Pennington Publishing Blog

Building Vocabulary through Reading

The reading research certainly supports direct vocabulary instruction: According to the National Reading Panel (2000), explicit instruction of vocabulary is highly effective in improving reading comprehension. “Students should be explicitly taught both specific words and word-learning strategies. To deepen students’ knowledge of word meanings, specific word instruction should be robust” (Beck et al., 2002). In fact, the vocabulary standards delineated in the Common Core Anchor Standards for Language mention each of these explicit areas of vocabulary instruction.

• Multiple Meaning Words and Context Clues (L.4.a.)
• Greek and Latin Word Parts (L.4.a.)
• Language Resources (L.4.c.d.)
• Figures of Speech (L.5.a.)
• Word Relationships (L.5.b.)
• Connotations (L.5.c.)
• Academic Language Words (L.6.0)

Teaching to these vocabulary standards will enrich your students depth of vocabulary knowledge and will teach your students how language and words help us learn. And reading research indicates that students can learn some 400 words per year in school through explicit vocabulary instruction (Beck, McKewon & Kucan, 2002).

However,

Numerous studies have estimated that students need to learn from 2,000–4,000 new words per year to make grade to grade reading growth. The most widely cited study indicates that students need to learn 3,000 new words per year (Honig 1983).

So, if the vocabulary standards help students master 400 words per year, how can we ensure that students learn the additional 2,600 words needed to make at least one grade level of reading growth in our classrooms? The Common Core authors discuss this solution in Appendix A of the CCSS document.  So, what is this key instructional strategy that will help your students meet and exceed that goal of 3,000 new words per year?

Independent reading.

Comprehensive Vocabulary

Let’s do the math. When reading at independent levels (around 95% word recognition*), that means that students are exposed to 5% unknown words. Reading at an average 200 words per minute, 30 minutes per day, 4 days per week, means that students will read 864,000 words during the school year. If 5% of these words are unknown to the reader and the reader masters 10%** of those unknown words, this results in a gain of not 3,000, but 4,320 new vocabulary words! (30 minutes x 200 words = 6,000 x 4 days per week = 24,000 x 36 weeks = 864,000 words read in a year x 5% unknown words = 43,200 x 10% mastery =4,320.

Now, having been convinced regarding the efficacy of building vocabulary through independent reading, let’s not jump to the same conclusions that some advocates of the “whole language” approach to reading made during the 1980s and 1990s and the “balanced literature” adherents make today: If incidental vocabulary acquisition through wide reading produces a greater number of new words (4,320 in our example) than does explicit vocabulary instruction (400), let’s abandon explicit vocabulary instruction altogether.

This conclusion is flawed. Consider this question: What is it that allows the reader to mastery 10% of the 5% unknown words when reading text at optimal word recognition levels? It’s precisely the vocabulary strategies that readers internalize through explicit instruction and practice. For example, numerous studies suggest that using instructional strategies that teach students how to use context clues effectively can improve that 10% mastery of unknown words (Rhoder and Huerster, 2002, Greenwood and Flanigan, 2007). Additionally, explicit instruction in Greek and Latin word parts which appear in 50% of Tier 2 academic vocabulary can provide the structural clues to significantly improve that 10% number. Clearly, studying non-contextual vocabulary can improve the efficiency of readers to understand and master contextual vocabulary in reading.

Bottom line: Students need both explicit vocabulary instruction (those Common Core grade-level vocabulary standards) and enough independent reading to make at least one grade level of reading progress.

But, how can we be sure that it’s independent reading that teaches the most vocabulary? Don’t students learn vocabulary naturally through listening throughout their school day and at home? Don’t students get plenty of reading throughout the day in literature, science, and social studies texts? Way back in 1988, reading researchers Hayes and Athens published interesting research regarding this question. They counted the number of words above the 1,000 highest frequency words (usually mastered by most primary grade students) for a variety of listening venues such as adult-level conversations, court cases, and the nightly news. As an example, watching and listening to the nightly news exposes the viewer/listener to only 19 of these key words. In contrast, reading for the same amount of time provides a much higher exposure to words beyond the most frequently used 1,000 words. For example, reading a challenging comic book for the same amount of time exposes the reader to 53 of these challenging words. Reading a challenging book for the same amount of time exposes a reader to 75. Unfortunately, research indicates that the amount students read in a school day through teacher-directed reading tasks is miminal. Clearly, independent reading is the most efficient means of learning new words, when supported by explicit vocabulary instruction.

When should students complete their independent reading?

Many teachers buy into the research on the value of independent reading and provide in-class time for sustained silent reading. However, my take is that independent reading in class is largely both inefficient and reductive.

Again, taking a look at the math, few teachers (other than “The Book Whisperer”) at the elementary, middle, and high school levels would be willing or even permitted to allocate the 120 minutes per week of class time necessary to achieve optimal vocabulary growth. In a typical secondary ELA class with 200 minutes of instructional time per week (less with holidays and all-too-frequent instructional interruptions), the 120 minutes would take up more than half of available instructional time. Few principals would permit this encroachment upon teaching grade-level standards. As one of my own principals once told our middle school ELA department, “The district is not paying you to babysit students doing independent reading. Earn your paychecks!” The principal’s statements were a trifle blunt, but essentially correct that all instructional time is reductive. You can’t add something without taking away something.

Now some teachers might be tempted to compromise and facilitate independent reading for some time in class and some time at home. My response is “Why not all independent reading at home?” Independent reading is the perfect homework. I can hear the arguments about why this won’t work rolling in… “They won’t do it. Parents won’t support it. There’s no accountability. It takes too much time to grade and manage it.” I’m not convince. Clever teachers can solve those problems.

