Enhancing the Tier 2

Vocabulary Development of

English Language Learners

An Action Research Study by Kenneth McKee

Word Tiers

Tier 1

(everday speech words)

Tier 2

(general academic vocabulary)

Tier 3

(domain-specific vocabulary)

Basic words that require little to no instruction.

Precise or sophisticated words that appear across domains.

Low-frequency words that appear in specific domains.

Book, girl, sad, run, etc.

Adjust, translation, depend, structure, etc.

Allegory, monarchy, hypotenuse, mitosis, etc.

Tier 2

Knowledge

Why focus on General Academic (Tier 2)

vocabulary?

Students who lack extensive knowledge of general academic

vocabulary are at a serious disadvantage in academic

environments (Baumann & Graves, 2010; Coxhead, 2000).

General academic vocabulary is most commonly an academic

barrier for English Language Learners (ELL’s) and economically

disadvantaged native English speakers (Kieffer & Lesaux, 2010).

Generative Morphology

Prefixes

Suffixes

Roots

Students generate“known” words to link to“new”words.

Cognates

There are positive correlations between students’ comprehension in English texts

and their ability to recognize cognate relationships.

There are negative correlations for students who do not recognize cognate

relationships.

(Nagy et al., 1993)

Participants

Six high school students, whose first language is Spanish, taking an

ESL course

Research Questions

Does morphological knowledge assist students in unlocking the

meanings of general academic vocabulary?

Which instructional strategies best develop students’ general

academic word knowledge?

What impact does accessing student background knowledge of

words have upon new word learning?

Innovation

Students will read a short, engaging text.

One or two Tier 2 words that are essential to comprehending the text will be selected for

vocabulary instruction. These words will be introduced before reading the text (Kelley,

Lesaux, Kieffer, & Faller, 2010), and I will give explicit instruction on the meanings of

morphemes within the words.

Students will work in groups to generate all the words they already know (including

Spanish cognates) that share morphemes and meaning with the target morpheme

(Flanigan, Templeton, & Hayes, 2012; Hiebert & Lubliner, 2008). These words will be

captured on morpheme web charts will be displayed.

Each lesson will ask the students to use the words in some way (talking or writing) as a

closure activity to the lesson (Kelley et al., 2010).

Let’s try it.

…Reading is more difficult than other more concrete concepts because readers have to

demonstrate a grasp of several components at once. What so many students do implicitly

when reading strategically, many others do not. We need to more explicitly explain the

reading process and use prompts that encourage students to self-monitor, reflect, and make

decisions. (Zuerblis, 2014)

Here is our word:

components

Com, con, co, col

=

“with; together”

Pon; pos

=

“put, place”

Word-Generation

Data Collection and Analysis

Quantitative

Adapted vocabulary knowledge rating pretest and posttest

Student attitude surveys

Qualitative

Ongoing interviews with the regular classroom teacher

Researcher journal

Student work and photographs of instructional practice

Timeline

July-August: Determine area of focus, conduct literature review, develop action plan, begin researcher journal.

August-October: Meet students and learn more about their individual literacy needs using WIDA and Access testing results, develop data collection instruments, choose texts for lessons determining the general academic vocabulary of focus, develop vocabulary lessons.

October-December – Administer pretests, teach lessons, complete researcher journal, conduct ongoing teacher interviews, formatively assess progress and make adjustments, conduct posttests.

January-February – analyze and interpret data, develop professional development

March –April: Write up findings in article, create suggested action plan, present study, findings, and instructional approaches at the NC Reading Association conference.

April-June: Disseminate findings, create Homebase PD module.

References

Baumann, J. F., & Graves, M. F. (2010). What is academic vocabulary? Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 54(1), 4-12. doi:1598/JAAL.54.1.1

Coxhead, A. (2000). A new academic word list. TESOL Quarterly, 34(2), 213-238. doi:10.2307/3587951

Flanigan, K., Templeton, S., & Hayes, L. (2012). What’s in a word? Using content vocabulary to generate growth in general academic vocabulary knowledge. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 56(2), 132-140. doi:10.1002/JAAL.00114

Hiebert, E. H., & Lubliner, S. (2008). The nature, learning, and instruction of general academic vocabulary. In A. E. Farstrup & S. J. Samuels (Eds.). What research has to say about vocabulary instruction (p. 150-181). Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Kelley, J. G., Lesaux, N. K., Kieffer, M. J., & Faller, S. E. (2010). Effective academic vocabulary instruction in the urban middle school. The Reading Teacher, 64(1), 5-14. doi:10.1598/RT.64.1.1

References

Kieffer, M. J., & Lesaux, N. K. (2010). Morphing into adolescents: Active word learning for

English language learners and their classmates in middle school. Journal of

Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 54(1), 47-56. doi:1598/JAAL.54.1.5

Nagy, W. E., Garcia, G. E., Durgunoglu, A. Y., & Hancin-Bhatt, B. (1993). Spanish-English

bilingual students’ use of cognates in English reading. Journal of Reading Behavior,

25(3), 241-259.

Zuerblis, N. (2014, September 19). Four ways to foster independent readers and writers

[Web log post]. Retrieved from http://inservice.ascd.org/education-resources/four-

ways-to-foster-independent-readers-and-writers-2/

Zwiers, J. (2008). Building academic language: Essential practices for content teachers,

grades 5-12. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.