Jj is for Jottings 132.  Direct Vocabulary Instruction.

When a child has poor vocabulary knowledge for their age, it indicates that they struggle to learn vocabulary from their written or spoken language experiences.  They will then need direct vocabulary instruction to increase their chances of catching up with their peers.

It also makes sense to teach them strategies to help them learn new word meanings from their language experiences.  These strategies involve teaching them to use morphological knowledge (see previous article) to work out meanings of more complex words, or to search for words that might provide clues to the meanings of other words in context.  A combination of this broad, strategy-based approach and direct vocabulary instruction will provide the best results, according to recent research.  And it aids not just vocabulary knowledge, but also reading comprehension.

 

SUPERFICIAL WORD KNOWLEDGE.

Many children with poor language and reading skills will have only a nodding acquaintance with many word meanings.  They can even be quite common, concrete words which you would expect them to know.  These children can easily slip through the net. Parents and teachers may not observe that, although children may use a word, their knowledge of it is actually very limited.  It’s not just a case of “he used that word so we can mentally tick it off as part of his vocabulary”.  We need to be more vigilant than that.

Superficial word knowledge can be reflected in a child’s spelling difficulties, in problems finding words, and in rapid naming tasks.

DIRECT VOCABULARY INSTRUCTION.

A general idea of what might be involved in the direct teaching of vocabulary goes something like this:

• Children see the target word in written text.
• They hear it aloud and repeat it.
• The teacher provides them with a child-friendly definition of the word. This would involve concepts the children already understand.  Researcher Dr. Danielle Colenbrander from Maquarie University provides a good example of a child-friendly definition for confide:  “To trust someone with information you don’t want anybody else to know”.
• Children then connect the knowledge of the new word with their own experience. You might ask them if they have ever confided in someone.
• Then the children complete activities in which the target word is used in a variety of different contexts and they actively use the word. In this way, they develop flexible and deep word knowledge.

THERE ARE SO MANY WORDS.  WHICH ONES DO WE TEACH?

Unlike teaching phonics  and spelling rules, direct teaching of vocabulary isn’t a case of teaching a child to fish and you feed him for a lifetime; it is a case of giving him one fish at a time.  So how do you decide which fish to give him first?

Very Young Children.

For very young children (prior to school), it would simply be a case of noticing where their use of everyday words is limited. Then you can concentrate on using that word in as many different contexts as you can think of.  For example, if the child uses “dog” only in relation to your own dog, you could point out other dogs in real life and say that they are also dogs, “just like our Mitzi”.  You can talk about different shapes, sizes and colours of dog; long-haired versus short-haired; and so on.  Remember to feed in the information (label) first, then expect the child to be able to tell you that creature over there is a dog.  Comprehension comes before expression.

Use real-life situations and pictures – in fact, as many senses as possible.  The more senses you involve, the better your chances of efficient learning.  This is, of course, the parents/care-givers doing the explicit teaching here.

Remember to check that they retain the word over time.  If part of the reason for poor vocabulary is poor auditory  memory, they may need much repetition over a period of time. So be prepared to revisit words.

School-Aged Children.

Teachers need to make choices about which words to target for explicit instruction.  They must decide which words will be most useful at school and in everyday life.  They need to take into account a child’s age, the school curriculum, oral language abilities, and the child’s interests.  In an ideal world, a speech pathologist would be working with the child’s classroom teacher to develop a set of appropriate words.  Parents can also contribute to this, and can follow up vocabulary activities at home.

Two Direct Vocabulary Instruction Stories.

Both of these are in relation to the same child.

I had a delightful boy who had been diagnosed with a Severe Comprehension Disorder.  We’ll call him X.  X had speech therapy at pre-school, and I “inherited” him when he began school.  Although he was at school, he was really functioning at the level of the very young child in terms of language comprehension. He was a great illustration of the need for direct vocabulary instruction, since he didn’t pick up even basic meanings easily.

Story 1.

I noted that X didn’t know many names of body parts, and he was not retaining “elbow”.  Week after week during therapy sessions we would spend a little time working on this before moving on to other language tasks.  We happened to be working in a meeting room which had about 20 chairs around the perimeter.  So I had X walk around the room, hitting the seat of each chair with his elbow whilst saying “elbow”.  Thus he had sensory input which was visual, auditory, feedback from his mouth parts as he said the word, the feel of his elbow on the chair, and movement. He also was working on it at home.  (He had a brilliant “therapy” mother.  She used to follow up everything and write me detailed notes about how he went.)

One week, we had done our “elbow” work and moved on to completing simple sentences.  I explained the task and gave X some examples.  Then we tried one: “The girl was wearing a pink…..”  “Elbow?” he said, hopefully.

At least he hadn’t completely forgotten the word by that stage.  (You’ll be pleased to know that “elbow” finally became cemented into his head for good, but it took much persistence.)

Story 2.

I was teaching X an alternative meaning for the word “duck”.  He knew about the bird, so that particular meaning had a tick.  He loved sport, so I said that if someone threw a cricket ball at his head, what would he instinctively do?  Duck. I screwed up pieces of scrap paper into balls and threw them at his head, whereupon he would physically duck as he said the word “duck”.  Once again, we did little bursts of multi-sensory teaching over time until X had the word firmly in his head for good.  But at one point he became a bit confused and, when I threw the paper ball at his head, he physically ducked and said “quack”!

Direct Instruction Required For Both Spoken And Reading Comprehension.

X was a perfect example of a child who had only superficial knowledge of the words he did know.  He had the good fortune to catch on to phonics very easily and to pick up sight words, so he had the mechanics of reading, but he barked at print, comprehending very little of what he was reading.  His expressive language was – on the surface – intact, so you could have a perfectly normal conversation about sport, his family activities etc.  But if you started to stray from his “comfort repertoire” his difficulties would quickly become apparent.  He was also a very attractive, friendly child with good manners and social skills. These factors, combined with his apparent ability to read, meant that he went right through primary school with very few teachers really understanding the extent of his difficulties.  His aides and I were well aware, but he hoodwinked most people – without meaning to, of course.

Admittedly, X was an extreme case of the need for direct vocabulary instruction, but there are plenty of children out there who also need this type of intervention.

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