As a reading specialist, I’ve taught at the elementary, middle, high school, and community college levels. I recently retired as a middle school ELA teacher. Reading research indicates that middle schoolers read less on their own than any other age group. At a lower performing, 75% free and reduced lunch, multi-ethnic, multi-language school, I have success rates of 80–90% compliance with students reading 120 minutes per week at home. How? I train parents and students in how to do and supervise independent reading and daily 3–5 minute reading discussions. I get students and parents to buy in by requiring student-parent trainings. I meet with each and every parent, 130 or so. This investment of time pays off because I don’t have to grade student response journals, book reports, etc. Instead, I train and trust parents to grade the quality of their child’s discussion and I count it as 15% of the student’s total grade. I mix things up with other activities which ensure accountability, such as online book clubs in which students must post and discuss and parents and I (I can’t resist) pop-in to the mix. My point is that you, the teacher, know what will work for your students, and with some experimentation, you can figure how how to hold students accountable for independent reading homework.

Which books should students read? How should students select these books?

How do you get students to read books at the optimal word recognition levels? You don’t have to spend thousands on Accelerated Reader® or Reading Counts! You don’t have to look for Fountas Pinnell A–Z+ leveled books. You don’t have to look for grade-level equivalents. You don’t have to match student Lexile levels to published book lists. You don’t have to do running records and a miscue analysis for each student.

The key to matching students to the right books is to train students (and parents at lower grade levels) to do so. Students don’t have access to the above data, nor will they as lifelong readers. I do believe in Reggie Routman’s mantra: If the book is too difficult, it will lead to frustration; too little of a challenge will lead to boredom. Students can be trained to pick the “Goldilocks Level”: not too easy, not too hard, just right (Routman, 2003). You don’t even have to require all independent reading to be at optimal levels. Some will be less optimal; some, especially if you agree with the Common Core author’s notions about text complexity, should be more rigorous.

Boredom is a powerful disincentive. Teachers worry far too much that students will pick easier books over more challenging ones. My experience is that students learn from their own mistakes. Students want to read texts which match their maturity levels. Believe me, successful authors know how to match content and vocabulary levels to their target audiences. Additionally, motivation plays an important role in book selection. When Harry Potter books were hot off the press, my fourth grader read far beyond his tested reading levels in the last few JK Rowling novels, to be able to access what his older brothers were reading and talking about. Self-selected reading will almost always be perfectly acceptable if students are trained in how to avoid boredom and frustration.

Teach one of these two methods to help students (and parents) pick the right books for independent reading. And let me reiterate once again, not all independent reading needs to conform to these challenge levels to get students to meet or exceed our 3,000 words annual goal:

1. The five and ten finger method (five for grades 3–5 chapter books and ten for grades 6–adult novels). Big print chapter books have about 100 words per page. Smaller print novels have about twice that number (200 words per page). Students read a random page from a book they want to read and count the number of unknown words as they read, using their fingers. If the number of unknown words is close to the 5 , say 3–7 for bigger print books or 10, say 7–13 for small print novels, that’s a good match.
2. Select any complete page at random and count the number of words on that page. Read that same page, counting the number of unknown words as you read. Anything within the 3-7% range is a good match. For example, a reader counts the number of words on a page and arrives at 225. While reading, the student counts 11 unknown words. 11.00 ÷ 225 = .05, or 5%.

*Word recognition is simply the ability of the reader to accurately read and automatically understand a word (Reutzel & Cooter 2009). Vocabulary experts agree that adequate reading comprehension depends on a person already knowing between 90 and 95 percent of the words in a text (Hirsch, 2003). For second language learners, Results suggest that the 98% estimate is a more reasonable coverage target for readers of academic texts (Schmitt, Jiang, Grabe 2012). Most reading specialists support 95% as an optimal level of word recognition for vocabulary growth in which the reader’s comprehension is not adversely affected by too many unknown words, but enough unknown words are provided to enable incidental learning by knowledge of context clues.

**A commonly used figure by reading researchers with variables such as repetitions, word families, inflections, prior knowledge of content, primary language ability, and knowledge of and ability to apply context clues.

*****

For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

Reading, Spelling/Vocabulary, Study Skills academic language words, affixes, Common Core Vocabulary Toolkit, contextual vocabulary, fifth grade, flash cards, fourth grade, Greek, homonyms, Latin, Mark Pennington, multiple-meaning words, prefixes, roots, seventh grade, sixth grade, spelling-vocabulary patterns, structural analysis, test preparation, Tier 2 words, vocabulary, vocabulary in reading, vocabulary lists, vocabulary skills, vocabulary worksheets, word lists, word recognition, worksheets

Every teacher and parent has heard about transformers: the movies, the action characters, etc. If you’re a parent of a younger child, you know all about Bumblebee.

Since the dawn of the Transformers in 1984, the spunky little Autobot called Bumblebee has been a fan favorite. Why? He was the underdog. He was small, and he was one of the weaker Transformers, but his heart was huge and he showed great bravery on the battlefield. As a result, he was an admired and gentle friend not only to humans, but to his peers as well. And it didn’t hurt that his alternate mode was a cute little yellow Volkswagen Beetle. He now has at least six other transformations! https://screenrant.com/bumblebee-transformers-last-knight-solo-trivia-facts/

What if we could apply that same transformer concept to beginning reading, reading intervention, and multi-syllabic word work? We can with Syllable Transformers.

