VOCABULARY JOURNAL: Building Academic Vocabulary with SPEED™
It’s finally available!!!! The student journals for academic vocabulary called, VOCABULARY JOURNAL: Building Academic Vocabulary with SPEED™ is now available on Amazon! So why did we create this resource? Well, we know that challenges with vocabulary strongly influence the readability of a text (Chall & Dale, 1995). Not only that, but lacking vocabulary is known to be a critical factor in overall school failure or success in disadvantaged students (Biemiller, 1999). Yes, it is a disheartening fact that ELs and struggling students have notably lower vocabularies than their counterparts ((Oller & Eilers, 2002), because these vocabularies are such strong predictors of overall achievement. One reason for this is that their native English learnering peers acquire an estimated 3,000 new words each year in school (Nagy & Anderson, 1984). This vast number of words helps native English students achieve growth in reading comprehension and their ability to communicate mastery across content areas. The self-fulfilling prophecy is that this reading growth and content mastery creates the path for native speakers and students to, in turn, learn more words which will fuel even further growth down the line. But for EL’s and struggling students, the challenge with vocabulary is greater than just acquiring the same 3,000 new words each year. These students come with such a range of size in their vocabulary (Snow & Kim, 2007), that it is almost impossible to calculate what it would take for these students to reach the same vocabularies, and by extension the same opportunity for school success, as their native classmates. It is because of this that it becomes almost impossible to have a singular approach to helping them catch up to their peers. So what is the solution? Well, the solution needed to be one that blossomed from the uniqueness of each learner’s situations and the reality of the schools in which they learn. The solution to this challenge came organically, from studying tons of research, watching great teachers, and analyzing the impact of different approaches on student learning and engagement. I call it SPEED™. SPEED™ is a comprehensive vocabulary acquisition process that allows for the introduction, building background knowledge, explicit teaching, meaningful and varied practice, and metacognitive dialogue that allows EL’s and struggling students to acquire vocabulary words quickly and profoundly. Since many studies suggest that the amount of instructional time devoted to building vocabulary is simply not enough, part of the SPEED™ approach includes teachers’ willingness to commit to increase the amount of consideration given to vocabulary instruction. Again, the commitment is to consider vocabulary needs when planning, not to necessarily increase the amount of time. In parts 1 and 2 of this book, we will share simple and time-efficient ways of doing this. An additional piece that makes SPEED™ effective is that students are asked to develop goals around their word usage outside of vocabulary “time”. This goal setting, helps students transfer the knowledge of the vocabulary gained during safe practice into other situations and times when the term would be appropriate. So, are you ready to help your students acquire academic vocabulary with SPEED?
5 Easy Ways to Build Your Students’ Academic Language
Last week we discussed the need to intentionally frame the social language of schools. Social language of school is the language that follows the rules of academic conversations and is flexibly used for a variety of purposes. This week, we look at academic language. Academic language is the language students need to access textbooks, assignments, assessments, and other academic tasks. It requires students’ knowledge of a number of grammatical features, vocabulary terms, and other features of the discipline. There are two main components to academic language: language of instruction and language of the discipline. The language of instruction is tier 2 vocabulary terms that are essential for students to complete learning tasks and engage in rigorous thinking. They are terms such as: support, analysis, determine, evidence, critique, and more. The language of the discipline is tier 3 vocabulary terms that are essential for students to learn the content to the degree embedded within the common core. They are terms like: axiom, theme, alliteration, democracy, slope, mammal, and more. It may seem like a daunting task to have to begin teaching academic language. So what can teachers do to support students’ mastery of both components of academic language? The following strategies can be used by teachers at any grade level to help begin the process of moving students from casual social language use to greater comfort using their academic language. Encourage and model the use of academic terms during casual classroom communication. When students are engaged in cooperative learning, projects, and group processing, monitor and provide feedback around students’ use of precise terminology. Model the explicit use of precise language, as well. Encourage students to read a wide range of texts. Students should have opportunities to read texts at their independent level, instructional level, grade level, and (as long as they are supported through close reading tasks and shared reading experiences) push level. Students should also have the opportunity to read from a range of genres within fiction and informational texts as well. Teach key vocabulary that students need to know and help students process when and how they are to use them. Allow students various opportunities to use those words in a range of authentic contexts. The more regularly students are able to uses the words and the more varied the practice, the greater the impact on student learning. Provide language stems to anchor students thinking and use of academic language. Language stems give students the academic language as a scaffold until they are comfortable enough to use academic language on their own. An example of a language frame is: My analysis showed that _____ because ______________. I know this because on page __________ the author states that __________________. Bridge academic and social language. All students benefit from translating their casual language to their academic language as sort of a side by side dictionary. This translating of social language provides students an opportunity to see the similarities and differences between the two which helps them make critical connections in the brain. This connection makes it easier for students to use precise language when it is needed.
3 Big Reasons We are All LanguageTeachers:

When we introduce ourselves in education, it is commonplace to identify with the content area or grade level we teach. I am a Science teacher, a Math teacher, a 3rd grade teacher, etc. But one thing is for certain; we are all language teachers, and we are all teachers of students. This means that there may be more similarities than meets the eye when it comes to the ingredients necessary to help students achieve success. When it comes to language, there are a range of pre-requisite skills necessary in order to be successful. Both social and academic language are necessary for meaningful learning to take place. And while we will talk more about academic language next week, it is important to also understand the needs of every learner when it comes to social language. Social language includes the words and communication tools students use in social situations. In school, that involves three major skills: using language for a variety of purposes, changing language, and following rules of academic conversations. There are a number of purposes for using language in school. Students must greet each other, share information, make requests and ask questions, and make commitments. Even when these language uses don’t involve the use of tier II and tier III terms, are students able to appropriately use language in these context? In an age when students spend more time texting in jargon like LOL, tweeting with limited characters, and pinning images that spark their interest, it is becoming more and more difficult for them to change their language for those purposes. After all, these social media and mobile communication tools has made using short hand code, the norm. These methods of communication also prevent students from seeing their audience. This makes it harder for students to assess the needs of the listener or audience which translates to difficulties meeting the needs of the listener or audience in real life. Not only that, but more and more, students are struggling to even understand the need for a different approach to conversation when they are talking to an adult vs a friend, speaking during after school activity vs during a conversation about a class project, and giving enough details for people to follow the speakers’ logic. When teachers wonder how children could be so rude or inappropriate in a classroom, they can ask whether the students know the “rules” of following classroom conversations. Chances are, they have not. So what can a teacher do to develop the social language needed to succeed in class? The rules needed for social language in a school setting are the following: Turn-taking in conversation (including active listening) introducing topics of conversation staying on topic rephrasing when misunderstood (clarifying speech) how to use verbal and nonverbal signals (saying thank you and making eye contact) proximity to peers when speaking (shoulder length apart and knees to knees) how to use facial expressions and eye contact