Teaching Vocabulary
The definition of vocabulary is a stored set of words that is expandable.

Vocabulary has both print and speech forms. Beginning readers use their knowledge of the spoken form of a word to recognize the print version of that same word. Words are added to students’ repertoire by both organically making inferences to create the meaning of new words and through instruction that teaches specific words and word-meaning strategies.
A strong vocabulary is vital to comprehension and enhances fluency. When students match text to words they have learned through listening and speaking, it becomes easier to read fluently; if a word they are reading is not in their spoken lexicon, that word will interrupt their reading. That new word must be learned, in both form and meaning, before it can be added to their vocabulary.
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Strategies to Develop Vocabulary
Vocabulary is important for reading to learn as well as learning to read. Below are some strategies for increasing your students’ lexicon.
Total Physical Response (TPR)
Pair new words with a physical action and use the two together consistently. For example, teach students that the word “observe” means to look and think. When explaining the word, pretend to hold a set of binoculars to your eyes, and then point to your brain. Whenever the word observe comes up, use the physical response with the word to trigger meaning for students. Students should also use the physical response to move words into their lexicon with more ease.
Call and Response
To keep students engaged, change up your call and response to get their attention with a term and definition. Teach the students that when they hear the teacher shout out the specific word, their job is to reply with the definition in unison. For example, when doing a unit on 3D shapes, the teacher could shout out the word “faces” to get students’ attention. The students then stop what they are doing and reply with, “The flat side of a 3D shape!” To make the connection even stronger, you can incorporate TPR (see above).
Visual Support
Having visual cues to remember new terms and their meaning can be crucial to many students. Create a vocabulary word wall for students to refer to. We learn by attaching new learning to background knowledge. A simple way to pick up new words is by creating a graphic organizer that shows the target word’s relationship to known synonyms. You can add these graphic organizers to your classroom word wall. You can also add words to the word wall by simply attaching a small drawing to the word. For example, if students are learning the word “hostility,” you can add a mean emoji face to the word before posting it on the word wall.
Read Aloud Inferencing and Discussion
