Check for Understanding: Post after ZOOM Meetings (by 11:59)

Directions: Please record bulleted highlights, questions, and/or concerns for each of the items below. Please be prepared to use this sheet for
talking points in the instructor led ZOOM meetings.

Assigned Reading: Assigned Viewing:

Beck, chapters 1-5
Chapter 1:
- Over the 10 years since Bringing Words to Life was first
published, several investigators have dealt with research about n/a
what classroom vocabulary instruction is like, and each has
concluded that instruction was wanting – less-than-robust
classroom practice.
- Early world learning takes place through oral contexts, and oral
environments play a role forever, but under most conditions
they begin to play a lesser role. (words they already know)
- Many words in the language do not call for attention. It is this
situation that makes direct instruction in word meanings
feasible, for if most words in the language required instruction
equally, clearly there would be too many words to cover in
school.

Chapter 2:
- Tier 1: typically found in oral language, tier 2: comprises of
wide ranging words of high utility for literate language users,
and tier 3: limited to specific domains
- Four kinds of vocabulary to consider (high frequency,
academic, technical, and low frequency)
- If students are to become successful in academic life, they need
to be able to get meaning from text, which in turn means being
able to build meaning using the more sophisticated vocabulary
of written language.

Chapter 3:
- When in the course of a lesson to introduce new words and how
many to introduce at once?
- Keeping the comprehension goal in mind should also influence
 the number of words introduced either before or during reading.
- Another aspect of creating an explanation with an eye toward
accessible language is developing it in such a way that students
will attend to the whole explanation. We don’t want some
words to take on unintended emphasis.

Chapter 4:
- Studies show that young students can benefit from robust
vocabulary instruction.
- Vocabulary instruction always began with a context from the
story because it provided a situation that was already familiar to
children and provided a rich example of the word’s use.
- In addition to providing other contexts, and often multiple other
contexts, teachers need to work with their students, as the one
in the foregoing example did, to help them move the word
beyond one context or one use.

Chapter 5:
- Students must be able to make context and connections around
words so that they can hold on to it, without that the word will
just a isolated piece of information.
- Use a follow up question or exit ticket where students are asked
to differentiate between two descriptions to show if they
understand the target word.
- Attention needs to given to words on at least 3 days, so that
there is some follow-up to simply introducing words.

Assigned Handouts: Discussion Forum Highlights:

It is very useful to have students record their descriptions, explanations, n/a

and examples in a vocabulary notebook.
Direct instruction in vocabulary is a critical aspect of literacy
development. Synthesizing research and theory on direct vocabulary
instruction into an innovative six-step instructional process enables
classroom teachers to teach and reinforce selected vocabulary terms
with success
sk students to restate the description, explanation, or example
in their own words – I Like this because this holds students accountable

Instructor Led Zoom Session Notes: Other:

- 40,000 words for adults

- 6,000 for 2nd grader
- 20,000 5th grader
- 2,000-3,000 – new words for kids
- New words in a year- depends on how much you read each year n/a
- 30 million word gap
- 8-10 exposures to own a word
- No (context clues and dictionary)
- 4-6 words at a time, not 20
- 4 different types of context