Birmingham Education Partnership

Building vocabulary to help

close the attainment gap

Fiona Oakley
Literacy Adviser, School Partnerships
fiona.oakley@literacytrust.org.uk

T: 020 7587 1842

W: www.literacytrust.org.uk
Twitter: @Literacy_Trust
Facebook: nationalliteracytrust
 Heading here
About The National Literacy Trust
We aim to equip disadvantaged young people with literacy fit
for employment and life
We target schools with high levels of
poorer children and below average
literacy levels and aim to eliminate the
attainment gap

We support the families who need help

most, reaching out to communities
through partnerships

We lead the national literacy campaign,

raising awareness of the critical
importance of the cause with compelling
research and a commanding policy
platform

www.literacytrust.org.uk 2
1977: The Silver Jubilee

Elizabeth
Beefan Oakley
3
 Exposure to a rich vocabulary

“You cannot write it if you cannot say it; you cannot say it if
you haven’t heard it.”
Pie Corbett, 2005

“Vocabulary is a matter of word-building as well as word-

using.”
David Crystal

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 Word appreciation

• Santa's helpers are subordinate clauses.

• In democracy your vote counts. In feudalism your count votes.

• Atheism: the only non prophet organisation.

• ‘The better part of valour is discretion.’

Henry IV Part 1 - Act 5, Scene 4

• ‘Brevity is the soul of wit.’

Hamlet - Act 2, Scene 2 5
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Objectives

• Explore the research around the vocabulary gap

• Develop knowledge of word morphology
• Understand the role of academic language in school
• Try out strategies for direct vocabulary instruction

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 Heading
The hereevidence
research

• There is a strong reciprocal relationship between word knowledge and

reading comprehension.
(National Reading Panel 2000, Biemiller 2003)

• Children who read more will come across a greater number of words and get
more practice at decoding words and have greater opportunities to enhance
their knowledge of morphology and spelling than less avid readers.
(Cain and Oakhill 2011)

• Learning new words is a cumulative task that takes place gradually over time.
(Nagy and Scott 2000 )

• Teaching definitions by themselves are unlikely to enhance comprehension.

(Baumann, Kame'enuu,& Ash, 2003)
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 The reading
Heading hererope

www.literacytrust.org.uk Hollis Scarborough (2001) 8

 Vocabulary size
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There are numerous estimates about vocabulary size. Some count all
words, others count word ‘families’ or ‘root words’ Children in the
highest quartile enter school with an average estimated receptive
vocabulary of 7100 root words. In contrast, children from the lowest
quartile have an average receptive vocabulary size of 3000 root words.
(Biemiller 2003)
In the American school setting, good estimates of L1 word knowledge by
graduating high-school students appears to be about 20,000 families
(Nation, Nagy etc)

Milton and Treffers – Deller (2013) revisited the link between vocabulary
size and academic achievement and concluded that native speakers’
vocabulary size on entering university in the UK is much smaller than
usually reported - being an average of 10,000 word families.
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 Closing
Headingthe vocabulary gap
here

• Becker (1977) identified poor vocabulary knowledge as the primary

cause of academic failure of disadvantaged students.
• Children’s declining reading comprehension compared to more able
peers from age 8 onwards largely results from a lack of vocabulary
knowledge. (Becker 1977)
• Disadvantaged students show declining reading comprehension as their
limited vocabulary comes to constrain what they can understand from
texts. (Chall et al 1990)
• From birth to 48 months, parents in professional families spoke 32
million more words to their children than parents in welfare families.
(Hart and Risley
2003)
• A child who is not at the expected standard in language at the age of five
is 11 times less likely to achieve the expected level in maths at age 11.
(DfE 2017)
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 Closing
Headingthe vocabulary gap
here
• Children with language difficulties at age 5 are four times more likely to have reading
difficulties in adulthood, three times as likely to have mental health problems, and
twice as likely to be unemployed. (Law et al 2017)
• Students with limited vocabularies read less and thus learn fewer new words. ‘Matthew
effect’ (Stanovich 1986)

‘Put simply, the word rich get richer, but the word poor get poorer.’

‘By explicitly teaching a mere 300 to 400 words a year we can foster an
annual growth of around 3000 to 4000 words.’

