The Academic Vocabulary Code

Words that Shape Societies

Dee Gardner
Brigham Young University
USOE CRT PROFICIENCY RESULTS
GRADE 4 2008
Science Math
All Students 62% 75%

Ethnicity
Asian 65% 81%
African American 39% 51%
Caucasian 70% 80%
Hispanic 31% 53%
American Indian 32% 53%
Pacific Islander 41% 67%

ELL 21% 45%

Non-ELL 67% 78%

Migrant 20% 44%

Non-Migrant 63% 75%

Eco. Disadv 45% 63%

Non-Eco Disadv 73% 82%

Adapted from http://www.schools.utah.gov/assessment/documents/Results_CRT_Report_2008.pdf

USOE CRT PROFICIENCY RESULTS
GRADE 12 2008

Science Math
All Students 55% 29%

Ethnicity
Asian 59% 29%
African American 23% 13%
Caucasian 62% 35%
Hispanic 29% 17%
American Indian 20% 20%
Pacific Islander 19% 23%

ELL 16% 13%

Non-ELL 57% 31%

Migrant 14% 10%

Non-Migrant 55% 29%

Eco. Disadv 38% 27%

Non-Eco Disadv 60% 30%
 Based on 2007 National Assessment
of Educational Progress (NAEP) Report
(from Goldenberg, 2008)

“…fourth-grade ELLs scored 36 points below non-ELLs in reading and

25 points below non-ELLs in math. The gaps among eighth-graders
were even larger—42 points in reading and 37 points in math.”

“Whatever the explanation for these achievement gaps, they bode ill
for English learners’ future educational and vocational options.”

“They also bode ill for society as a whole, since the costs of large-scale
underachievement are very high.”
 Preventing The Fourth-Grade Slump

“Students seem to need three kinds of strengths in order to

progress to Stage 3 [Reading to Learn]: sufficient knowledge of
the meanings of more academic and abstract words, sufficient
reasoning ability to understand the more difficult texts, and
facility with reading skills—word recognition, and decoding, and
fluency.”
(Chall, 2000)
Academic Vocabulary Knowledge

Academic Reading Skills

Academic Success

Economic Opportunity

Societal Well-Being
The Gate-keeping Tests of Education
are Primarily Tests of Reading Ability

By Extension,

They are Also Tests of

Robust Vocabulary Knowledge
UBSCT ACT GRE

SAT
CRT
LSAT
GMAT MCAT
 UBSCT Sample
Spiders Centipedes Sow Bugs.  Spray webs and places where these
 pests crawl.  Hit as many as possible.  Repeat as necessary storage and
 disposal statement storage store in an area inaccessible to children
 and away from heat or open flame disposal this container may be
 recycled in the few but growing number of communities where 
aerosol can recycling is available before offering for recycling empty 
the can by using the product according to the label do not puncture 
if recycling is not available do not reuse empty container wrap the
container and discard in the trash precautionary statements hazards
 to humans and domestic animals caution harmful  if absorbed 
through the skin keep out of the reach of children avoid contact with 
skin eyes and clothing do not remain in enclosed areas after use 
ventilate enclosed areas before returning avoid contamination of 
food remove plants pets and birds before using cover and turn off 
fish aquariums wash hands thoroughly with soap and water after 
handling statement of practical treatment if on skin remove with 
soap and water if irritation persists seek medical  attention
environmental hazards do not apply directly to water this pesticide
 is toxic to fish 
Consider our English Language Learners’
Vocabulary Development
with the End in Mind

Academic Literacy
“I am currently tutoring children in an orphanage in beautiful
Nepal. The children go to a private English-medium school. One
of the boys has been placed in remedial classes because of his
math. Everyone has assumed that he is slow, but after I started
tutoring him I realized that he has no idea what his teachers are
saying in his math class (he has BICS, no CALP). I spent time
tutoring him in English vocab for math (based on his textbook),
and he can finally complete his math homework in less than 4
hours! Now I spend my time writing math-based English
materials for him while he's at school. . . If more teachers
understood these issues, a lot more ESL/EFL children would be
able to succeed in school!”
Rachel Wood (BYU TESOL MA Graduate)
 95-98%
Vocabulary Threshold
for
Basic Reading
Comprehension
When we are -------- -----, I ---- that
your ---- of the ---------- ------ ------
-------- -------- will be -------* -------,
---------- with ------- to the ---------------
------------ between ------- --------- and
---------- ---------.

44% Word Knowledge

When we are -------- today, I ---- that
your ---- of the --------- facing
------language -------- will be -------
forever, ---------- with ------- to the
---------- ------------between reading
--------- and vocabulary ---------.

63% Word Knowledge

When we are finished today, I hope
that your view of the --------- facing
second language learners will be
changed forever, ---------- with -------
to the ---------- relationship between
reading abilities and vocabulary
knowledge.

