way toward being successful, confident language users. Clinicians and teachers can propel students along that way by choosing useful, interesting words, helping students get an initial understanding of them through multiple exposures and lively interactions, and clinicians and teachers, as well as other school personnel in contact with students, can encourage students to notice and revel in words in their environment. The essence of all these activities that keep attention focused on vocabulary is to generate excitement around words and students' uses of them.

Acknowledgments

The author gratefully acknowledges the Institute for Education Sciences of the U.S. Department of Education for its support to some of the research described in this clinical focus article: Robust Instruction of Academic Vocabulary for Middle School Students, Award R305A100440 granted to Margaret G. McKeown and Isabel L. Beck from the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the institute, and no official endorsement should be inferred.

Words Taught in Robust Academic Vocabulary Encounters Program

Sixth grade
academic	diminish	outcome
access	dominant	perceive
acknowledge	dramatic	perspective
acquire	empirical	potential
adapt	establish	preliminary
adequate	exceed	priority
adjacent	exploit	process
allocate	expose	prohibit
alter	external	prospect
ambiguous	extract	rational
anticipated	features	refine
approach	foundation	restrict
assume	function	retain
benefit	implement	reveal
bias	incentive	rigid
capable	inclination	significant
compatible	incorporate	straightforward
compensate	induce	submit
compile	inherent	substitute
confine	initiative	suspend
conform	innovative	sustain
consent	insights	symbolic
consequences	integral	techniques
consult	interact	traditional
consume	internal	transfer
contradict	interpret	transmit
controversy	invoke	trend
convene	isolate	undertake
convert	manipulate	unify
criteria	mutual	unique
crucial	neutral	utility
derive	notion	virtually
detect	obtain	voluntary

abstract	definitive	invest
accommodate	despite	maintain
accumulate	deviate	marginal
advocate	devote	methodical
alternative	differentiate	minimize
amend	distort	modify
analogous	diverse	monitor
arbitrary	domestic	objective
assess	duration	orient
assure	dynamic	passive
attain	encounter	presume
attribute	enhance	principle
capacity	erode	recover
cease	evident	regulate
circumstances	exclude	relevant
civil	explicit	reliable
coherent	facilitate	reside
coincide	finite	resolve
commitment	fluctuate	restrain
complement	fundamental	sequential
complex	generate	simulate
comprehensive	global	specify
concept	hierarchy	sufficient
concurrent	imply	supplement
confirm	incident	transition
considerable	indicate	trigger
consistent	inevitable	ultimate
constraint	inhibit	valid
constructive	integrate	variable
contemporary	integrity	version
coordinate	interval	welfare
decline	intervene	widespread