Syllable Transformers

As a reading specialist working with struggling older readers in the 1990s, I had the pleasure of learning from the late Dr. John Sheffelbine from California State University at Sacramento. John was a self-described “phonicator” and developed both the BPST (Basic Phonics Skills Test), the Scholastic Phonics Readers, and the SIPPS program. One powerful set of lessons that John developed dealt with open (long vowel) and closed (short vowel) syllables. An open syllable is one which ends in a long vowel e.g. bay; a closed syllable ends in a consonant and the vowel is short e.g. bat.

John hypothesized that the best way to learn these open and closed syllable rules was to practice them together: to see how the vowel sound transforms from one syllable pattern to another. Additionally, because educators were transitioning from the whole language/balanced literacy philosophy to a phonics-based approach, many students over-relied on sight words and syllables, rather than upon applying sound-symbol correspondences. The instructional implications were clear that practice in real syllable patterns would not solve the problem for these “look and say” syllable guessers. The answer was to use nonsense syllables. Brilliant!

I tried John’s “Syllable Transformations” and they worked wonders. However, I could see the power of expanding John’s idea to other syllable patterns. I also tweaked his approach to make the methodology a bit more “user-friendly” and “technologically-savvy” (I typed them up and displayed them on a machine we used to call the overhead projector.)

Of course, John’s “Syllable Transformations” prefigured what we now refer to as flexing the vowel and applying set for variability. Years later I developed my own comprehensive reading intervention program (promo below), and I included Syllable Transformers as a quick warm-up activity before multi-syllabic word work. Teachers and students love this fast-paced whole-class response activity.

Examples (Open and Closed Syllables): ba-bam-bay-tay-tat

In my Pennington Multi-Syllabic Strategies for Familiar and Unfamiliar Words I expand the strategy of flexing the vowel to adjusting consonant sound variations, syllable types, syllable division guidelines, common syllable patterns, vowel and consonant accent shifts, and conventional spelling rules to provide a bank of problem-solving choices for decoding and encoding.

The Science of Reading Intervention Program

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Word Recognition includes explicit, scripted instruction and practice with the 6 Daily Google Slide Activities every reading intervention student needs: 1. Phonemic Awareness 2. Blending, Segmenting, and Spelling 3. Phonics and Heart Words Practice 4. Word Chains 5. Sam and Friends Phonics Books (decodables for olders). 6. Elkonin Sound Box dictations, Personal Sound Walls, and Multi-Syllabic Word Work. Print versions are available for all activities. First Half of the Year Program (55 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension resources are designed for students who have completed the word recognition program or have demonstrated basic mastery of the alphabetic code and can read with some degree of fluency. The program features the 5 Weekly Language Comprehension Activities: 1. Background Knowledge Mentor Texts 2. Academic Language, Greek and Latin Morphology, Figures of Speech, Connotations, Multiple Meaning Words 3. Syntax in Reading 4. Reading Comprehension Strategies 5. Literacy Knowledge (Narrative and Expository). Second Half of the Year Program (30 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Assessment-based Instruction provides diagnostically-based “second chance” instructional resources. The program includes 13 comprehensive assessments and matching instructional resources to fill in the yet-to-be-mastered gaps in phonemic awareness, alphabetic awareness, phonics, fluency (with YouTube modeled readings), Heart Words and Phonics Games, spelling patterns, grammar, usage, and mechanics, syllabication and morphology, executive function shills. Second Half of the Year Program (25 minutes-per-day, 18 weeks)

The Science of Reading Intervention Program BUNDLE  includes all 3 program components for the comprehensive, state-of-the-art (and science) grades 4-adult full-year program. Scripted, easy-to-teach, no prep, no need for time-consuming (albeit valuable) LETRS training or O-G certification… Learn as you teach and get results NOW for your students. Print to speech with plenty of speech to print instructional components.

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My purpose in this article is convince educators to teach morphemes, not just academic words as part of a balanced vocabulary program and to provide the FREE tools to teach them. Good vocabulary instruction includes structural analysis (how words are put together), not just a list of tough academic words or difficult words which your students will be reading in a story or in an article. And good vocabulary instruction does not include a weekly list of Greek and Latin-based SAT or ACT vocabulary words with the quiz on Friday.

To support my case, that teachers should “Teach Morphemes, Not Just Whole Words,” let’s get on the same page regarding what function these Greek and Latin word parts serve as English vocabulary-builders.

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a morpheme is the smallest unit of language that has its own meaning, either a word or a part of a word: “Worker” contains two morphemes: “work” and “-er”. Notice that the word part must be meaning-based to be a morpheme; not an inflection. An inflection is a change in the form of a word (usually the ending) which indicates a grammatical function or attribute such as person, number, case, gender, mood, or verb tense.

Of course, Greek and Latin are not the only foreign-based morphemes in English. We have plenty of other languages which provide their own morphological contributions. I do suggest including a brief lesson on English Language History to teach your students why we have so many words which have inconsistent spellings and pronunciations. However, it’s the Greek and Latin derivations which constitute the vast majority of words which you students are challenged by in difficult text. You may wish to prove this to your students by using the clear examples from this article: Greek and Latin “Dead” Languages.

Check out the Latin (in red) in this first sentence from the Federalist Papers #1 by Alexander Hamilton:

After an unequivocal experience of the inefficacy of the subsisting Federal Government, you are called upon to deliberate on a new Constitution for the United States of America.

