By Francie Alexander (www.scholastic.com)
Knowing what words to teach is the first step in providing effective vocabulary practice. I have a favorite mnemonic device that helps me remember the types of words I want to teach explicitly:
Type A Words: These words are like Type A personalities. They work hard in order to convey the meaning of the text being read. There are two sources for these words: Academic Language and the Content Areas. Academic Language describes the language of schooling — words used across disciplines like genre and glossary. Content Area words are specific to the discipline — words like organization in social studies and organism in science. If you want your students to “get it,” these are the must-know words.
Type B Words: These words are the Basics. There are hundreds of high-frequency words. The basics make up a large percentage of student reading and writing. Students must be able to read words like the, is, and, are, been and because — well, because.
Type C Words: The Connectors act as signal words. There may be some overlap with the basic words. Students need to understand the signals for cause and effect relationships, sequence and other important indicators of how text is organized.
Type D Words: D is for Difficult — words with multiple meanings are challenging for all students and may be especially so for English-Language Learners.
Type X Words: X is for the eXtras. These are the words that will not be encountered frequently but in a certain story or context are important to meaning. Tell the students what it means without teaching explicitly.