Funding Statement

Anglin, J. M. (1993). Vocabulary development: A morphological analysis . Monographs of the Society of Research in Child Development , 58 , i–186. [ Google Scholar ]
Baugh, A. C. , & Cable, T. (1978). A history of the English language (6th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. [ Google Scholar ]
Baumann, J. F. (2009). Vocabulary and comprehension: The nexus of meaning . In Israel S. E. & Duffy G. G. (Eds.), Handbook of research on reading comprehension (pp. 323–346). New York, NY: Routledge. [ Google Scholar ]
Beck, I. L. , & McKeown, M. G. (1985). Teaching vocabulary: Making the instruction fit the goal . Educational Perspectives , 23 ( 1 ), 11–15. [ Google Scholar ]
Beck, I. L. , McKeown, M. G. , & Kucan, L. (2002). Bringing words to life: Robust vocabulary instruction . New York, NY: Guilford. [ Google Scholar ]
Beck, I. L. , McKeown, M. G. , & Kucan, L. (2008). Creating robust vocabulary: Frequently asked questions and extended examples . New York, NY: Guilford. [ Google Scholar ]
Beck, I. L. , McKeown, M. G. , & Kucan, L. (2013). Bringing words to life: Robust vocabulary instruction (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Guilford. [ Google Scholar ]
Beck, I. L. , McKeown, M. G. , & McCaslin, E. S. (1983). Vocabulary development: All contexts are not created equal . The Elementary School Journal , 83 , 177–181. [ Google Scholar ]
Bos, C. S. , & Anders, P. L. (1990). Effects of interactive vocabulary instruction on the vocabulary learning and reading comprehension of junior-high learning disabled students . Learning Disability Quarterly , 13 ( 1 ), 31–42. [ Google Scholar ]
Bos, C. S. , & Anders, P. L. (1992). Using interactive teaching and learning strategies to promote text comprehension and content learning for students with learning disabilities . International Journal of Disability, Development and Education , 39 ( 3 ), 225–238. [ Google Scholar ]
Bowers, P. N. , Kirby, J. R. , & Deacon, S. H. (2010). The effects of morphological instruction on literacy skills: A systematic review of the literature . Review of Educational Research , 80 ( 2 ), 144–179. [ Google Scholar ]
Carey, S. (1978). The child as word learner . In Halle M., Bresnan J., & Miller G. (Eds.), Linguistic theory and psychological reality (pp. 264–293). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. [ Google Scholar ]
Carlisle, J. F. (1995). Morphological awareness and early reading achievement . In Feldman L. (Ed.), Morphological aspects of language processing (pp. 189–209). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. [ Google Scholar ]
Carlisle, J. F. (2000). Awareness of the structure and meaning of morphologically complex words: Impact on reading . Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal , 12 , 169–190. [ Google Scholar ]
Carlo, M. S. , August, D. , McLaughlin, B. , Snow, C. E. , Dressler, C. , Lippman, D. N. , … White, C. E. (2004). Closing the gap: Addressing the vocabulary needs of English language learners in bilingual and mainstream classrooms . Reading Research Quarterly , 39 , 188–215. [ Google Scholar ]
Casey, N. , & Escobar, R. (2018, September 19). Colombia struck a peace deal with guerrillas, but many return to arms . New York Times . Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com
Corson, D. J. (1985). The lexical bar . Oxford, United Kingdom: Pergamon Press. [ Google Scholar ]
Corson, D. J. (1995). Using English words . Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Kluwer Academic. [ Google Scholar ]
Coxhead, A. (2000). A new academic word list . TESOL Quarterly , 34 ( 2 ), 213–238. [ Google Scholar ]
Coyne, D. M. , McCoach, D. B. , Loftus, S. , Zipoli, R., Jr. , & Kapp, S. (2009). Direct vocabulary instruction in kindergarten: Teaching for breadth versus depth . The Elementary School Journal , 110 ( 1 ), 1–18. [ Google Scholar ]
Coyne, M. D. , McCoach, D. B. , Loftus, S. , Zipoli, R. , Ruby, M. , Crevecoeur, Y. , … Kapp, S. (2010). Direct and extended vocabulary instruction in kindergarten: Investigating transfer effects . Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness , 3 ( 2 ), 93–120. [ Google Scholar ]
Crosson, A. C. , & McKeown, M. G. (2016). Middle school learners' use of Latin roots to infer the meaning of unfamiliar words . Cognition and Instruction , 34 ( 2 ), 1–24. [ Google Scholar ]
Crosson, A. C. , McKeown, M. G. , Robbins, K. P. , & Brown, K. J. (2019). Key elements of robust vocabulary instruction for emergent bilingual adolescents . Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools , 50 , 493–505. https://doi.org/10.1044/2019_LSHSS-VOIA-18-0127 [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
Curtis, M. E. (2006). The role of vocabulary instruction in adult basic education . In Comings J., Garner B., & Smith C. (Eds.), Review of adult learning and literacy (Vol. 6 , pp. 43–69). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. [ Google Scholar ]