“Government” was a Greek derivation through the French, by the way. Not to be outdone, let’s check out the Greek (in red) in this sentence about Hamilton’s arch rival, Thomas Jefferson:

Thomas Jefferson’s views on democracy were greeted with widespread cynicism, sarcasm, and even panic by European rulers.

Now, most teachers would agree that these are important Tier 2 (Beck in the Common Core Appendix A) academic words to master. I agree, but not by creating a list, having students look them up in the dictionary, and quizzing on Friday. Instead, teach the morphemes!

Let’s use the first word, unequivocal, to prove my point.

Let’s say you passed out the word list of the above red words on Monday and had students look each up in the dictionary. Students look up unequivocal. According to the Oxford Dictionary of English (3^rd Edition), they would find this definition:

“Unequivocal means “leaving no doubt; unambiguous.”

This definition does provide some clues to meaning; however, for most of your students, it doesn’t provide a complete understanding of the word. As is often the case, dictionary authors use difficult vocabulary in their definitions. For many of us, the word unambiguous in this definition is just as tough to understand as Hamilton’s word, unequivocal. Additionally, dictionaries provide multiple definitions for many words, so we’re often stuck with the old conundrum: You have to know the definition to learn the definition. Lastly, dictionaries only provide the denotative meanings of the words, not the connotative meanings. In other words, authors frequently select words which mean one thing, but may suggest something else. Does Hamilton’s word choice suggest the same meanings as modern dictionaries? We simply don’t know for sure.

My point is that learning the dictionary definitions of Greek and Latin-based English words is of some value, but this approach doesn’t completely solve the problem of finding out what a word means in the context in which the author uses it. Plus, memorizing the definitions of the key Greek and Latin words would take an inordinate amount of time.

A much better way to learn challenging English vocabulary is to memorize, practice, and apply the Greek and Latin word parts.

Let me show you how efficient and effective these short-cuts to meaning can be with Hamilton’s  word, unequivocal. Unequivocal has four Latin word parts:

You already know the first word part, un, which means not; equi means equal; voc means call; and al means relating to

Simply rearrange these definitions to make more sense in English.

Unequivocal means “relating to not calling equal.”

Compare the word parts definition: “relating to not calling equal” to the dictionary definition: “Unequivocal means “leaving no doubt; unambiguous.” Both are helpful, but looking up the word unequivocal in the dictionary helped your students learn one word and you probably had to translate that dictionary definition for them. Plus, think of all the wasted class time, looking up all those academic words!

Learning the four word parts in unequivocal not only helps your students learn the one word; think about how many other words include the word parts used in unequivocal. I did the research for you, because I’m sure you’re just dying to know. The un prefix is part of a whopping 3,876 words; equi is used in 196 words, including such useful words as equilibrium, equivalent, and equitable; voc is found in 167 words, such as these word gems: vocalize, evocative, and invocation; and the al suffix is in 3,544. Amazing! Learning the four Latin word parts in unequivocal is powerful. If you knew these word part definitions, you would have short-cut clues to the meaning of many more challenging words‒a total of 7,783 to be exact (morewords.com)!

Of course, beyond our single word example, unequivocal, the reading research overwhelmingly confirms the value of learning Greek and Latin word parts, not just whole words.

In a key vocabulary study, Nagy and Scott found that [Display] “Knowing Greek and Latin word parts helps students recognize and gain clues to understanding of other words that use known affixes and roots” (Nagy & Scott, 2000).

Comprehensive Vocabulary

Now, I don’t want to leave you the false impression that learning a bunch of new Greek and Latin word parts will solve all your students’ vocabulary challenges. And, just as with the whole-word definitions of important Greek and Latin words, it would be impractical to memorize all Greek and Latin word parts. But, some Greek and Latin word parts are used much more often than others. In fact, the 20 highest frequency Greek and Latin prefixes make up 97% of all Greek and Latin prefixes. With suffixes, the top four constitute 97%, as well.

Plus, although we got good clues regarding the meaning of unequivocal, it was not a perfect definition. This will be the case for many Greek and Latin-based English words. However, for other words, their Greek and Latin word parts will form perfect definitions, such as with distract. Dis means away from and tract means draw. To draw away from is a perfect definition for distract. The point I’m making about memorizing Greek and Latin word parts is that knowing some clues to the meaning of a challenging word are much better than having no clues, but when the Greek and Latin word parts form a perfect word definition, that’s a bonus!

*****

For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

Literacy Centers, Reading, Spelling/Vocabulary, Study Skills 25 Greek and Latin Power Words, Common Core Vocabulary, Common Core Vocabulary Toolkit, Dead languages, DUAL Word Parts Worksheet, Greek and Latin, Greek and Latin Morphology, Greek and Latin prefixes, Greek and Latin roots, Greek and Latin suffixes, Greek and Latin vocabulary, Greek and Latin word lists, high frequency word parts, Mark Pennington, memorize vocabulary, morphemes, morphological, morphological awareness, morphology, research-based vocabulary word lists, structural analysis

Common Core State Standards

Standards-based education is now the norm in public and most parochial schools. Having largely captured the focus of the educational reform movement over the last 25 years, standards-based instruction is now the instructional mandate in all 50 states. Although some states have rescinded their adoption of the Common Core State Standards and some, like Texas, never did adopt the Standards, each state has adopted its own set of standards and some have developed their own state assessment systems. Teachers and district administrators continue to align curriculum to the instructional demands of the Common Core English Language Arts Standards.

