Saskatchewan Learning, 200
Click here to read this appendix in the Common Core
– it deals with text complexity. How can students with
special needs be supported to read complex texts?
How can you best help students with
disabilities know lots of words?
 How can you build their motivation to
learning words?
 What is the benefit of direct and indirect
vocabulary instruction?
 How can you authentically assess students’
vocabulary development?
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What is Vocabulary?
Knowledge of word meanings
 Key to comprehension
 Related to conceptual knowledge

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Vocabulary is vital to communicating with others and
understanding what you read

Vocabulary is the study of: the meaning of words, how the
words are used, root words, prefixes, and suffixes, and
analogies

Vocabulary should be introduced within a context; not word
by word or giving students a vocabulary list

In order for students to comprehend while they read, they
need to know enough vocabulary words

Vocabulary is not just learning the definitions of words, but it
includes learning how the word should be used in language
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vocabulary should be taught both directly and indirectly;
repetition and multiple exposures to vocabulary items are important;
learning in rich contexts is valuable for vocabulary learning;
how vocabulary is assessed and evaluated can have differential
effects on instruction; and
 dependence on a single vocabulary-learning strategy will not result
in optimal learning.
(NICHD, 2001)
Eight Characteristics of Effective Vocabulary Instruction
1. Effective vocabulary instruction does not rely on definitions.
2. Students must represent their knowledge of words in linguistic and nonlinguistic
ways.
3. Effective vocabulary instruction involves the gradual shaping of word meanings
through multiple exposures.
4. Teaching word parts enhances students’ understanding of terms.
5. Different types of words require different types of instruction.
6. Students should discuss the terms they are learning.
7. Students should play with words.
8. Instruction should focus on terms that have a high probability of enhancing
academic success.
Marzano and Pickering, 2005
1. Provide a description, explanation, or example of the
new term.
2. Ask students to restate the description, explanation, or
example in their own words.
3. Ask students to construct a picture, symbol, or graphic
representation of the term.
4. Engage students in activities that help them add to their
knowledge of the terms.
5. Ask students to discuss the terms with one another.
6. Involve students in games that allow them to play with
the terms.
Marzano and Pickering,
This article has ideas for
sight vocabulary but they
can easily be used for
meaning vocabulary – can
you think of ways to do it?
This article has ideas for
vocabulary assessment
and instruction – take a
look- what are some
insights you gained?
This article has good ideas
for instruction. What ones
do you think are best?
Good info about
vocabulary instruction –
and some meaningful
lesson examples at end of
article.
CCSS – Appendix A
Research suggests that if students are going to grasp and
retain words and comprehend text, they need incremental,
repeated exposure in a variety of contexts to the words they
are trying to learn. When students make multiple
connections between a new word and their own experiences,
they develop a nuanced and flexible understanding of the
word they are learning. In this way, students learn not only
what a word means but also how to use that word in a variety
of contexts, and they can apply appropriate senses of the
word’s meaning in order to understand the word in different
contexts
(Landauer & Dumais, 1997; Landauer, McNamara, Dennis, &
Kintsch, 2007; Nagy, Herman, & Anderson, 1985).
The word can be explained in known
words that the students will
understand.
 The word will be able to be used by
students in what they might write or
talk about.

Beck, Kucan, McKeown, 2002
Tier One
 the words of everyday speech usually learned
in the early grades
Examples…. dog, baby, run
General Academic Words
 more likely to appear in written texts than in speech.
 appear in all kinds of texts
› informational texts (words such as relative, vary,
formulate, specificity, and accumulate),
› technical texts (calibrate, itemize, periphery), and
› literary texts (misfortune, dignified, faltered,
unabashedly).
 often represent subtle or precise ways to say relatively
simple things—saunter instead of walk
 highly generalizable.
CCSS, Appendix A
Domain Specific Words
 specific to a domain or field of study (lava, carburator,
legislature, circumference, aorta) and key to
understanding a new concept within a text.
 far more common in informational texts than in
literature.
 Recognized as new and “hard” words for most readers
(particularly student readers), they are often explicitly
defined by the author of a text, repeatedly used, and
otherwise heavily scaffolded (e.g., made a part of a
glossary).
CCSS, Appendix A
CCSS – Appendix A
Examples of Tier 2 Words
In early times, no one knew how volcanoes formed or why they
spouted red-hot molten rock. In modern times, scientists began to
study volcanoes. They still don’t know all the answers, but they
know much about how a volcano works.
Our planet made up of many layers of rock. The top layers of
solid rock are called the crust. Deep beneath the crust is the
mantle, where it is so hot that some rock melts. The melted, or
molten, rock is called magma.
Volcanoes are formed when magma pushes its way up through
the crack in Earth’s crust. This is called a volcanic eruption. When
magma pours forth on the surface, it is called lava.
Simon, Seymour. Volcanoes. New York: HarperCollins, 2006
Sketching Words
Use a sketch to show the meaning of each word.
Word: ______________________________
Word: ______________________________
Word: ______________________________
Word: ______________________________
Word: ______________________________
Word: ______________________________
Sketching Words
Use a sketch to show the meaning of each word.
Word: ______________________________
spouted
Word: ______________________________
layers
solid
Word: ______________________________
eruption
Word: ______________________________
crust
Word: ______________________________
surface
Word: ______________________________
http://wallwisher.com/wall/iv8dhlu77l
What needs to be taught?
 How is this best taught to students with
disabilities?
 What is the relationship between
vocabulary and comprehension?
 How can you assess a student’s
comprehension?

