Vocabulary Done Right!

I can't even believe it has been so long since my last post, it really is too long to even mention.  We are just a few hours away from this little cuties first birthday and I have been super busy getting things together to teach sixth, SIXTH, YES, SIXTH grade!!  Cra-zay!  We had a few abrupt changes at our school and therefore I have found myself in 6th grade until a position in a primary grade opens up (hopefully next year)!

Anyways, throughout conversations of this huge and overwhelming transition I have found that 1) I have had lots of moments of self-reflection, 2) I am my own worst critic.  BUT, I am confident about my vocabulary instruction.  It is not only a highly education time of our day, but I hear my students COMPLAIN when we don't get around to it some days...WIN, WIN.

This set up can be used with any set of words, but we use the words from our Wonders Reading Series.  I have added a link to a huge file that will be half off for the entire day tomorrow in honor of our sweet girl's birthday!

The set up begins with the vocabulary chart.  This is where we store and organize all our information for the entire week.  It also makes a great study guide for assessments and we also use this opportunity to practice cursive since it is usually only words or short sentences!

Day 1: Introduce words in a cloze format.  The vocabulary word is used in a sentence, however the word is committed and left with a blank.  I can not stress enough how important and rewarding this is for the students to think about what words would make sense in the blanks.  I usually let 3-4 students guess and then write the correct word in on the chart, which is usually projected up on our whiteboard.

Day 2: Students get an opportunity to come up with definitions for each word.  Again, such deep conversations are taking place!  We also utilize dictionaries on Day 2 if and only IF we feel our definitions are not satisfactory. 

Day 3 & 4: We use the next two days to do the antonyms and synonyms.  Again, we really stress that they should be one word and a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT WORD...things like not happy, longer, etc will not due!  Sometimes we do all the synonyms one day and then the antonyms the next.  Other times we do four synonyms and four antonyms one day and the other set the next day.

Day 5: The last day of course was an assessment day.  We utilized the crossword puzzle as well as what was provided in the Wonders Reading series.  

Below I have included a link to the 90 page packet (plus answer keys) of all the vocabulary resources that correlate to the third grade Wonders Reading Series!  This product will be 50% off for the entire day tomorrow!