Dole, J. A. , Sloan, C. , & Trathen, W. (1995). Teaching vocabulary within the context of literature . Journal of Reading , 38 ( 6 ), 452–460. [ Google Scholar ]
Gardner, D. , & Davies, M. (2013). A new academic vocabulary list . Applied Linguistics , 35 ( 3 ), 305–327. [ Google Scholar ]
Goodwin, A. P. , & Ahn, S. (2013). A meta-analysis of morphological interventions in English: Effects on literacy outcomes for school-age children . Scientific Studies of Reading , 17 ( 4 ), 257–285. [ Google Scholar ]
Graves, M. F. , & Prenn, M. C. (1986). Costs and benefits of various methods of teaching vocabulary . Journal of Reading , 29 ( 7 ), 596–602. [ Google Scholar ]
Hayes, D. P. , & Ahrens, M. (1988). Vocabulary simplification for children: A special case of “motherese.” Journal of Child Language , 15 , 395–410. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
Kieffer, M. J. , & Lesaux, N. K. (2012). Effects of academic language on relational and syntactic aspects of morphological awareness for sixth graders from linguistically diverse backgrounds . Elementary School Journal , 112 ( 3 ), 519–545. [ Google Scholar ]
Margosein, C. M. , Pascarella, E. T. , & Pflaum, S. W. (1982). The effects of instruction using semantic mapping on vocabulary and comprehension . Paper presented at the meeting of the American Educational Research Association, New York, NY. [ Google Scholar ]
Marulis, L. M. , & Neuman, S. B. (2013). How vocabulary interventions affect young children at risk: A meta-analytic review . Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness , 6 , 223–262. [ Google Scholar ]
Mezynski, K. (1983). Issues concerning the acquisition of knowledge: Effects of vocabulary training on reading comprehension . Review of Educational Research , 53 ( 2 ), 253–279. [ Google Scholar ]
McKeown, M. G. , & Beck, I. L. (2014). Effects of vocabulary instruction on measures of language processing: Comparing two approaches . Early Childhood Research Quarterly , 29 ( 4 ), 520–530. [ Google Scholar ]
McKeown, M. G. , Beck, I. L. , Omanson, R. C. , & Pople, M. T. (1985). Some effects of the nature and frequency of vocabulary instruction on the knowledge and use of words . Reading Research Quarterly , 20 , 522–535. [ Google Scholar ]
McKeown, M. G. , Crosson, A. C. , Artz, N. J. , Sandora, C. , & Beck, I. L. (2013). In the media: Expanding students' experience with academic vocabulary . The Reading Teacher , 67 ( 1 ), 45–53. [ Google Scholar ]
McKeown, M. G. , Crosson, A. C. , Beck, I. , Sandora, C. , & Artz, N. (2012). Robust Academic Vocabulary Encounters (RAVE) . Intervention developed for Robust Instruction of Academic Vocabulary for Middle School Students . Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, Award R305A100440.
McKeown, M. G. , Deane, P. D. , Scott, J. A. , Krovetz, R. , & Lawless, R. R. (2017). Vocabulary assessment to support instruction: Building rich word-learning experiences . New York, NY: Guilford. [ Google Scholar ]
Nagy, W. E. , Berninger, V. , Abbott, R. , Vaughan, K. , & Vermeulen, K. (2003). Relationship of morphology and other language skills to literacy skills in at-risk second grade readers and at-risk fourth grade writers . Journal of Educational Psychology , 95 ( 4 ), 730–742. [ Google Scholar ]
Nagy, W. E. , & Scott, J. A. (2000). Vocabulary processes . In Kamil M. L., Mosenthal P. B., David Pearson P., & Barr R. (Eds.), Handbook of reading research (Vol. 3 , pp. 69–284). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. [ Google Scholar ]
National Reading Panel. (2000). Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction (NIH Pub. No. 00-4754) . Washington, DC: National Institutes of Health. [ Google Scholar ]
Perfetti, C. A. (2007). Reading ability: Lexical quality to comprehension . Scientific Studies of Reading , 11 ( 4 ), 357–383. [ Google Scholar ]
Reichle, E. D. , & Perfetti, C. A. (2003). Morphology in word identification: A word-experience model that accounts for morpheme frequency effects . Scientific Studies of Reading , 7 ( 1 ), 219–238. [ Google Scholar ]
Silverman, R. (2007). A comparison of three methods of vocabulary instruction during read-alouds in kindergarten . Elementary School Journal , 108 ( 2 ), 97–113. [ Google Scholar ]
Stahl, S. A. , & Fairbanks, M. M. (1986). The effects of vocabulary instruction: A model-based meta-analysis . Review of Educational Research , 56 , 72–110. [ Google Scholar ]
Stahl, S. A. , & Nagy, W. E. (2006). Teaching word meanings . Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. [ Google Scholar ]
Wasik, B. A. , & Bond, M. A. (2001). Beyond the pages of a book: Interactive book reading and language development in preschool classrooms . Journal of Educational Psychology , 93 , 243–250. [ Google Scholar ]