Although the authors of the Common Core State Standards assert that literacy instruction must be a shared responsibility within the school, the largest burden still falls on the shoulders of ELA teachers. Of the four Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening, and Language Strands, the Language Strand presents the greatest challenge for many teachers. Most ELA teachers simply have not had the undergraduate or graduate coursework to prepare them to teach the L.1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 Standards in grammar and usage, mechanics, spelling, language application, and vocabulary.

This author, Mark Pennington, has written articles and developed free teaching resources on the Common Core ELA Standards and included these in his Pennington Publishing Blog to support fellow ELA teachers and reading intervention specialists. Mark’s assessment-based teaching resources are available at Pennington Publishing.

This article and resource compilation is jam-packed with FREE resources, lesson plans, and samples from grades 4–high school ELA and reading intervention programs, developed by teacher and author, Mark Pennington. Each of the following 25+ articles has multiple links to research, related articles, and free or paid resources:

Common Core Literalism

The Common Core State Standards were never written to be the Bible for ELA and reading intervention teachers. Read what the Common Core authors have to say and see how a common sense approach to teaching to the Standards can benefit both students and teachers.

FREE Instructional Resources: Syllable Awareness Assessment, 20 Advanced Syllable Rules, 10 English Accent Rules

Response to Intervention and the Common Core

Many teachers have never read the entire Common Core English Language Arts Standards. Sure, they’ve read their own district or state summaries of the Standards, but not the documents themselves. To understand the instructional role of the Standards, teachers must read the  appendices, which discuss important reflections and research regarding, for instance, reading intervention.

Grammar and the Common Core

More than any other Strand within the Common Core State Standards, the Language Strand with its focus on direct grammar, mechanics, and vocabulary instruction has been whole-heartedly embraced or intentionally ignored by teachers.

Common Core Instructional Minutes

With all the CCSS mandates, how can an ELA teacher allocate instructional time to be faithful to the Standards, while maintaining some sense of one’s own priorities? This article gets down to the minute-by-minute.

Common Core Academic Language Words

Of course, history, science, and technology teachers need to teach domain-specific academic vocabulary. However, there is a difference between academic language and academic vocabulary. The latter is subject/content specific; the former is not. Reading more challenging expository novels, articles, documents, reports, etc. will certainly help students implicitly learn much academic language; however, academic language word lists coupled with meaningful instruction do have their place. So, which word lists make sense?

Common Core Greek and Latinates

The bulk of Vocabulary Standards are included in the Language Strand of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Greek and Latin affixes (prefixes and suffixes) and roots are key components of five of the grade level Standards: Grades 4−8. Which Greek and Latin affixes and roots should we teach? How many should we teach? How should we teach them?

Grammar, Mechanics, Spelling, and Vocabulary

Grammar, Mechanics, Spelling, and Vocabulary  is part of a comprehensive Grades 4−12 language program, designed to address each Standard in the Language Strand of the Common Core State Standards in 60−90 weekly instructional minutes. This full-year curriculum provides interactive grammar, usage, mechanics, and spelling lessons, a complete spelling patterns program, language application openers, and vocabulary instruction. The program has all the resources to meet the needs of diverse learners. Diagnostic assessments provide the data to enable teachers to individualize instruction with targeted worksheets, each with a formative assessment. Progress monitoring matrices allow teachers to track student progress. Each instructional resource is carefully designed to minimize teacher preparation, correction, and paperwork. Appendices have extensive instructional resources, including the Pennington Manual of Style and downloadable essay-comments. A student workbook accompanies this program.

Overview of the Common Core Language Strand

English-language arts teachers have long been accustomed to the four-fold division of our “content” area into Reading, Writing, Listening, and Speaking. These divisions have been widely accepted and promoted by the NCTE, publishers, and other organizations. In a nod to the fearsome foursome, the Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts maintains these divisions (called strands) with two notable revisions: Speaking and Listening are combined and Language has its own seat at the table.

Common Core Grammar Standards

The Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts are divided into Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening, and Language strands. The Common Core Grammar Standards are detailed in the Language Strand. It is notable that grammar and mechanics have their own strand, unlike the organization of many of the old state standards, which placed grammar and mechanics instruction solely within the confines of writing or speaking standards.

Of course, the writers of the Common Core use the ambiguous label, Language, to refer to what teachers and parents casually label as grammar and mechanics or conventions. To analyze content and educational philosophy of  the Common Core State Standards Language Strand, it may be helpful to examine What’s Good about the Common Core State Standards Language Strand? as well as What’s Bad about the Common Core State Standards Language Strand? chiefly from the words of the document itself.

How to Teach the Common Core Vocabulary Standards

What most teachers notice after careful reading of the Common Core Vocabulary Standards is the expected breadth, complexity, and depth of instruction across the grade levels. These vocabulary words require direct, deep-level instruction and practice in a variety of contexts to transfer to our students’ long-term memories. So what instructional strategies make sense to teach the Common Core Vocabulary Standards? And what is the right amount of direct, deep-level vocabulary instruction that will faithfully teach the Common Core Vocabulary Standards without consuming inordinate amounts of class time? Following is a weekly instructional plan to teach the L.4, 5, and 6 Vocabulary Standards.

CCSS Language Progressive Skills

The Language Strand has been one of the most controversial components of the COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS & LITERACY IN HISTORY/SOCIAL STUDIES, SCIENCE, AND TECHNICAL SUBJECTS. The Language Progressive Skills document emphasizes the essential grammar, usage, and mechanics skills, which need to be reviewed and reinforced year after year..