the process of simultaneously extracting
and constructing meaning through
interaction and involvement with written
language.
 Comprehension entails three elements:1

› The reader who is doing the comprehending
 capacities, abilities, knowledge, and experiences
that a person brings to the act of reading
› The text that is to be comprehended
 any printed text or electronic text
› The activity in which comprehension is a part
 the purposes, processes, and consequences
associated with the act of reading.
The Rand Group
cognitive capacities (e.g., attention,
memory, critical analytic ability,
inferencing, visualization ability),
 motivation (a purpose for reading, an
interest in the content being read, selfefficacy as a reader), and
 various types of knowledge (vocabulary,
domain and topic knowledge, linguistic
and discourse knowledge, knowledge of
specific comprehension strategies).

Features of text
 Background knowledge of the reader
influences text difficulty
 Vocabulary
 Linguistic structure
 Electronic Texts

Purpose- teacher mandated or internally
motivated – for enjoyment, to learn, to
perform a task
 Process- skimming for information or
reading intently for remembering or
studying (influenced by purpose)
 Consequence of reading – knowledge,
application, engagement

Classroom culture
 Economic resources
 Classroom learning environment
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Students with disabilities can learn isolated skills and strategies but
need support with generalizing.
Teach comprehension skills through read alouds, think alouds, and
oral language to provide students with weak decoding skills access
to higher levels of language and content.
Teach vocabulary of frequently encountered words as well as
content area vocabulary.
Provide students with a diverse range of text structures to read and
process. This will improve vocabulary and background knowledge.
Teach students to self monitor when they read by asking if the text
makes sense and if they can remember what they read.
The three most highly researched types of strategy instruction for
students with disabilities are question answering, text structure, and
multiple strategy instruction such as Reciprocal Teaching and
Collaborative Strategic Reading.
Grillo, 2010

Comprehension is the understanding and
interpretation of what is read

To be able to accurately understand written
material, children need to be able to:
› Decode what they read quickly and automatically
› Make connections between what they read and what
they already know
› Think deeply about what they read

Readers who have good comprehension are able
to draw conclusions about what they read

Comprehension involves combining reading with
thinking and reasoning
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Ask and answer questions
Make inferences and draw conclusions, citing text
Summarize text
Identify themes
Interpret words and phrases within texts
Analyze text structure
Identify and assess point of view
Integrate and evaluate content presented in
diverse media and formats
Compare and contrast texts- themes, topics,
approaches
(Tompkins, 2006; Reutzel, Smith, & Fawson, 2005; Harvey & Goudvis, 2000 )

Activating Prior Knowledge – making connections with the text to think
about what is already known about the text or topic

Predicting – making connections with the text to make guesses about what
might happen or about the content to be presented

Inferring – using text clues and reader clues to draw conclusions about the
story and characters

Self-Questioning – generating questions to guide reading and being able
to find the answers to those questions and/or generate new ones

Visualizing/Sensing – creating mental pictures and other sensory images
while reading the text

Identifying Important Information – making decisions while reading
about what is most important and worth remembering

Monitoring – asking “Does this make sense?” and clarifying by adapting
strategic processes to accommodate the response

Summarizing – recalling important information and being able to
synthesize those ideas
 Explain the strategies and the thinking process, what kind of
thinking to use, how you will document it, and why it’s
important
 Model the strategies, the thinking process, and the
documentation, using a read aloud and think aloud to
demonstrate how to think like an effective reader
 Guide the students to apply the strategies, thinking process,
and documentation, providing hints or prompts to ensure
thinking. Gradually fade the support as students show they
understand.
 Provide opportunities for students to practice the
strategies and thinking process in groups, pairs, and
independently
 Summarize the learning, reflect on the use of the
strategies, and set goals for applying the strategies in new

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Before Reading - Anticipation
 Get ready to read - activate prior knowledge, set
purpose, get motivated, make connections, ask questions,
make inferences, draw conclusions, make predictions
During Reading - Reader-Text Interactions- Realizations
 Engage meaningfully with text, actively respond to the
reading – determine importance, make inferences, ask
and answer questions, summarize, visualize, monitor,
draw conclusions, adjust predictions
After Reading - Contemplation
 Extend and elaborate ideas from the text – summarize,
make inferences, ask and answer questions, evaluate,
extend learning
Allen & Mohr, 2006; Vacca & Vacca, 1999; Vaughn & Estes, 1986
This article has some
specific teaching ideas to
help you support students
with their comprehension.
Think of how you can use
one of these in your own
teaching.
More ideas in this article.
Can you use any? Be
ready to share.
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Text Enhancement Strategies:
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Graphic Organizers
Mnemonic Illustrations
Story Maps
Computer Assisted Instruction
Study Guides
Cognitive and Metacognitive Strategies:
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Text Structure
Questioning
Cognitive Mapping/Story Mapping
Main Idea Instruction
Summarization
What you need to think about to plan
effective vocabulary and
comprehension lessons?
 What is most important?
 How can these ideas and strategies be
integrated into a scripted or published
program?
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