ALL RESOURCES Pre-Teaching Vocabulary (PTV)

Pre-Teaching Vocabulary (PTV)

Pip st john.

A teaching resource conceived and developed by Pip St John, and published in October 2016 under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 Licence.

Pre-Teaching Vocabulary (PTV) is a vocabulary teaching methodology that uses symbols and pictures from Communicate in Print (or CIP, see http://www.widgit.com ) on visual prompt cards to support teaching children how to learn new words.

Teachers are provided with a range of prompts that support all aspects of word learning (both phonological and semantic). The resources are specialised for whole class, small group and individual settings, and for the use of permanent and temporary classroom displays. PTV resources are designed to encourage children’s ability to learn words independently.

Pre-Teaching Vocabulary provides a structured and principled approach for teaching children how to learn new words. It is particularly effective for teaching children with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN).

PTV aims to support existing teaching methods for word learning and to hone and develop teachers’ existing vocabulary learning strategies. It provides teachers and children with a practical framework upon which to develop critical thinking skills and tools for independent word learning.

Pip St John's Resources

A message from Stephen Parsons, Outgoing Chair

Published 14th June, 2024

Conference summary 2024

Published 3rd May, 2024

We are making progress with DLD

Published 21st February, 2024

Conferences

NAPLIC 2024 Conference videos now available to purchase

The NAPLIC 2024 Conference took place in Birmingham on Saturday April 27th 2024 .

Join NAPLIC for:

Three newsletters every year
Regular enews
Discounted conference rates
Free conference publications

Already a member? Login now

MEMBER AREA
JOIN NAPLIC

IMAGES

FREE RESOURCE
如何对英语学习者进行词汇预教
Pre-teaching Vocabulary
Research on Pre-Teaching Vocabulary: Benefits and Drawbacks
7 Examples of Pre-Teaching for Educators (2024)
Widgit Symbol Resources