Common Core Curricular Crossover

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) produces some interesting curricular crossover. The traditional English-language arts divisions of reading, writing, listening, and speaking have been replaced with four new strands: reading, writing, speaking and listening, and language. The six Standards of the Language Strand borrow a bit from each of the traditional divisions. The inclusion of the Language Strand as its own set of Standards has created some concern in the ELA community.

Spelling Word Lists by Grade Levels

As an MA Reading Specialist and author of quite a few spelling curricula (eight at last count), I’m often asked about spelling word lists by grade levels. Which words are right for which grade levels? Is blank (substitute any word) a third or fourth grade word? Which spelling words are the most important ones to practice? The short answer is…

Common Core Essay Writing Terms

I propose using the CCSS language of instruction for the key writing terms across all subject disciplines in elementary, middle school, and high school. Some of us will have to come down out of our castles and give up pet writing terms that we’ve used for years, and ones that, indeed, may be more accurate than those of the CCSS. But for the sake of collaboration and service to our students, this pedagogical sacrifice is a must.

Common Core Content Area Reading and Writing

Nothing in the new Common Core State Standards (CCSS) has worried English-language arts teachers more than “The Great Shift.” This shift changes the emphasis of reading and writing in K-12 English-language arts (ELA) classrooms from the literature and narrative to the informational (to explain) and argumentative (to persuade) genres.

Common Core Language Standards

Teachers are generally quite familiar with the CCSS Reading and Writing Standards, not so with the Language Strand Standards. The Language Strand includes the grammar, usage, mechanics, and vocabulary Standards.

Standards and Accountability

Sometimes we teachers can be our own worst enemies. Check out this article, published in the Answer Sheet of The Washington Post.

Turning Dependent into Independent Readers

The Common Core State Standards for English-language Arts makes a compelling case for not doing business as usual in our ELA classrooms. That business consists of the traditional “sage on the stage” methodology of reading an entire novel or play out loud and parsing paragraphs one at a time. Our new business? Scaffolding just enough reading strategies and content as we act as “guides on the side” to facilitate independent reading. In other words, the days of  spoon-feeding have got to go.

Why and How to Teach Complex Text

A growing body of research presents a challenge to current K-12 reading/English-language Arts instruction. In essence, we need to “up” the level of text complexity and provide greater opportunities for independent reading. The Common Core State English-language Arts Standards provides a convincing three-reason argument in support of these changes in instructional practice. Following this rationale, I will share ten instructional implications and address a few possible objections.

Common Core State Writing Standards

The Common Core State Writing Standards have used a rather utilitarian approach to categorize essays into two classifications: argument and informational/explanatory writing.  The approach used by the English-language Arts committee was to examine the writing assignments of freshman English college professors then define the essay accordingly for the purposes of the Common Core State Writing Standards.

How to Teach the English-language Arts Standards

Every English-language arts teacher shares the same problem—too much to teach and not enough time to teach it. So, where are the magic beans that will allow us to teach all of the have-to’s (think ELA Standards) and still have a bit of time to teach the want-tos? Following are a few suggestions to help the clever ELA teacher have her cake and eat it, too.

Should We Teach Standards or Children?

The excesses of the standards-based movement frequently run contrary to the need to differentiate instruction, according to the diagnostic needs of children.

More Articles, Free Resources, and Teaching Tips from the Pennington Publishing Blog

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Pennington Publishing’s mission is to provide the finest in assessment-based ELA and reading intervention resources for grades 4‒high school teachers. Mark Pennington is the author of two Standards-aligned programs: TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE and Grammar, Mechanics, Spelling, and Vocabulary . Mark’s comprehensive Teaching Reading Strategies and the accompanying Sam and Friends Guided Reading Phonics Books help struggling readers significantly improve their reading skills in a full-year or half-year intensive reading intervention program. Make sure to check out Pennington Publishing’s free ELA and reading assessments to help you pinpoint grammar, usage, mechanics, spelling, and reading deficits.

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How to Teach Multiple Meaning Words

Multiple meanings matter. Can we learn how to teach multiple meaning words vocabulary to our students? I think so, and it’s important. For example,

From an old vaudeville act:

“You drove me to drink!” her husband shouted.

“No, you walked there yourself every night,” his wife responded.

This mildly humorous exchange is built upon word play. Word play is a basic tool for many writing and speaking genre. The word play in the short vaudevillian dialog involves the double-meaning of the verb, drove. It also involves different uses of the parts of speech: The husband uses to drink as an infinitive (an unconjugated verb). The wife interprets her husband’s word, drink, as a common noun place (say a bar) and the object of the prepositional phrase to drink (where). Finally, the husband uses the verb phrase, drove me to, as an idiom, meaning forced me or caused me, whereas the wife uses drove me as a colloquialism meaning he used the car to drive (no one drives a person).

Enough already! English-language arts teachers certainly can take the fun out of anything. My point is that multiple meaning words are important components of any language. English has plenty of them.

The Common Core authors include multiple meaning words in the Language Strand as Standard L.4.a., but word play is also included in word relationships Standard L.5.b. and figures of speech Standard L.5.a. By the way, I love the fact that the Standards include puns (my boldface):

See how multiple meaning words fit into the breadth of the Common Core Vocabulary Standards in the Language Strand:

• Multiple Meaning Words and Context Clues (L.4.a.)
• Greek and Latin Word Parts (L.4.a.)
• Language Resources (L.4.c.d.)
• Figures of Speech (L.5.a.)
• Word Relationships (L.5.b.)
• Connotations (L.5.c.)
• Academic Language Words (L.6.0)

What is the instructional focus of multiple meaning words?

