A Content Literacy Tool By: Micheal Paterno Word Storm Activity A Content Literacy Tool By: Micheal Paterno

What is a Word Storm? graphic organizer designed to facilitate a higher level of thinking and understanding Thinking about a definition, parts of speech, uses in a sentence, synonyms, antonyms, etc. Students draw an image that represents that word somehow Students can certainly complete the Word Storm activity individually, with a partner, or within a group

Why would I teach Word Storming? Fosters a higher level of thinking and understanding about a word or topic The Word Storm activity guides the students to think in other ways about the word and the many ways in which it can be used. Pushes the student to one of the higher levels of Bloom’s taxonomy, creating, and further verifies the student’s mastery over the vocabulary. The drawing option is an incentive to help those students who are struggling as linguistic learners, but tend to excel as artistic learners. They may feel more comfortable with this option and be able to better express their understanding of the vocabulary in this way. There is also an additional benefit as students often learn better via their classmates than their own teacher.

How would I teach Word Storming? 1. Decide what vocabulary to include and what the students should be using the activity to learn (definitions, parts of speech, synonym/antonym, etc.). 2. Design the Word Storm activity to include a section for each aspect that the vocabulary is being broken down into. There will be a separate Word Storm for every vocabulary word. 3. Give out the Word Storm activity. Include the original context of where the vocabulary was found and decide whether the students are working independently, in partners, or in groups. 4. As the students are engaged in deciphering the vocabulary, circulate the room and assist with any conflicts of understanding that may arise. 5. Plan time for the pairs or groups of students to share the results of their work with each vocabulary word with the rest of the class.

Word Storm Activity Samples