‘With a bigger, harder curriculum, in any subject, we begin with the

words.’

‘Vocabulary teaching can be incidental, disorganised and limited, when

it needs to be organised, cumulative and rich.’ (Quigley 2018)

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“Vocabularies are crossing circles
and loops. We are defined by the
lines we choose to cross or to be
confined by.”

A.S. Byatt
 Vocabulary in the National
Heading here
Curriculum
• Pupils’ acquisition and command of vocabulary are key to
their learning and progress across the whole curriculum.
Teachers should therefore develop vocabulary actively,
building systematically on pupils’ current knowledge. They
should increase pupils’ store of words in general;
• In addition, it is vital for pupils’ comprehension that they
understand the meanings of words they meet in their reading
across all subjects, and older pupils should be taught the
meaning of instruction verbs that they may meet in
examination questions. It is particularly important to induct
pupils into the language which defines each subject in its
own right, such as accurate mathematical and scientific
language.
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 Have you heard the word?
Word I do not I have heard I can use I can give a definition of
know the the word the word this word/phrase or use it
word but can’t in the right in writing. (Write it
remember way when I below.)
its meaning am talking
Orthography

Morphology

Etymology

Collocation
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 Components of word knowledge

• 1. Orthography (spelling)
• 2. Morphology (word-family relations)
• 3. Parts of speech ( suffixes)
• 4. Pronunciation ( syllables and stress)
• 5. Meanings (range, variant meanings, homophones)
• 6. Collocations (what words very commonly go with a word)
• 7. Meaning associations (topical links, synonyms, antonyms)
• 8. Specific uses (technical, common)
• 9. Register (power, politeness, disciplinary domain, formality,
slang, dialect form) 15
 Morphemes
Heading here

• A morpheme is a unit of meaning

• A phoneme is a unit of sound
• A grapheme is a unit of writing (representing one sound)

-ing sh

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 Morphology
Heading here
A morpheme is defined as the smallest unit of meaning in a word.
In a word such as independently, the morphemes are said to be:
in - depend - ent - ly
depend is the root (or base) word and the other morphemes are, in
this case, affixes.
A prefix comes before the root and suffix comes after it.

Free morphemes – morphemes that can stand alone as meaningful

words
Bound morphemes – morphemes that can only be attached to
another part of a word (cannot stand alone), affixes are bound
morphemes

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 Morphemes

http://tabethadawkins.weebly.com/morphology-and-etymology.html#
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Word building

Prefixes Base or Root words Suffixes

un appear ness
re manage ment
pre form tion
in struct ance, ence
dis port ing
mis embody ate
mal agree ed
ex rupt able, ible

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 Heading here
Semantics - Collocation
Words that go together

Salt and …..

A round of …..
He broke my …..
From dawn till …..
A….cup of tea
Teacher….!

Often depends on cultural knowledge

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 Specifichere
Heading usage

How many meanings

can you find for the
root word ‘bank’?
How might you
use it in a
sentence?

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 Use concept maps to explore new
Heading
words here
What is it?
A result, effect or an action; something important or
relevant

Example
Can you find any
The current teacher
morphemes and what
recruitment crisis is a consequence do they mean?
consequence of ever
con / sequ /ence
increasing teacher
workload.

Stahl & What is its etymology?

Kapinus From the Latin ‘con’ meaning with and
Power, 2001)
‘sequi’ meaning to follow 22
 Latin andhere
Heading Greek word roots

• Teach these as often as you can

• Best as a whole school initiative
• ROOT word of the week

mit/miss How many words can you think of?

emit, permit, remit, commit, submit, admit

transmission, emission, mission, missive, permissive, missile,
missionary, admission, intermission

