Summary of Concepts from Textbook and Articles
- Effective vocabulary instruction
- According to this article, vocabulary is imperative since it includes all the words that we should know for us to access our upbringing knowledge, communicate and express our ideas effectively, and study about new concepts.
Personal reaction to this article
- It is important for us to read to our kids from birth and beyond, since they become exposed to letters, sounds, word voice and choice, sentence structure as well as fluency and more, during their early years hence this helps to lay foundation for their academic success in the coming years.
- Parents and teachers need to familiarize themselves with scientific based research and what this research informs us about teaching and reading comprehension.
- Vocabulary Instruction for Reading Comprehension
This article handles the alternate techniques in the teaching of vocabulary in place of comprehension of definitions and concepts.
- The teacher has a dilemma between teaching grammar incidentally or directly both approaches have their degree of success but students learn better when they are directly involved in the construction of meaning rather than memorization.
- Techniques such as webbing where students pool words that have a similar or close relationship enables them to familiarize with newer words and vocabularies
Personal reaction to this article
I find the incidental approach to teaching grammar as the better alternative. The incidental instruction of grammar avails more tools to the instructor in their teaching of grammar. The students learn without the knowledge that they are doing so.
- Teaching Vocabulary to Adolescents to Improve Comprehension
This article concentrates on pupils studying in the Girls and Boys town in Nebraska US. The students are children suffering from neglect and they stay over a period of 18 to 22 months over which period they undergo a four stage learning process with the following stages.
- For students reading between 6th and 8th grade – Builds up the vocabulary of the students
- For students reading above eight grades – emphasizes on integration of information through either reading or writing.
- The studies found that comprehension and the ability to learn vocabulary are intertwined, and thus devoted more time to vocabulary teaching in its context to enhance both vocabulary and comprehension.
- The introduction of words for learning as new vocabulary should be well considered and chosen in consideration of their background familiarity with words. Use of words whose relationships were already built in might cause a hindrance in the learning of the children by establishing connections between words.
Personal reaction to this article
The approach of introducing a new task to the child’s learning regime only after they have achieved a certain level of comprehension in the previous sections provides continuity to the learners set of skills. I would use this method in my teaching practice as it enables the learners to tackle much complex aspects of language once they are comfortable with a preceding aspect.
- Learning happens to be in what we already know and the learning process only activates what we already knew cognitively. Learning is impossible without having some prior knowledge on the subject. The teacher has to have the ability to stimulate the willingness of students to learn. A student will utilize reading after they are confident in their ability to use reading as a learning tool.
Personal reaction to this article
The appreciation of this fact is actually the main impediment towards effective teaching practices. Learning has to come from an approach of the known progressively stitching it with the new concepts intended for learning. It is difficult to teach a new concept to a student without relating it to something they already know.
Discussion
The teaching of grammar through the direct method proves to be a difficult approach for the learner to understand due to the feeling that the concepts being introduced are totally new to them and do not find ready application in the real world. By the use of the incidental approach, the student is able to relate the words being taught to them by way of either deriving meaning from the context or by way of getting an interest in the vocabulary owing to the subject at discussion. In the method used to teach late starters, the method of choosing vocabulary used is found to similarly work in helping the children create/discover their own connections with words.
Questions from the text
- In teaching, there are two methods of teaching grammar to students. The direct method is one of the methods, which is the other one?
- How does prior knowledge in a subject aid in the process of learning?
