Building Bridges for Emergent Bilinguals, Part

V: Developing Vocabulary Across Content Areas

Rebecca Curinga, PD CoordinatorAika Swai, Program Coordinator

PD Session #5April 26, 2014Syracuse Teacher Center

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Agenda10:00 Review of ‘Reading to Learn’ and the Read

Retell-Respond Method10:45 How Bridges students acquire new vocabulary

12:00 Lunch

12:30 Teaching vocabulary with Concept Maps using the Bridges Curriculum

1:45 Practicing methods of vocabulary development across content areas using the

Bridges Curriculum3:00 Wrap-Up, Homework and Evaluation

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Activity 1:Review from last session

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HW Review: ‘Reading to Learn’

•Think-pair-share, your experience with:• Developing Before, During, and After activities.

•Read-Retell-Respond method• Extension activities focusing on cueing systems in

‘reading to learn’•You have five minutes to discuss your

experiences.•Be prepared to share one effective new

method you incorporated for either Before, During or After reading.

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Reading Stages

•Learning to Read: up to 3rd grade•Learning the ‘mechanics’ of reading•Confirmation of oral language and concepts you

already know

•Reading to Learn: 4th grade and up•Fluency and automaticity in reading •New concepts and information are learned

through reading

Reading Comprehension

Top Down

Bottom up

Components of Reading

Pragmatics & World Knowledge

Semantics/Vocabulary

Morphological Skills

Syntax

Phonological Skills

Print Concepts 7

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Today’s Goals

To be able to:•Identify the components of vocabulary knowledge

and how they apply to Bridges students.

•Understand how to use Concept Maps to help Bridges students acquire new vocabulary.

•Learn and practice word play activities to directly aid reading comprehension for Bridges students.

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Activities for Goal 1:How do Bridges students acquire new vocabulary?

Vocabulary

Breadth

•How many words do you know?

Depth

•How much do you know about each word?

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What does a monolingual’s vocabulary look like?

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semantic: an edible part of a plant,

usually fleshy and containing seeds;

banana, apple, orange; vegetables,

dairy, meat

collocations/idioms: bear

fruit, forbidden fruit, fruits of

one’s labor

frequency: 43 times per million

words; easily accessible

phonological: [fru:t], [fru:ts], [fru:te]

rhymes with suit; sounds like fresh,

friend, front

morphological:fruit-s, fruit-y

syntactic: (noun) a, the fruit; fruit

pragmatic: general term;

no specific context

fruit

What does it mean to know a word?

(Beck, McKeown & Kucan, 2002; Nagy & Scott, 2000)

I never

heard it

I have

a sense of it

I know it

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FRUIT

DEPOSITION

MENDACIOUS

Knowledge of a word is incremental!

How many words do we actually know?

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10%

90%

Our oral vocabulary = Approximately 20,000 word families e.g. life: lives, lived, alive, life-

less, lively

High Frequency (but, so, because, man woman)

Low Frequency (ancestors, melanin, absorb)

(Nation, 1993)

How does this translate into what we are reading?

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80%

20%

Frequency of written words

High Frequency (but, so, because, man woman)

Low Frequency (ancestors, melanin, absorb)

(Nation, 1993)

What does the bilingual’s vocabulary look like?

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fruit, fruto/fruta

phonological: [fru:t], [‘fru:to] [‘fru:ta]rhymes with suit; bruta; sounds like fruto/a, frente, frío, fresh, friend, front

morphological:fruit-s, fruit-y

fruto-s, fruta-s

syntactic:el fruto; la fruta

pragmatic: general term;

no specific context

semantic: an edible part of a plant, usually fleshy and containing

seedsbanana, apple, orange; vegetables, dairy, meat

collocations/idioms:bear fruit – dar fruto

forbidden fruit – fruta prohibida

fruits of one’s labor – frutos de su trabajo

frequency: fruit: 43x pmwfruto: 18x pmwfruta: 24x pmw

Summary of vocabulary knowledge• Complex network of interrelated knowledge• Continues to change and grow throughout the

lifespan • Takes years of wide-spread exposure to a language to acquire a “native-like” lexicon

