ELL Basic Reading Lesson

75% of Comprehension is Knowledge of Vocabulary

English Learners greatest literacy need is to acquire new vocabulary. This activity to be used before, during and after reading, will help students to learn new words and know familiar words better.

Objective: Students will be able to see what words they know for any given piece of text prior to attempting reading. Students will set goals for learning a set number of words (with teacher guidance) in more depth.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPre-Reading-

Provide a paragraph to be previewed. Using the Highlighting Tools, ask students to highlight all the words they know using the yellow highlighter.

This will give a clear indication of which words will need to be taught for comprehension.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPre-Reading Activity-

Next using the Highlighting Tools, ask students to highlight all the words they are familiar with (heard or seen before) using the green highlighter.

This will give the student more confidence in what they know and goals for what they will need to know better.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPre-Reading Activity-

Again using the Highlighting Tools, ask students to highlight only the words they are completely unfamiliar with using the pink highlighter.

This will give the student more confidence in what they know and what they will need to learn to understand the text.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPre-Reading Activity-

Using the Collect Highlights button, the three different categories of words can be collected and grouped together.

Putting this information on a chart will help students to see what they know and set goals for what they want/need to know.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPre-Reading Activity-Using a chart like this one, the teacher can ask the student about their knowledge of various words from the Column #3, what they know about words from Column #2, and target words from Column #1.

Use Text to Speech to allow students to hear words spoken and Translation tool where helpful.

ELL Basic Reading LessonPost Reading Activity-

Using a chart like this one after reading, students can revisit how much better they now know a certain number of words.

Have students use Word Prediction and Speak as I Type to write up what students now know. This visual helps students to see they are making progress in their understanding and word knowledge.