I Teach PreK!July 10, 2017 - July 13, 2017

4F-450 Made for PreK: Fun Ways to Build Oral Language &Vocabulary

Alison Schmerler

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Made for PreK—Fun Ways to Build Oral Language & Vocabulary

Presented by: Alison Schmerler

Topics ¡ What is oral language? ¡ How can we formally assess oral language? ¡ What are the functions/purposes for which children use language? ¡ How can we easily support oral language and vocabulary growth every

day? What is oral language? The term oral language refers to the ability to actively speak and listen to communicate, to learn, and to thrive. “Children’s early experience with words accumulates as a dictionary of meanings, synonyms, antonyms, and slang expressions…early interactions set up an entire approach to words as symbols for experience.” Why is oral language important? Oral language is the foundation for understanding written text. Word knowledge is the cornerstone of reading comprehension. “The more teachers intentionally make time for talking and sharing experiences…the more support there is for children’s language development and later reading comprehension success.”

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• Semantics: The way words are used in a given context • Vocabulary: Word meanings and pronunciations

Assessing Semantics & Vocabulary * Does the child understand and use a growing number of…

• accurate words for the situation? • relational terms? • synonyms and antonyms? • words with multiple meanings?

Syntax

• The order of words within a sentence • Understanding the rules for developing sentences

Morphology

• Using correct word endings, prefixes, suffixes • Understanding that word parts can be added to or taken away from words

to form new meanings Assessing Syntax and Morphology

• Does the child... – use past tenses? – use contractions? – use regular and irregular verb forms? (e.g., run/ran; stand, stood) – use pronouns (e.g., he, she, it) and time-related adverbs (e.g.,

today, yesterday, later, now, all day).

Assessing Oral Language Development

Semantics

Morphology Phonology

Syntax

Pragmatics

Vocabulary Vocabulary

Semantics

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Phonology Understanding that the smallest units of sound can be combined to make words Assessing Phonology

• Does the child... – Use age-appropriate speech? – Engage in language play

– singing songs and reciting rhymes – clapping number of syllables in words – matching beginning, ending, medial sounds in words – blending and segmenting sounds in words – substituting sounds in words

Pragmatics

• Understanding use of language appropriate for given situations (e.g., greeting, making requests, giving information, responding to communication from others).

Assessing Pragmatics

• Does the child... – use age-appropriate conversational skills? – interact in an age-appropriate manner with peers? – use language for a variety of functions?

Halliday’s Functions of Language

ResearcherMichaelHallidayidentifiedsevenfunctionsoflanguageusedbyyoungchildren.Thesefunctionsrepresentwaysthatwewantallyoungchildrentobeabletouselanguage.

1. Theinstrumentalfunctionisusedtogetneedsandwantsmet:“Ineedadrinkofwater.”

2. Theregulatoryisusedtoregulate,orcontrol,thebehaviorofothers.Thisfunctionissometimesusedinappropriately,butisimportantinorderforchildrentobeabletoprotectthemselves:

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“It’smyturntoswingnow!”

3. Theinteractionalfunctioninvolvesinteractingsociallywithothers:“Doyouwanttoplaywithme?”

4. Thepersonalfunctionissimilar,butinvolvesthesharingofpersonalideas,feelingsandemotions:“Mymomisgoingtohaveanewbaby.”

5. Heuristicisthetermusedtodenoteinquiryorinquisitiveness.Childrenusethisfunctiontoquestionandexplore:“Whydidtheredandyellowpaintmakeorange?

6. Theimaginativefunctionisimportantforcreativityandenhanceschildren’sabilitytocreatementalimagesofcharacters,settingsandactionsinstories:“Let’spretendwe’regoingonanairplane.”

7. Therepresentationalfunctionisusedwhenchildrenaresharingfactualinformationthatisnotofapersonalnature:“IknowallaboutTyrannosaurusRex.He’sabigdinosaurthateatsotheranimals.”

Itisimportanttonotethatweoftenseeacombinationofthesefunctions,suchaswhenchildrenareengagedinsocialinteractionsduringimaginativeplayencounters.Theymayevenattempttoregulatethebehaviorsofothersasapartoftheirimaginativerole-playing.

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FunctionsofLanguageUse:ObservationFormName: Age:Date: Time:Setting: Activity:LANGUAGEFUNCTION OBSERVATIONS/EXAMPLESInstrumentalRegulatoryImaginativeInteractivePersonalHeuristicInformativeComments:SuggestionsforPlanning:

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Try High-Quality Talk

¡ Asking thought-provoking questions ¡ Giving sufficient wait time for answers ¡ Responding to children specifically and directly ¡ Talking frequently in a positive tone of voice

Encourage children to think by asking questions such as:

¡ Have you thought about…? ¡ What will happen if you…? ¡ What is your problem? ¡ How can you find out about…? ¡ What happens when you test…? ¡ Why do you think this will happen…? ¡ How can you fix this..?

Discussion Tools: Turn and Talk Speaking Frames—I am happy when…. Productive Talk Tools: Share, expand, clarify—Can you say more about….? Listen to one another—Who can repeat what Alex just said? Reasoning—Why do you think? Think together—Who can add to Jamar’s idea? Metacommunication—Why is is important to listen carefully to each other?

