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Thesaurus Power
Give your class the advantage of Thesaurus Power! They will use a thesaurus to understand word meanings and relationships. They focus on how a thesaurus functions and how it gives the entry word, definition, synonyms, antonyms, and part...
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Introduce Vocabulary: Into the A, B, Sea (Rose)
As budding readers learn about the ocean, they'll get practice with the alphabet and new vocabulary words (cling, nab, prey, slumber, and thrive) in context. Read Deborah Rose's book Into the A, B, Sea, which includes a glossary in the...
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Reinvigorate Your Vocabulary
Eighth graders participate in a variety of activities to examine the meanings and roots of word derivatives and the meanings of words. Using context clues, they determine the meanings of words omitted from a passage and complete a prefix...
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Unwind: Vocabulary Strategy, Creating an Unwind Glossary
Prior to reading Unwind, Neal Shusterman's 2007 young adult science fiction novel, class members research the common definition of words drawn from the novel that will come to have a very different meaning to them as they are drawn into...
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Using Context
Teams practice decoding and using context strategies to determine the meanings of unfamiliar words. After verifying the meanings of words through the use of dictionaries, the Internet, thesauruses, and other sources, learners write the...
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Antonyms, synonyms and homophones
Shed light on what antonyms, synonyms, and homophones are. In this lesson, upper elementary schoolers create pairs using an antonym, a homophone, and/or a synonym. Then they play an antonym matching game.
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Introducing New Vocabulary Words
Using context clues, synonyms, antonyms, dictionaries, and original sentences, middle schoolers work through a new list of vocabulary words. A SMART board file guides them through the process of learning and reinforcing the words. After...
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Word Reference Materials
A class discussion on reference materials opens up a lesson on how to use these important resources. They discover that dictionaries, glossaries, and thesauruses are called word reference resources, and they practice using them. The...
EngageNY
Close Reading and Viewing: Minerals and Metals
How easy is it to live off the land? Scholars read Minerals and Metals in Your Life and discuss how Canada's natural resources meet the needs of the people. Pupils watch a brief video and discuss the gist of the text and video. They then...
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Using the Glossary
Fifth graders explore the glossary. In this language arts lesson, 5th graders define unknown words in a text by using the glossary. Students read a text and use the glossary to find unknown words.
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Vocabulary Development
What is a root word? What is a prefix? Suffix? Use these questions to spark a discussion amongst your language art learners. Then, start by writing the word irresistible on the board and have teams of learners attempt to create new words...
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Guided Reading Organizer for Chain Reaction
The class uses Chain Reaction, a magazine, to build a better understanding of Latin and Greek roots found in scientific vocabulary. They use two attached worksheets to help them read a scientific article, using visual clues and their...
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Phineas Gage: Notecard Vocabulary Strategy
Understanding the vocabulary in a text, especially a text like Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science that includes quite a few technical terms, can be the key to understanding the text as a whole. Learners focus on...
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Vocabulary Self-Collection Strategy
Dedicate one or two class periods to creating a class glossary of geometry terms. Many geometry terms also appear in our every day vocabulary, but they have very different meanings. For example, the word gross in geometry is very...
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Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs-Part I
Here is a lesson plan that gives learners a chance to practice using context clues. They read the story, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Students use different word strategies (base words, synonyms, antonyms) to decode and understand...
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Vocabulary Development
Students create new words. In this vocabulary development lesson students use five root words and add a prefix and a suffix to make new words. They use the new words in a sentence.
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Vocabulary Dictionary Drill
Investigate vocabulary terms related to communities. First your class generates a list of vocabulary terms related to the study of communities. Working in small groups, they compete in a dictionary drill to discover the meaning of the...
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Glossary
Show your class how they can use a glossary to determine the meaning of an unfamiliar word. A book about the great emperor penguin is used to hone in on vocabulary development through the use of context clues and the glossary found at...
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Mid-Unit Assessment: Text-Dependent and Short Answer Questions: Excerpts from “A Limited Supply”
There's no such thing as an unlimited resource. Scholars complete a mid-unit assessment by reading A Limited
Supply. They answer text-dependent questions and complete a graphic organizer about key terms in the text.
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Synthesizing Information from Texts about Natural Disasters: What Makes an Earthquake a Natural Disaster?
Are all disasters natural? Scholars reread Earthquakes! to determine what classifies these events as a natural disaster. They label earthquake facts as N for natural or D disaster to support their ideas. They then discuss academic...
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How To Use the Internet To Make Student Glossaries
Students use an internet dictionary to produce a glossary of words related to a particular subject area being studied. They choose the correct meaning of the word for their glossary, based on it's relationship to the subject matter being...
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Investigate a New Word from "Notes from the Trail"
Learners read and take notes from Notes from the Trail. In this reading fluency lesson, students read back and share their notes finding 7-10 new words. Learners define, write an unrelated sentence and present.
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Cool Words to Share
Fifth graders use teacher-selected vocabulary to present a written story to a first grade student. The book include a glossary of terms and illustrations of the terms. This is a great instructional activity for big/little buddies to do...
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Inferring: Who was John Allen?
Help your learners work with difficult or archaic words. A continuation of lesson two of this module, the plan here focuses on deciphering the Inventory of John Allen, in particular the unfamiliar words that make up much of the list. Add...