A bilingual is not the sum of two monolinguals! 16

(Grosjean, 1989)

Learning new words in English for Bridges students

1. Concepts and vocabulary in home language, just new vocabulary word• e.g. family, book

2. New concept and new vocabulary word • privacy – no translation in many languages• equation – there is a word in home language

but Bridges students don’t know it 17

Word Sort Activity

Make two piles of words:1. Words Bridges students will most likely

have a concept for and know the word in home language

2. Words that will most likely be new concepts for Bridges students

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Summary of Bridges students’ vocabulary

• Some universal concepts in home language but many are culturally specific

• Many “everyday” words in home language, but need academic words/concepts in both languages• Everyday words are often Tier 1• Academic words can be Tier 2 or Tier 3• Academic words and new concepts need to be

explicitly taught20

Vocabulary in the Bridges Curriculum

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ELA, Unit 2, Week 1

•What are some methods you currently use to teach different types of vocabulary in your classroom?

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Teaching Bridges students strategies for learning new vocabulary

Tier 1: Picture Glossary

Tier 1 & Tier 2: Word Wall

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Turtle

Bridges vocabulary strategies continued

Tier 2 • Word play activities• Vocabulary binder

Tier 3• Concept Maps• Word Study

notebooks 24

• Keep words alive through repetition and reinforcement

• Provide rich and varied language experiences• Keep a well-stocked classroom library

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Activities for Goal 2:Understanding vocabulary instruction using Concept Maps

Unit 2 ELA, Week 5, Lesson 21

Develop a concept map for the ELA central concept:

STRONG26

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(Chularut & DeBacker, 2004)

Example concept map

Concept maps in Bridges

1. Always start with ideas students know best •with pictures and HOME LANGUAGE

2. Show relationship between ideas on map•write the relationship on the line (an example of…)

3. Understanding of the central concept grows within a context defined by the Focus Question (and Essential Question)

4. Return to definition to refine throughout the unit 28

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Measuring vocabulary outcomes in Bridges

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Activities for Goal 3:Practicing word play activities to directly aid reading comprehension for Bridges students

A Model of Second Language Reading

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(Bernhardt, 1994)

Vocabulary in text• About 1-3 new words can be figured out

through understanding word parts• indicate indicates, indicated, indication,

indicator• Cognates: árbol (Spanish “tree”) arboretum

• More exposure to words helps develop knowledge about the word (need at least 8+ encounters)

• Rich contexts, and knowing how to use textual cues aid word knowledge 33

(Nagy & Anderson, 1984; Sternberg, 1987; Ellis, 1995)

Bridges Word Play activities

Repetition, varied experience, language practice, differentiation•Do-think-say•Word Connection •Word Sort •Visual literacy

•Picture label•Word match

•Dramatization 34

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Application / Practice in Content Area Groups

Participants develop a vocabulary exercise in content areas from menu of word-play activities.1. Develop an activity that supports the vocabulary

of the week using Tier 1 and Tier 2 vocabulary from the Bridges Curriculum in your content area.

2. Think about how the activity connects with what you learned about vocabulary knowledge.

3. Share your activity with the other groups.

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Summary of Today’s PD Session

•What has changed in your understanding of how Bridges students acquire vocabulary?

•What is one thing you will do in your classroom this week to help build vocabulary knowledge?

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Homework Assignment: Practicing Vocabulary Methods

Document your experience with the following and be prepared to share at the next PD (April 4): •Build vocabulary activities to expand breadth and

depth of vocabulary knowledge of your students using your classroom content.•Create a Concept Map for a Tier 2 or Tier 3 word.•Develop at least two word play activities that help to

deepen knowledge of the Tier 1 and Tier 2 vocabulary words.

•Implement the activity with your current students.

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Recommended Reading• Hiebert, F. Vocabulary Unpacked. Text Project and

University of California, Santa Cruz in partnership with NYC Office of English Language Learners.

• Graves, M. F., August, D., & Mancilla-Martinez, J. (2013). Teaching vocabulary to English language learners. Teachers College Press.

• Beck, I. L., McKeown, M. G., & Kucan, L. (2013). Bringing words to life: Robust vocabulary instruction. Guilford Press.