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=516380353

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 Heading here
Numeric Prefixes
Meaning Greek Latin Examples
monotone, monoxide, unicorn,
1 mono uni
unicycle
2 di bi, duo dioxide, binoculars, bicycle, duet
3 tri tri triangle, tricycle, triplicate, tripod
4 tetra quad (quart) tetrahedron, quadrilateral, quarter
5 pent quint pentagon, quintuplets, quintet
6 hex sext hexagon, sextet
8 octo octo octopus, October, octagon, octave
decade, decagon, decimal,
10 deca deci
December,
100 (hecto) cent century, centurion, cents, percentage
kilometre, kilobyte, millennium,
1000 kilo mille
millilitre
half hemi semi hemisphere, semicolon, semicircle
many poly multi polygon, monopoly, multiply,
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 Heading here
How is academic vocabulary different?
Greek and Latin in English
•The Oxford Dictionary includes 10,500 words of Greek origin,
which constitute 21.6% of the dictionary.
•Approximately 80% of vocabulary of maths, science and
technical English derives from Latin or Greek (often via French)
•Being able to analyse these words is essential for developing
understanding in many subjects – most notably Science and
Maths
•struct – build – construct, destruction, instruct, obstruction
•sym/syn – with – synthesize, symmetry, symbiosis
•sub - under – subtract, submarine
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 Heading here
3 tier vocabulary model
Low frequency words, often
subject specialist or technical
vocabulary e.g. condensation,
metamorphosis, evaporation

Medium frequency words

for academic language -
e.g. coincidence,
industrious, function.

High Frequency
vocabulary in
everyday use, e.g.
desk, weather, book

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 Heading here
Word lists
• The General Service List (GSL) plus the Academic Word List
cover nearly 90% of words in academic texts. As well as these
general academic words, students also need to know the
specific words related to their subjects - which is usually
around 5% of the words in an academic text (Nation, 2001) and
some of the less frequent words used in English - again about
5%.
• New General Service List (Browne 2013)
http://www.newgeneralservicelist.org/ contains nearly 3000 of
the most frequent words in English texts.
• Academic Word list ( Coxhead) contains 570 word families
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/alzsh3/acvocab/
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 Heading here
Science GCSE text book extract
Table salt is produced from sea water, or is
extracted from the ground using ‘solution
mining’. In this process, water is pumped into
layers of salt underground. The resulting salt
solution is then heated, which evaporates the
solvent and makes the solution more and more
salty. Eventually it reaches a point where there is
as much salt in the water as can possibly dissolve.
This is a saturated solution and it contains the
maximum amount of solute that can dissolve in
that amount of solvent at that temperature.
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 Heading here
Explicit teaching of vocabulary
Table salt is produced from sea water, or is
extracted from the ground using ‘solution mining’.
In this process, water is pumped into layers of salt
underground. The resulting salt solution is then
heated, which evaporates the solvent and makes
the solution more and more salty. Eventually it
reaches a point where there is as much salt in the
water as can possibly dissolve. This is a saturated
solution and it contains the maximum amount of
solute that can dissolve in that amount of solvent at
that temperature. ( 88 words) 29
 Coffee/Tea break
Heading here
Please be back in 15 minutes

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 Effective vocabulary learning
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Most vocabulary researchers argue that vocabulary learning is a combination
of:
(a)learning words from context through extensive reading;
(b)providing direct instruction of vocabulary words;
(c)developing word-learning strategies;
(d)building word-recognition fluency;
(e)developing word appreciation (and motivation) on students’ parts.

(Graves 2000, Nation 2001, Stahl & Nagy 2006)

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 Building
Heading here a love of words

‘Words should wander

and meander. They
should fly like owls and
flicker like bats and slip
like cats. They should
murmur and scream
and dance and sing.’

My Name is Mina by David

Almond
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 Heading here
Teaching approaches
Indirect instruction
•Using wider reading to grow vocabulary ‘naturally’
•Paying attention to context to work out meaning using
background knowledge or prior knowledge

Direct instruction
•Pre- teaching vocabulary
•Demonstrating morphology and word building knowledge
•Checking understanding through use in context

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 Indirecthere
Heading instruction

• Present students with vocabulary that

‘Lucy looked and saw might be suitable for a given context.
Encourage them to order the language
that Aslan had just for precision and effect, exploring the
breathed on the feet of power of language choices.
the stone giant. • How might this have been said? What
difference would it make to the
“It's all right!” shouted meaning?
Aslan ______. “Once the
feet are put right, all the
rest of him will follow.”’

