hunger
poor
digits
manage
Tier 2
blemish
flinched
testimony
dragged
hibernate
Tier 3
diverged
trestle
ludicrous
hallucination
The words listed in Tiers 1 and 2 should be explicitly taught to students. Although many of the words in Tier 1 are used everyday, students may still need the practice. These words are typically easy for students to pick up on because they are more common, and students are familiar with the context, in which, they are used. While there are a lot of basic words students need to know, academic words are still much more crucial. When it comes to standardized testing, these are the words that students see most often. Having a deeper understanding of these words will help students pick up on more specialized words (Tier 3), because they will have a better understanding of the written context of the word(s).
In order to help students understand Maniac Magee, teachers will need to create lessons and/or activities that explicitly teach the vocabulary words in Tiers 1 and 2. These vocabulary words show up quite a bit throughout the novel, and if the students are familiar with their meaning going in, they will be able to focus more on the story itself. By practicing and reviewing the words in Tier 2, they will understand how the words fit into the story. Instead of focusing on transition words, teachers should pull out these words because they are seen a lot in our written and oral language. Knowing and understanding these words, means better comprehension of this text. This can also improve fluency and comprehension with other texts, because these words are not limited to this one.
Vocabulary Lesson Plan for Maniac Magee
Objective:
Students will become familiar with basic and academic vocabulary words used in Maniac Magee.
Students will determine the meaning of unknown vocabulary using context clues.
Materials:
Pen or pencil
Piece of paper (or worksheet chart already included)
Dictionary
Outline of Key Events:
-Teacher will have students make a chart on a piece of paper. The first column will be a list of 18-20 vocabulary words. The second column will be for peer definitions, and the third will be for them to write the dictionary definitions. Students will read the novel, and tell students to highlight any words that they do not know, or have never seen before. Students will list these words on the chart in the first column.
-Once all of the students have read the novel, teacher make sure that the students have listed the unknown vocabulary words in the first column of their charts.
-Teacher will arrange students in pairs and have them each exchange charts.
-Each student must define the vocabulary word as best as they can, using only the context clues given on the referenced pages. Students are to write their definitions in the second column, next to the corresponding word.
-Teacher will model this activity for students, to ensure that everyone understands what they are supposed to be doing.
-Teacher will walk around the classroom, making sure that each student has at least 10 academic words (Tier 2) listed.
-Once everyone has completed this part of the lesson, the teacher will ask the students to return the papers to their partners and, using a dictionary, compare their peers definitions to the dictionary definitions. If their peers responses were correct, students can place a check mark in the third column for that word. If the peers were incorrect, students will write the correct definition in the third column.
Closing summary:
-Teacher will ask students to total how many definitions their peers got correct.
-Teacher will have students raise their hand if their partner got at least 10 correct.
-Assuming that this is half of the class, teacher will explain that this activity demonstrates how much information we can get about a word from looking at the context clues.
-Teacher explains to students that this is an important skill, because it can improve their performance in reading comprehension.
Ongoing assessment:
-Teacher will add these words to the classes' word wall, or class vocabulary list.
-Teacher can also give the students a vocabulary assessment on these words. Students will have to match the word with its correct definition, or to the sentence that uses it appropriately or in the right context.
This mini lesson looks EXTREMELY successful in getting the students to understand the importance of identifying and defining unknown words as well as the resources they can use to determine definitions. I love that the students are asked to write down all the unknown words and then have a peer write the definition in their own words based on the book context. This method, in my opinion, is very successful in asking the students to find the definitions to these words without initially using dictionary definitions. Valand has the students referencing the dictionary definition AFTER the students have their peers write their own definition based on the context clues. I think it’s important that she added the dictionary use in there because students need to use a resource like the dictionary to know whether their definitions are correct or not. I think Valand was successful in creating a mini-lesson without relying on dictionary definitions; she initially has the students creating their own definitions. Essentially she has them using the dictionaries AFTER they have created their own language so I think Valand followed the guidelines for this mini-lesson. I would DEFINITELY use this mini-lesson in my classroom. I love this idea and actually have never heard of something like this so I really appreciate Valand sharing it with us!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Kate! This lesson plan is a great way to help students define unknown words. I think it's beneficial that students write down unknown words from the book they are reading because it helps them identify the words they are having trouble with, rather than having an instructor pick and choose words that students may not find value in or need clarification on. Having students identify which words they would like to understand more deeply allows a deeper connection to be made to the book as well. Understanding words on a deeper level will help the students' comprehension of the book overall as well. Having students define their peers' words for each other in their own words is a great way to promote collaboration and give all students even more opportunities to use context to define the meaning of words. Not only will students have the opportunity to understand their words at a deeper level, but they can take a look at words their peers chose and form a deeper understanding of those words also. Like Kate mentioned, following up the collaboration activity by defining the words with the dictionary definition is a great way to verify and compare the definitions the peers created. I like Valand's idea for the ongoing assessment of adding the words onto the word wall in the classroom. The teacher can evaluate which words the students had the most trouble defining or seemed to be most valuable for the class and add these onto the word wall so the class could integrate them into their lessons more often. Thanks Valand for sharing this great idea for a lesson plan!
ReplyDeleteI really like this lesson as well Valand, you did a great job of helping students to build knowledge from the vocabulary words. I think it is great for students to write down words that they do not know when they encounter a new word when reading. This will allow them to think about the word instead of reading it and moving on to the next. This will not only help with comprehension skills but also extending the students vocabulary. Many students from different backgrounds have different exposures to language therefore we can not assume what students do and do not know. The fact that you are having the students choose the words that they want to know is a great idea because it allows for individual learning. I also like the fact that you are incorporating the word wall into this lesson, I think that this technique will teach students to always try and identify an unknown word based on the context in which it is being used. I love this lesson Valand and i think it would be something i would like to use in my classroom.
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