Building Oral Language

Talk a LOT

Teach Academic Language

Model rich vocabulary

Questioning

Expectation &

opportunity for talk

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Become a “word-conscious” teacher Deliberate modeling of sophisticated vocabulary builds “word consciousness”— of both the teacher and the child—and can increase students’ vocabularies. Building Word Knowledge

Tier 1. Basic Words: Words that need little instruction in meaning (e.g., baby, happy, clock, mother, to, they)

Tier 2. General Academic/Rich Words: Rich words, often with more precise or subtle words used frequently in texts and found across a variety of domains (e.g., absurd, fortunate, earnest, sincere). Words with multiple meanings (e.g., run, show, field)

Tier 3. Domain Specific/Content Words: Words that are often specific to particular disciplines and do not appear frequently in texts from a variety of other disciplines.

Step One: Selecting Words for Study Words selected for study should be . . .

• High frequency words found across many subject areas

• Potentially useful

• Interesting

• Not too difficult to explain in words children will understand

Step Two: Developing Child-Friendly Explanations & Examples

• Start with a strong focused concept of what the word means.

• Ask yourself, “When do I use this word?”

• Use everyday language students can understand and include examples in your explanation.

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Step Three: Developing Instructional Talk

• Call attention to a target word as used in the book.

• “Think aloud” for children.

• Share child-friendly explanation.

• Provide examples and associations.

Word Scales:

Frigid, icy, cold, cool, warm, hot, scorching, burning

Catch a Word Charts:

Keep tally lists of rich words that you and the children use.

Use Tier 2 and Tier 3 words in Centers:

Blocks Art

Tier 1 share, big, small color, paint, picture

Tier 2 balance, structure observe, stunning

Tier 3 perpendicular symmetrical

Build Oral Language and Vocabulary with Read-Alouds

Reading aloud to young children, especially when accompanied by discussion before and after reading, is perhaps the most effective way to increase children’s vocabularies.

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Read-Alouds

Things to remember:

u Read and reread books

u Use large and small group settings

u Explore all parts of the book

u Give the children something to look for

u Ask them to describe the illustrations/photographs

u Read without showing the illustrations—occasionally

Easy, Effective Language Activities

u Use common everyday objects to give a real purpose to communicating with words—water bottle

u Play Let’s Go to the …. Pick a destination: farm, zoo, library, etc. Ask senses-based questions about each destination.

u Play Movement, Movement. Act out new movement words: wriggle, squirm, creep, scramble.

u Play Make a Face. Make faces for scowl, frown, pout, thrilled, joyful, surprised.

u Once Upon a Time Bag—Fill a drawstring bag with various objects or pictures. Take them out one at a time and help children tell a story about them.

u Make a telescope to play I Spy.

u Use puppets to encourage language.

u Play Twenty Questions with real classroom objects.

u Play I’m Thinking of a “Rich” Word. I’m thinking of the word that means a person who studies the weather. (meteorologist)

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u Play Odd Word Out—happy, glad, angry, cheerful

u Play Categories—name everything that is red.

u Play Change the Word. The giant pumpkin weighed over 100 pounds! What other word could we use in place of giant?

u Play Would You Rather? Have a picnic or go to a restaurant?

u Hide pictures behind small “windows” and ask children to guess the hidden picture.

u Use real objects to demonstrate and practice positional words.

u Play Simon Says, I Spy, and Hokey Pokey using positional words in the directions.

LIST OF RELATED CITATIONS

MADE FOR PREK—FUN WAYS TO BUILD ORAL LANGUAGE AND VOCABULARY

PRESENTED BY STAFF DEVELOPMENT EDUCATORS (SDE)

ALISON SCHMERLER

Apel, K. and Lawrence, J. (2011) “Contributions of Morphological Awareness Skills to Word-Level Reading and Spelling in First-Grade Children With and Without Speech Sound Disorder.”Journal of Speech, Language, Hearing Research. Apel, K and Werfel, K. (2014) “Using Morphological Awareness Instruction to Improve Written Language Skills. “PubMed. Beck, Isabel, McKeown, Margaret, and Kucan, Linda. (2013). Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction. New York:The Guilford Press. Blum, I., Koskinen, P., Bhartiya, P., and Hluboky, S. (2010). “Thinking and Talking About Books: Using Prompts to Stimulate Discussion.” The Reading Teacher. Developing Early Literacy: Report of the National Early Literacy Panel. (2009). National Literacy Institute. Ehlert, Lois. (2014) Lots of Spots. New York:Little Simon. Goldstein, P and Randolph, K. (2017).”Word Play Promoting Vocabulary in Learning Centers.” Young Children

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Halliday, M. (1969). “Relevant Models of Language.” Educational Review. Hart, B., & Risley, T. R. (1995). Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young American Children. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Company. Hutton, J., Horowitz-Kraus, T., Mendelsohn, A, DeWitt, T, and Holland, S, the C-MIND Authorship Consortium. (2015) Home Reading Environment and Brain Activation in Preschool Children Listening to Stories. Pediatrics. Lane, H and Allen, S. (2010) “The Vocabulary Rich Classroom: Modeling Sophisticated Word Use to PromoteWord Consciousness and Vocabulary Growth.” The Reading Teacher. Layne, S. (2015). “The Simple Things.” Reading Today. Pinnell, G. S. (2002). Ways to look at the functions of children’s language. In Power, B.and Hubbard, R. (Eds.) Language Development: A Reader for Teachers. New York: Pearson. Rowland, Pleasant T. (2002). Happily Ever After. Middleton, WI: Rowland Reading Foundation. Test, J., Cunningham, D., and Lee, A. (2010). “Talking With Young Children: How Teachers Encourage Learning.” Dimensions of Early Childhood. Van der Veen, C, van der Wilt, F, van Kruistum, C, van Oers, B, and Michaels, S. (2017). “MODEL2TALK: An Intervention to Promote Productive Classroom Talk.” The Reading Teacher.