Our instructional focus with multiple meaning words is centered on homonyms. A brief reminder: Homonyms represents a general category, literally meaning same names, that is used to indicate similar words which have different meanings. Homographs (words spelled the same, but pronounced differently, such as bass (a deep tone or voice) and bass (a type of fish), and homophones (words pronounced the same but spelled differently, such as reed and read) are subsets of homonyms. So, yes, bass, reed, and read are all examples of homonyms.

How do context clues fit in… the Standard does not mention these.

True, however words are always used in context. Without context clues, we wouldn’t understand homonyms. For example, saying “I like a lot of bass” is meaningless unless we surround the homograph with context clues, such as “I like a lot of bass on my speakers” or “I like a lot of bass, but not a lot of trout.”

As an aside, the Common Core Standards are quite explicit in some sections as exemplars for instruction; however, they are not a detailed instructional scope and sequence (see below for a helpful example). The Common Core authors expect teachers to use their brains to fill in the blanks. As an educational author, I always list applicable Standards; however, I also include a good measure of common sense. For example, the Language Strand Language Conventions Standards (L.2) include plenty of specific Standards regarding the use of different verb forms; however, the Standards nowhere mention “Thou shalt teach thine students what a verb is.”

Which Multiple Meaning Words to Use and How to Team Them

Students should practice grade-level homonyms (same spelling homographs and sound homophones) in context clue sentences which show the different meanings and function (part of speech) for each word.

Examples

In my five vocabulary programs (see below), I use vocabulary worksheets to help students learn grade-level multiple meaning words and context clue strategies to explain their use. Check out my S.A.L.E. Context Clue Strategies with free lessons HERE.

Multiple Meaning Words

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For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

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Comprehensive Vocabulary

How do figures of speech and idiomatic expressions fit into vocabulary acquisition? ELA teachers do a great job of teaching the traditional figures of speech, metaphors and similes and many or the poetic devices, such as alliteration and personification in the context of literature and poetry. Check out a nice list with examples of the “Top 20” figures of speech with examples. 

However, most of us give short shrift to the colloquial forms of language which actually fill more literature and poetry than the venerable figures of speech. For example, in Shakespeare’s Richard III:

GLOUCESTER:
Off with his head! Now, by Saint Paul I swear,
I will not dine until I see the same.

RATCLIFF:
Dispatch, my lord [Hastings]; the duke would be at dinner:
Make a short shrift; he longs to see your head.

https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/short-shrift.html

The authors of the Common Core State Standards recognize the essential roles that colloquial expressions play in our English language. See the varied examples detailed in the Language Strand (L.5.a.). Did you know that the eighth grade standards include puns? I love that.

I especially appreciate the authors’ emphasis on teaching idiomatic expressions. Idiomatic expressions are more than just the archaic “A stitch in time saves nine” examples that I used to teach, one per day, and have my students illustrate for Open House.

In fact, our non-literal language fills what we read, say, and speak. For example, I love that idiom of ours: through the door. It always gets some head-shaking in my EL, SDAIE, ELD, ESL, etc. classes. But all languages are filled with colloquial language.

For example, when I arrived in Mexico City to really learn the language some years back, I already had six years of middle school and high school Spanish, one college conversational Spanish class and one Spanish-only literature class. I felt pretty confident with the language.

Upon my arrival I found that my new friends understood me just fine. However, I only understood about 50% of what was being said to me. My Spanish instruction was failing me. I knew the formal, but not the informal language.

My Mexican roommate asked me if I had a chamarca. It was 90 degrees out and humid, as well. Why was he asking if I had a jacket? I looked at him strangely, and he explained that he had substituted the slang, charmarca, for his novia. You see, chamarca is slang for girlfriend; while novia was the formal word for girlfriend I learned in Spanish classes back in the U.S.

Learning to really learn the language was all about learning the idiomatic expressions. Spanish uses a lot.

The Common Core State Standards emphasize a balanced approach to vocabulary development. Unlike some of the other ELA Standards, the vocabulary Standards are quite specific and especially so with figures of speech. Although much of our Tier 2 (academic language) vocabulary is acquired through reading challenging text, other methods of vocabulary acquisition are best taught through explicit, direct instruction. Take a moment to skim the vocabulary standards and see how you’re doing in your class or classes this year.

• Multiple Meaning Words and Context Clues (L.4.a.)
• Greek and Latin Word Parts (L.4.a.)
• Language Resources (L.4.c.d.)
• Figures of Speech (L.5.a.)
• Word Relationships (L.5.b.)
• Connotations (L.5.c.)
• Academic Language Words (L.6.0)

How to Teach Figures of Speech and Idiomatic Expressions

In my five vocabulary programs for grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 (details follow), I use the wide variety of figures of speech (stated and suggested by the Language Standards) to teach students what the figure of speech is, what it means, and how to use it properly. My vocabulary worksheets require students to practice the figure of speech in the writing context, using surrounding context clues to show the meaning of the figure of speech.

Figures of Speech

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For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

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How to Teach Connotations Shades of Meaning

Some of our English words are quite imprecise and have shades of meaning. Whereas the Greeks have at least four words for love, we only have one. How crazy is it that we can say, “I love you darling, and I also love hot dogs” in the same sentence? Some of our English words are extremely precise. When we’re discussing walking, we can use that general word, as in this example: Walking through the park, we stopped to feed the birds. However, we can assign more precision to the gerund by saying the following: Ambling, or Sauntering, or Cruising, or Strolling Walking through the park, we stopped to feed the birds.  