COMMENTS

How Does Pre-teaching of Vocabulary and the Use of Technology Increase
Research relating to this topic was found through using Google Scholar using the terms pre-teaching of vocabulary, technology in the classroom, vocabulary and technology. Reviewing related literature reviewed two major themes: pre-teaching of vocabulary is an effective way to improve academic performance, and using technology
Strategies for Pre-Teaching Vocabulary in Context
Pre-teaching vocabulary (PTV) means teaching vocabulary before learners engage with a text or task. It scaffolds learners' processing or production of language, or else focuses attention on lexis within a text or task. The principles for designing PTV activities should reflect the rationale for using PTV in a given context.
Pre-teaching Vocabulary in Teaching Reading Skill: A Hindrance to
Abstract. Pre-teaching vocabulary of unfamiliar words of a reading or listening lesson is a technique used by English language teachers where they define and explain unfamiliar but essential words ...
The Effect of Pre‐reading Instruction on Vocabulary Learning: An
An important, albeit underresearched, method of creating constructed salience in vocabulary learning is pre-reading instruction. Direct teaching of vocabulary is a common pre-reading activity because it "can add to the incidental learning of the same [i.e., pre-taught] words and can raise learners' awareness of particular words so that they ...
3 strategies for pre-teaching vocabulary
Pre-teaching is a teaching strategy that involves introducing learners to new concepts before they are taught explicitly in the classroom. This could include the instruction of subject-specific vocabulary learners should know before they begin a new topic, or it could involve the use of flipped learning to encourage learners to research a ...
Full article: What's Up With Words? A Systematic Review of Designs
Previous reviews of vocabulary research (Wright and Cervetti, Citation 2017) found that most studies were interventions focused on teaching target words. In 37.5% of the current studies, a similar but evolving pattern emerged, with current emphasis on building vocabulary through context, with visual supports, or with the use of a specific ...
PDF Pre-teaching Vocabulary to Improve Comprehension of a Narrative Text
strategies in the area of improved student vocabulary knowledge. Pre-teaching vocabulary prior to reading was the least frequently cited strategy out of the eleven that were shared in the survey. Based on this study, one could conclude that classroom teachers may not know the benefits of pre-teaching and further research is needed to
Strategies for Pre‐Teaching Vocabulary in Context
Therefore, research evidence is clear about the benefits of pre-teaching vocabulary in efficient understanding of the reading text and to perform better in comprehension tasks (Alamri & Rogers ...
Preteaching Strategies to Improve Student Learning in ...
Vocabulary pre-teaching is for instance used in order to facilitate the learning of students with moderate learning disabilities in a general education classroom (Berg and Wehby 2013). It is also ...
How Does Pre-teaching of Vocabulary and the Use of Technology Increase
Understanding science vocabulary is one of the key components leading to student success in mastering science content. This study looks at the research surrounding pre-teaching vocabulary and the use of technology in the classroom. The purpose is to further investigate and deepen knowledge of science vocabulary. This research will use mixed methods of data collection. The study reports ...
Five Research-Based Ways to Teach Vocabulary
The five activities described below are effective ways to teach vocabulary for all students, but especially for struggling students, students with learning disabilities, and ELs. 1. Essential Words Routine. Teachers use a simple graphic organizer to preteach the meanings of important words in about 5 minutes per word.
Vocabulary Development with ELLs
Pre-teach vocabulary. Before doing an activity, teaching content, or reading a story in class, pre-teaching vocabulary is always helpful, especially for ELLs. This will give them the chance to identify words and then be able to place them in context and remember them. You can pre-teach vocabulary by using English as a second language (ESL ...
How to Teach Vocabulary using a Research-Based Approach
We first must put words into a framework where students are asked to categorize the word, provide the function/purpose/features, a synonym, and an antonym/shade of meaning (more on this to follow in #6 - Explicit). Then, using the word in context can help students understand how to apply the word. Multiple-meaning words are another great way to ...
7 Examples of Pre-Teaching for Educators (2024)
7 Examples of Pre-Teaching. 1. Vocabulary Lists. Vocabulary lists are the most common form of pre-teaching the help English language learners prepare for an upcoming lesson. The teacher gives the students a list of words that need to be used in the upcoming unit of work. The students study the words so that they will be able to use them in the ...
Pre-teaching Content and Vocabulary
Pre-teaching content and vocabulary can help prepare students for content-area instruction by giving them a chance to get familiar with the material prior to the lesson. ... research-based information, activities, and advice for educators and families of English language learners (ELLs). Colorín Colorado is an educational service of WETA, the ...
Preteaching Strategies to Improve Student Learning in Content Area
Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 26, 627-642. Crossref. Google Scholar. Heverly J. (2011). Why I no longer teach vocabulary. English Journal, 100(4), 98-100. Google Scholar. Hudson P. (1996). Using a learning set to increase the test performance of students with learning disabilities in social studies classes.
What is pre-teaching?
Limited vocabulary is one of the biggest obstacles to learners' writing and reading comprehension.A lack of varied and academic vocabulary directly affects a learner's ability to understand a subject and, as a result, they can begin to fall behind their peers in the classroom. Pre-teaching provides learners with an understanding of concepts before they are discussed in the classroom and ...
Instructional strategies for words learning: the case of preschool
Effective word-learning strategies are essential for the development of language skills, cognitive processes, and learning success in young children. This paper describes a study conducted to compare the effectiveness of three different methods of teaching words at preschool age. The study used the C-LWAT (Complex Test for Word Acquisition in Preschool Children) methodology. Three hundred ...
PDF Pre-teaching Vocabulary in Teaching Reading Skill: A Hindrance to
This study attempted to justify pre-teaching vocabulary in teaching reading skills in the EFL or ESL context. While casting light on the effectiveness of this technique, this paper reviewed the ...
Effective Vocabulary Instruction Fosters Knowing Words, Using Words
Research on vocabulary development, vocabulary instruction, and its relationship to comprehension has a long and rich history (see Baumann, ... pre-K through high school; learners learning English as an additional language; and learners with learning disabilities. ... Teaching vocabulary within the context of literature. Journal of Reading, 38 ...
NAPLIC
PTV resources are designed to encourage children's ability to learn words independently. Pre-Teaching Vocabulary provides a structured and principled approach for teaching children how to learn new words. It is particularly effective for teaching children with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN). PTV aims to support existing ...
Pre-Teaching Vocabulary
Pre-teaching vocabulary is a strategy in which teachers introduce students to new vocabulary words before reading a text selection that contains the new vocabulary words. ... Research has shown that this strategy will help students by helping to improve their comprehension of the text they are reading. (Miller and Veatch, 2011, p.19) Pre ...
A Systematic Review of Mathematics Vocabulary Interventions for
This systematic review synthesizes the effects of mathematics vocabulary interventions on the mathematics outcomes of students with mathematics difficulty (MD) in Grades K through 12. We evaluated methodological rigor using three indicators: research design, implementation fidelity, and instruction in the counterfactual.
The Effects of Vocabulary Pre-teaching and Pre-questioning on
Therefore, research evidence is clear about the benefits of pre-teaching vocabulary in efficient understanding of the reading text and to perform better in comprehension tasks (Alamri & Rogers ...