This weeks reading was on building student vocabulary. Both readings spelled out strategies teachers can use in class (and some students can do at home.)
Contextual Redefinition was one of my favorite strategies because it was also a strategy students can use on their own when they are independently reading. This strategy I also thought would be more useful for a novel-type reading, not reading a type of textbook. Alot of reading I will assign in physics will have the content vocabulary words defined explicitly in the reading.
For this reason, the personal glossary strategy was another one of my favorites. This strategy was especially appealing because I already do something like this for myself. In the front of my notebooks for class I have a blank sheet of paper that I write word definitions on as I read through material. For me, I also include concepts/equations for certain things. I think this extension can be relevant to my students as well.
Etymologia was another one I would like to use, and have no experience with it before. Occasionally some of my teachers has used word meanings in class before and it was always something that stuck with me but never thought to look for word stems and meanings before. This idea even came up when I read about Levin’s Keyword method in the other reading. I thought using meaningless mnemonics to associate with words is not as useful as discussing word morphemes.
Lisa,
ReplyDeleteI also liked the personal glossary strategy. I like the sense of independence that it gives to students. The way you set aside a page in your notebook for vocabulary and equations is a great strategy. I will consider having my students try something like this for the next unit we study.
Mindy