Whether the words we choose to say or write are imprecise or precise in the denotative sense (what the dictionary says), we pour meaning into the words (connotations) by the way we use the words and the surround context clues. After all, we could say, “I love you darling” in a romantic sense, in a sarcastic, mocking sense, or in a humorous sense. It all depends on the communication clues we provide.

However, words do mean something on their own and it makes sense to teach our students what they do mean apart from the surrounding clues to help developing speakers and writers make proper word choices. Teaching the connotative meanings of words is best facilitated through the use of synonyms.

The writers of the Common Core Vocabulary Standards include connotative vocabulary acquisition in CCSS L.5.c.:

• Multiple Meaning Words and Context Clues (L.4.a.)
• Greek and Latin Word Parts (L.4.a.)
• Language Resources (L.4.c.d.)
• Figures of Speech (L.5.a.)
• Word Relationships (L.5.b.)
• Connotations (L.5.c.)
• Academic Language Words (L.6.0)

How to Teach Connotations

One great way to teach connotations is with semantic spectrums. Just like a rainbow is a color spectrum, certain vocabulary words can be placed within their own spectrum of meaning (semantics). Typically, when using semantic spectrums to introduce new words, the teacher selects two new words which have connotative meanings. The teacher provides the definitions of the two new words (or students look them up), and students write these new words on a semantic spectrum to fit in with two similar words, which most of your students will already know. For example, the two new words, abundant and scarce would fit in with the already known words, plentiful and rare, in this semantic order: abundant–plentiful–scarce–rare.

In my three standards-based vocabulary programs (described below with free downloads), my semantic spectrums look like this:

Semantic Spectrums

Notice that the parts of speech are all verbs for both the new words and already known words in the first example. In the second example, the new words are nouns, but the already known words are adjectives.

It makes no difference whether the parts of speech are consistent or not for the purposes of learning the connotations. Plus, it provides a nice means of extended learning, should you choose to use the teachable moment.

Teacher: Notice that social and shy are what kind adjectives. What inflected endings would we have to add onto our vocabulary words: extrovert and introvert to make them into what kind adjectives? 

Students: “ed.”

Teacher: Who could use the adjective forms in a sentence to show their meanings? What transition words would most likely be used to show the differences between extrovert and introvert? Can anyone think of another word to fit in our spectrum? Yes, you can use your thesaurus.

Semantic spectrums are wonderful teaching tools to help students master Connotations (L.5.c.) Standard. I provide 28 semantic spectrums for each of my vocabulary programs, different ones for each 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 grade level.

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For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

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How to Teach Word Relationships

In Appendix A of the Common Core State Standards, the authors discuss the importance of learning new vocabulary in the context of word relationships. To deeply understand a new word, often students must see this word in light of its connections to other words. The authors state,

Students benefit from instruction about the connections and patterns in language.
Developing in students an analytical attitude toward the logic and sentence structure of their texts, alongside an
awareness of word parts, word origins, and word relationships, provides students with a sense of how language works
such that syntax, morphology, and etymology can become useful cues in building meaning as students encounter
new words and concepts (Beck, McKeown, & Kucan, 2008) (Appendix A 32).

Years ago the SAT tested vocabulary through word relationships, known as analogies. Knowing the typical analogy categories helped students make educated guesses to be able to match one set of word relationships to another. For example, NIGHT is to DAY in the same way as TALL is to SHORT. Both sets illustrate antonym categories.

Many teachers have found that teaching analogies helps students understand how new words fit into already-known words. Building these word connections helps students better memorize and also use the new vocabulary with greater precision.

Which Word Relationships and Which Words to Teach

Both word relationships and new vocabulary should increase in complexity throughout the grade levels. For example, from item to category, such as with hurricane to weather in grade 4, students should progress to problem to solution, such as with infection to diagnosis in grade 8. Where can you get such a list of word relationships and words? Print off my comprehensive grades 4-8 Vocabulary Scope and Sequence to plan your vocabulary instruction, found at the end of this article.

The instructional scope and sequence is from my three vocabulary programs for grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 (described at the end of the article). Not only is there an instructional plan for word relationship, but all Vocabulary Standards are included:

• Multiple Meaning Words and Context Clues (L.4.a.)
• Greek and Latin Word Parts (L.4.a.)
• Language Resources (L.4.c.d.)
• Figures of Speech (L.5.a.)
• Word Relationships (L.5.b.)
• Connotations (L.5.c.)
• Academic Language Words (L.6.0)

How to Teach Word Relationships

To teach word relationships deeply, provide students with paired words to be learned which have a definable category relationship. Require students to write sentences which apply context clues strategies to show the different meanings of the two words in relationship to each other. Teach the S.A.L.E. Context Clue Strategies to equip your students to use surrounding word clues.

*****

For full-year vocabulary programs which include multiple meaning words (L.4.a.), Greek and Latin morphology with Morphology Walls (L.4.a.), figures of speech (L.5.a.), words with special relationships (L.5.b.), words with connotative meanings (L.5.c.), and academic language words (L.6.0), check out the assessment-based grades 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 Comprehensive Vocabulary.

Get the Grades 4,5,6,7,8 Vocabulary Sequence of Instruction FREE Resource:

Get the Greek and Latin Morphology Walls FREE Resource:

Get the Diagnostic Academic Language Assessment FREE Resource:

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