88% Word Knowledge

When we are finished today, I hope
that your view of the challenges
facing second language learners will
be changed forever, especially with
regard to the ---------- relationship
between reading abilities and
vocabulary knowledge.

97% Word Knowledge

Test Question:

What kind of relationship

exists between vocabulary
knowledge and reading
abilities?
When we are finished today, I hope
that your view of the challenges
facing second language learners will
be changed forever, especially with
regard to the reciprocal relationship
between reading abilities and
vocabulary knowledge.

100% Word Knowledge

Richard Anderson:

“We found small but highly reliable increments in word

knowledge attributable to reading at all grades and ability
levels. The overall likelihood ranged from better than 1 in
10 when children were reading easy narratives [fiction] to
near zero when they were reading difficult expositions.” (p.
61)

Anderson, R. C. (1996). Research foundations to support wide reading. In V. Greaney (Ed.), Promoting reading in
developing countries (pp. 55-77). Newark, Delaware:International Reading Association.
 Sample Fiction Text
From A Wrinkle in Time

Everybody was asleep. Everybody except Meg. Even

Charles Wallace, the “dumb baby brother,” who had an
uncanny way of knowing when she was awake and unhappy,
and who would come so many nights tiptoeing up the attic
stairs to her even Charles Wallace was asleep.
How could they sleep? All day on the radio there had been
hurricane warnings. How could they leave her up in the attic in
the rickety brass bed, knowing that the roof might be blown
right off the house and she tossed out into the wild night sky
to land who knows where? Her shivering grew uncontrollable.
You asked to have the attic bedroom, she told herself
savagely. Mother let you have it because you are the oldest.

Anglo-Saxon Words: 94.4% Greek-Latin Words: 5.6%

Academic Word List: 0%

 Sample Science Text
Source: CK-12 Foundation

The early earth had no oceans and was frequently hit

with meteorites and asteroids. There were also
frequent volcanic eruptions. Volcanic eruptions
released water vapor that eventually cooled to form the
oceans. The atmosphere slowly became more oxygen
rich as solar radiation split water molecules and
cyanobacteria began the process of photosynthesis.
Eventually the atmosphere became like it is today and
rich in oxygen. The first complex organisms on earth
first developed about 2 billion years ago.

Anglo-Saxon Words: 75% Greek-Latin Words: 25%

Academic Word List: 6.5%

 UBSCT Sample
Spiders Centipedes Sow Bugs.  Spray webs and places where these
 pests crawl.  Hit as many as possible.  Repeat as necessary storage and
 disposal statement storage store in an area inaccessible to children
 and away from heat or open flame disposal this container may be
 recycled in the few but growing number of communities where 
aerosol can recycling is available before offering for recycling empty 
the can by using the product according to the label do not puncture 
if recycling is not available do not reuse empty container wrap the
container and discard in the trash precautionary statements hazards
 to humans and domestic animals caution harmful  if absorbed 
through the skin keep out of the reach of children avoid contact with 
skin eyes and clothing do not remain in enclosed areas after use 
ventilate enclosed areas before returning avoid contamination of 
food remove plants pets and birds before using cover and turn off 
fish aquariums wash hands thoroughly with soap and water after 
handling statement of practical treatment if on skin remove with 
soap and water if irritation persists seek medical  attention
environmental hazards do not apply directly to water this pesticide
 is toxic to fish 

Anglo-Saxon Words: 68.3% Greek-Latin Words: 31.7%

Academic Word List: 9.2%
The number one problem for ELLs taking the
UBSCT, CRT, and UALPA tests is VOCABULARY,
in terms of both understanding the
instructions and actually comprehending the
content of the tests.

From Personal Communication with Delia Allan (ELL Liaison and Test Proctor for
Nebo School District)
What to do?
1. We must care.

2. We must understand the nature of academic vocabulary:

what it is, where it’s found, how it’s distinguished from
other vocabulary, etc.

3. We must find ways to prioritize the instruction of

academic vocabulary. Time is of the essence!

4. We must develop useful tools to aid academic learners

and their teachers
 Finding the Academic Core
University Word List (Xue & Nation, 1984)
1. Compiled from four small manually- assembled corpora
2. Resulted in 800 word families (covers 8.5% of academic texts)

Academic Word List (Coxhead, 2000)

1. Compiled from a 3.5 million-word corpus
2. Four major registers (arts, commerce, law, science)
3. Approximately 875,000 words (tokens) each
4. Four major registers subdivided into 7 subject areas (28 total)
5. Words had to occur 100+ times in corpus
6. Words had to occur 10+ times in each of the four major registers
7. Words had to occur in 15 or more of the 28 subject areas
8. Resulted in 570 word families (covers 10% of the academic corpus)
New Academic Core--First Iteration (Davies & Gardner, forthcoming)

