Another Vocab Strategy...cloze!

Here is another technique that I knew...but may have forgotten.  Back in the days when I taught k-2, I always made charts and used color.  I still do...but then, I was more interactive. I would often give students a word card and have them place it on a big book page, or in a pocket chart or even on a chart.  Why did I never think to do this with upper grades? 

Here is another strategy I "re-learned" at the FOSS embedded language workshop.  Why not take the information from your study guide and make a review chart on it?  Then hand out the vocab cards and have the kids tape them in the right spot? You can use it more than once...simply take the cards off and do it again. Our students with limited language knowledge really benefit from the repetition, the color and the concrete application. 

Next, I stepped it up a notch and added one for a scientific diagram.  Here in Virginia, we have to teach the students all the names of the part of the flower.  It is REALLY HARD for me to remember, much less, the students.  So, I made a diagram with the terms on them to practice several times as a warm up or review.

Let me caution,,,this does NOT take the place of the hands-on activity.  I wouldn't use either chart until the kids had had multiple exposure to plants in a hands-on way. Active engagement is KEY to understanding.  However, review and practice is too...

Making Meaning - vocabulary development

Here's a great technique I learned from FOSS last week that work's really well at the end of a unit or simply to review a tough concept. We did this in a workshop after we had had several hands-on activities exploring these concepts.  I would NEVER do this from just a reading of a non-fiction piece.  After all, FOSS believes in "building conceptual meaning through experience."

First you write out several vocabulary words on sticky notes.  I would make four sets so that each table could work on it together.  You would also give each table a piece of chart paper.

Here is a suggested list:  air, gas, volume, molecules, pressure, copress, expand, push.

Directions:

1. Determine how the words/concepts are related.
2. Organize in groupings on chart paper.
3. Draw lines between related terms.
4. On the lines, write some words showing how terms are related.

Here are some examples of what we did at the workshop.

I really liked being able to move the sticky notes around because we continued to debate abou how we wanted to place them....

Hope you can use this!

How do you teach science vocabulary in a way that makes sense?

Vocabulary has always been a sticking point in many of our students lives.  Some come from families where they use enriching vocabulary without even knowing it....they take walks together and observe the leaves changing in the fall.  They read books together and when they get to a word the child doesn't know...they talk about it.  Some families have deep conversations at the dinner table talking about world events or something interesting that happened at their work.  In those families, vocabulary is naturally developed in context of the world around them.

In other families...not so much.  And so, when they come to our classrooms and we throw out words like niche, population and community they look at us like...huh????

When I want to teach a new word or concept in my classroom, I try to do it as I did with my own two boys in natural settings.  I may highlight a word when I'm reading aloud that is interesting or confusing.  We may write the word on a card and stick it up to come back to later. 

In science, I try to do the same thing.  For example, this week we were introducing the concept of niche.  We decided to use our worms as a way to introduce the idea of roles in an ecosystem.  This is the result:

You can see we started with the focus question:  What role do worms have in our school yard ecosystem?  Then I started reading a non-fiction book about worms to them so we could learn about the roles of our worms. We learned about the band on the worms and how it usually carries the eggs, the cocoons or eggs that they will drop and the castings or poop.  As we read we learned that the worm helps to loosen the soil through tunnels, the castings make the soil richer and many animals eat them.

The students were then introduced to the word niche and told that niche is just the scientific word for role of an animals in a habitat.

They seemed to get that concept pretty easily.

I am have also posted some ideas for Vocabulary in Science in my documents side bar.  This is FREE for this week and then I will take it off when I post it on Teacher's Pay Teachers next weekend. .  I hope to feature more throughout the week.

Vocabulary in Science...a great strategy!

     I know I talk A LOT about FOSS on this blog, but I also LOVE Seeds of Science; Roots of Reading. (http://scienceandliteracy.org/)  I use two units in my fourth grade classroom - Planets and Moons and Weather.  My students and I love how they connect literacy to science in meaningful and enriching ways. 
     One of my favorite strategies is called "Science/Everyday Words".  In this strategy, you will make a class chart to record science content words and the "everyday" words that help our students connect to the word meaning.  For example:

Science Word	Everyday Word
Data Precipitation Evidence observer	Information Rain, sleet, or snow Clues look

  
I like to have a copy of the chart with the science words posted first and the everyday word side left blank.  As we go through the lesson or unit and we come to the word, we add them in. It seems to work really well and the kids make a connection.  In fact, it worked so well we use it in other content areas - like social studies, math and even reading. 

If you go to my documents link, there is a FREE PDF with the instructions and a blank worksheet to use as a model or even to give the students to keep track of the words as you go along. 

Hope you enjoy it!