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 Close reading:
Heading here shades of meaning

quietly proudly joyously cheerily

calmly briskly abruptly jubilantly

Where would you place the words on this continuum?

Least appropriate Most appropriate

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 Heading
Zone here
of relevance

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 A basic teaching
Heading here sequence

Beck, McKeown and Kucan ( 2013) suggest a basic format suitable for young
vocabulary learners but just as adaptable for older pupils.

1. Read the text

2. Contextualize the target word within the text
3. Have the pupils say the word out loud
4. Provide a student friendly explanation of the word
5. Present examples of the word used in contexts
different from the immediate context
6. Engage the pupils with a range of activities that
get them to interact with the word
7. Pupils repeat the word out loud
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 Using Four Square Vocabulary
1. Pupils take paper
and fold into 4 A house in the middle of
squares a wild moor.
2. Top left: dictate desolate Someone who is really
the word to be unhappy.
taught
3. Describe the word
4. Top right: pupils
discuss & give miserable happy
examples of that
concept uninhabited cheery
5. Bottom right:
bleak lively
pupils think of non
examples
6. Bottom left: pupils
give a definition
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 Using Four
Heading Square Vocabulary
here

1. Pupils take paper and fold

into 4 squares
2. Top left: dictate the word congruent Having the same
to be taught shape and same size
3. Describe the word and
model in context.
4. Top right: pupils discuss
& write a definition of the
concept A cube has six
5. Bottom right: pupils draw congruent faces.
a diagram
6. Bottom left: use in a
sentence in context
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 Heading here
What does it mean to ‘know’ a word?

I am
Some idea I pretty familiar
of what it much with it
Heard it means, know and I can
but don’t get the what it use it
really gist when means without
and might thinking in
know I hear it, try it out my
what it but don’t in my speech in
means really use speech in more than
it one one
context context

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 Support for personal reflection on
Heading here
vocabulary knowledge

Have seen or Know Know it well

Word Do not heard the something and can
know the word – not about it and explain it and
word quite sure of can relate it to use it in a
meaning an everyday mathematics
situation lesson

congruent

transformation

power
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 Building
Heading word
here cards

Help pupils build their own personal word card collections.

Then they can use the cards to sort, compare, stimulate
sentences and group new words.

EXTRICATE
WORD To free
Definitional Contextual someone or She chose to extricate
information information something herself from official
from a duties.
Personal difficulty

clue He tried to extricate

his friends from the fight.

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 Heading here
Word Webs

Signature
Signatory Consign
Resign Consignment
Resignation Consigned
Resigning Sign
Resigned
Design
Signal
Assign Designer
Signalling Designing
Assignment
Assignation Designed
Reassign Designation
Designate
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 Word associations
Heading here

Involve pupils in a variety of engaging activities as soon as

possible to help pupils process and embed meanings. Activities
should be short, lively and engaging.
Take the words provisions, Musulman, foundations

> Which word goes with religion?

> Which word goes with house?
> Which word goes with meal?

Pupils must choose and then give an explanation to the

association. Note these are not synonyms but associations.

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 Other examples
Heading here of activities
1) List – group – label
Discuss and note words connected to a particular topic. Invite pupils to group the
words. There are no right or wrong answers but they must be able to justify the
groupings so that they can create appropriate labels for each group of words.

2) Have You Ever?

Take your target words and ask pupils to …
“Describe a time when you might urge someone … commend someone ... banter with
someone

3) Would You Rather ...?

Form questions around target words:
Would you rather interact with sharks or polar bears? Why?
Would you rather anticipate your birthday or a holiday?
Would you rather try and confine butterflies or cats?
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 Heading
Planning here
and discussion time

Whole school training

•What general vocabulary knowledge does everyone need?
•What teaching strategies can be used generically?

Subject area/year group planning and teaching

•Think ahead to some topic(s) you are going to teach.
•What morphology and root words are important?
•What strategies from this session will you use?

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 Thank you

“Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, our most

inexhaustible source of magic. Capable of both
inflicting injury and remedying it.”

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

J.K. Rowling

All text © National Literacy Trust 2017

T: 020 7587 1842 W: www.literacytrust.org.uk Twitter: @Literacy_Trust Facebook: nationalliteracytrust

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