1. Compiled from 425 million-word Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA)

2. Nine major academic subregisters:

Subregister Academic Magazine Newspaper TOTAL

History 11,789,228 2,496,981 14,286,209

Education 8,453,127 8,453,127

Geog/SocSci 15,813,693 938,370 16,752,063

Law/PolSci 8,827,316 3,639,786 12,467,102

Humanities 11,110,772 11,110,772

Phil/Psych/Rel 6,659,684 5,803,787 12,463,471

Sci/Tech/Ag 13,389,027 9,414,505 22,803,532

Medicine 5,740,016 3,946,586 9,686,602

Financial 0 5,256,801 7,568,030 12,824,831

TOTAL 84,914,694 31,496,816 7,568,030 120,847,709

5. No assumptions about high-frequency words preceding academic core

6. Academic parameter set for PERC of 1.7 in COCA—means a word is 1.7

times as frequent in “academic” as we would expect, based on the fact
that “academic” is one-fifth of COCA.

7. Julliand’s D (dispersion) in academic subregisters set for .854 or higher—

means words must nicely distribute across the 9 academic subregisters.

8. To eliminate anomalies, words must appear at least 5 times in at least 8 of

the 9 academic subregisters.

9. Resulted in 3,074 lemmas (covers 14.5% of the academic corpus)

10. Subsequently grouped into “optional” word families (600 word families)
 PERC 1.7 DISP .854
|----------- Academic Core----------------|
the may between advocate rethinking astronomy parotid
be such student realm unsupported biodiversity tonsillectomy
and service group bias quantifiable ozone postoperatively
of power system metaphor higher-level self-efficacy sinusitis
a history program entity blurring asteroid otolaryngology
in low study regulatory unrealized modernity thrombosis
to both provide minimize edited archaeology histologic
have market political necessity requisite socialism maxillary
to interest among value quantitatively liberalization perfusion
it support however prevention deletion stressor neoplasm
that site include isolate traceable tariff randomised
for project community assembly re-emergence sovereign tibial
with cost information productive proportionally bacterial turbinate
on energy social inventory subjectively infantry pathologic
do available level dynamic dissociate multilateral squamous
this seek such equation interchangeably liturgy branchial
they author within offering proximate semiconductor otolaryngologist
at focus result content chronologically pedagogical intraoperative
but upon change enroll class nation-state mastoid
we concern research abstract delineation pixel tonsil
his central teacher shared self-defeating sacrament sanitarian
from recognize education readily ubiquity mitigation cholesteatoma
that particularly although revolutionary requested polity haemoglobin
not trade policy circuit vagueness self-concept sensorineural
by benefit process processing catalyze depressive cutaneous
---High Frequency Core--- -----------Academic Specialized---------
Lemma POS ACAD FREQ
abstract Adjective 4,681
abstract Verb 456
abstract Noun 628
abstraction Noun 1,413
academia Noun 812
academic Adjective 23,437
academic Noun 2,239
develop Verb 55,517
developed Adjective 3,647
developing Adjective 9,421
development Noun 67,157
developmental Adjective 5,775
developmentally Adverb 584
ideal Adjective 6,350
ideal Noun 3,988
idealism Noun 661
idealized Adjective 531
ideally Adverb 1,410
institute Noun 13,797
institute Verb 1,282
institution Noun 29,476
institutional Adjective 9,291
institutionalization Noun 544
institutionalize Verb 957
institutionalized Adjective 566
usable Adjective 780
usage Noun 2,569
use Noun 67,106
useful Adjective 12,158
usefully Adverb 264
usefulness Noun 1,290
user Noun 15,641
 Word-Family Possibilities

accept (v),   acceptance (n),   acceptable (j),   accepted (j),

unacceptable (j),   acceptability (n),   unacceptably (r),
acceptably (r),   acceptor (n),   unacceptability (n) 

human (j),   human (n),   humanity (n),   humanist (n),  

humanist (j),  humanism (n),   humanistic (j),  inhuman (j),
humanly (r),   inhumanity (n),   humanness (n) 

 
 Heavily Academic Word-Families

structure (n),   structural (j),   structure (v),   structured (j),

restructuring (n),   restructure (v),   structuring (n),  
structurally (r),   unstructured (j),   structuralist (j),  
structuralism (n),   restructured (j)  

 
 
modern (j),  modernity (n),  postmodern (j),  modernization (n),
modernist (j),   modernism (n),   postmodernism (n),  
modernize (v),   postmodernist (j),  modernist (n),   modern (n),
modernized (j),   modernizing (j),   modernizer (n),
modernizing (n),   postmodern (n)
Screenshot of Word and Phrase – Showing Academic Word Functionality
Screenshot of Word and Phrase – Showing Synonyms in Phrases
Screenshot of Word and Phrase – Showing Part of Speech Collocates
The Academic Vocabulary Code
Words that Shape Societies

Dee Gardner
Brigham Young University