Practical Activities for Learning and Retaining vocabulary Words, Words Words, Practical Activities for Learning and Retaining vocabulary

Why Vocabulary? “Without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary Nothing can be conveyed” (David Wilkins) Linguist David Wilkins

What is Vocabulary? Vocabulary knowledge is knowledge; the knowledge of a word not only implies a definition, but also implies how that word fits into the world” (Steven Stahl, 2005)

How do we acquire vocabulary? Indirect exposure Explicit instruction

Graves’ Effective vocabulary Program 1. Extensive independent reading 2. Specific words instruction Michael Graves is Professor Emeritus of Literacy Education at the University of Minnesota. His books include Teaching Individual Words: One Size Does Not Fit All and The Vocabulary Book.

3. Independent word learning strategies 4. Word consciousness and Graves- Cont’ 3. Independent word learning strategies 4. Word consciousness and word- play activities (Graves, 2006)

Discussion Discussion: Do you think it’s our job, as teachers to help our students learn and remember the words and their meanings, or do you think it’s their job and “you’ll meet them after the test”? What activities do you use in order to help your students learn the vocabulary list?

Word Learning Strategies Cognates 2. Dictionary use: Have them notice that the same word might play a different role in different settings and therefore have several meanings. For example: "A study done by…/ … we have to study for the test

Word Learning Strategies- Cont’ Contextual Analysis Morphological analysis Contextual analysis- For example: His dog just died, he’s in a horrible state, Vs. The state of Israel. We have to make the students aware of the fact that the same word might have different meanings in different contexts Guessing words’ meaning solely based on context requires previous knowledge. One has to have certain strategies, and some metacognitive knowledge in order to guess a word by it’s meaning. 4. Morphological analysis of Turkish words. When we look at a word and analyze it morphologically we divide it into the smallest units that hold meaning: i.e., roots, prefixes and suffixes, as for example in the word : hopelessly. Open for discussion: when can you use it in your classroom? For example, when you teach for Bagrut exams, for the Unseens or English for Academic Purposes, there are many terms that have to do with science and inventions (roots: geo, bio, prefixes: anti pre re de, suffixes : less, ly ). Once your students know some roots, suffixes and prefixes, it can greatly enhance their vocabulary and their reading comprehension abilities. 4. B YouTube Clip- (total: 2.5 Min). Roots, Prefixes, suffixes

Practical Vocabulary Activities 1. What goes with the word… ? 2. Make up a sentence with the word 3. Quizlet Write on the board: important , favorite, success, immediately, necessary, to acquire, both, learn, elicit See these and more great activities on "A practical Guide for teaching vocabulary” written by a committee headed by Prof. Penny Ur 1. What goes with the word favorite? Favorite animal, favorite food, favorite movie. 2. Make up a sentence -Open for discussion- what kind of sentences can we make with words? A. One sentence with 2 words B. words that aren’t related for example: come here immediately, it’s very important. C. True/ false sentences D. Question sentences- higher levels E. It’s best to have the ss make up personalized sentences, as it helps the learner remember it better. 3. Quizlet

Practical Vocab Activities- Cont’ 4. Recording words and meaning 5. Matching Recording words and their meaning- this enhances student’s exposure to the target language. We allow them to listen to it again and again in their free time and thus helping their pronunciation to become more accurate. Here are some activities that will Energize the classroom and enhance student’s engagement. 5. Matching activities: 2. Matching pieces of paper - in groups Divide them into 4 groups. Each group gets a set of words which combined together, make a phrase. In your groups, match the words to complete the phrases. The winning group is the one that finished all 6 phrases correctly! Give them 1 minute. Then check it together Ask: How else could you use this in your classroom? Word and it’s Hebrew meaning, synonyms, antonyms… etc’ Another way of Engaging the students is Palmenism: “Memory Game” it enhances exposure to the target language. 3. Up side down Memory Game: Stay in your groups, with the cards you have. Turn the cards upside down, mix them all up and when I tell you- each one, on his / her turn, flips 2 cards and try to match them. Give them 1.5 minutes. You can also do it on the board, using Blu Tac. Each time one student comes and tries to match but it will take longer.

Matching & Fill in the Gap Activities Strips of paper on the wall Collocation Forks Activity 4: Strips of paper / Matching activities These activities are take from http://leoxicon.blogspot.co.il/2014/10/classroom-walls-vocabulary.html?utm_source=BP_recent http://leoxicon.blogspot.co.il/ http://leoxicon.blogspot.co.il/2014/10/classroom-walls-vocabulary.html?utm_source=BP_recent

Gallery Walk Activity 5- Gallery walk -usually done with pictures, to start a discussion, but can also be used for recycling previously learnt vocabulary. Have the words written on the walls. Give the students 20 seconds to choose a word. Ss need to stand next to the word they have chosen and make a sentence with that word. Then they move on to a different word etc.’ Could be nice for teaching literature, poems with feelings- you could put words with pictures or just the words: shattered, frown, despair…

Some more activities Recall & share Sentence Race 6. Recall & Share Sentence Race: divide the class / group in 2 . Each group tries to make up sentences for as many words as possible (from the vocab list) in 2 minutes. The winning group is the one that made up the largest number of grammatically correct sentences *Writing stories with as many words as possible from the list. (takes longer) 7. Tic-Tac- Toe Word bingo- tell ss to choose 7 words from the list, the teacher reads 7 items. The ss tick every item that is on their list which was called out by the teacher. The winner is the first one who ticked all the items. Ask: How can we use it differently? the teacher reads definitions / synonyms… .

Just for fun… The Human Sentence 8. The human sentence

"When students travel, they don't carry grammar books, they carry dictionaries” (Krashen, 1993)

Wrap up Exposure If you don’t use it- you lose it! This is a picture done by a technique called Multiple exposure, which combines two or numerous separate exposures into one. The need for multiple exposure- one must be exposed 14-16 times to a vocab item in order to be able to automatically use it / retrieve it, some studies suggest 20+ Multiple exposure also makes this picture more intense, it enhances the image. It looks more energetic and it almost forces us, the spectators to be more engaged because there are many elements to it.

Thank you! Efrat Golan Matalon Dialog- School of Languages The Open University efratgm@openu.ac.il

Bibliography The Vocabulary Book- Learning and Instruction Michael F. Graves, Teachers’ college, Columbia University, 2006 A practical guide for teaching vocabulary – Ministry of Education, English inspectorate 2014 : http://cms.education.gov.il http://leoxicon.blogspot.co.il 5 minutes activities- Penny Ur & Andrew Wright, Cambridge University press, 1992 10 good games for recycling vocabulary- http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Koprowski-recylingVocabulary.html