One of the toughest subjects to fit into my daily schedule was vocabulary. Oftentimes, vocabulary instruction gets pushed to the back burner and we focus more on reading comprehension. However, a higher vocabulary leads to higher reading comprehension. Which makes it even more important to spend some time daily on building that vocabulary. One of the easiest ways to start more intentional vocabulary instruction is to use a word of the week to build vocabulary.
If you want to learn more about how to teach vocabulary in Kindergarten and why it’s important, make sure to check out this post here.
A word of the week is an effective way to add additional vocabulary instruction and practice into your daily schedule without spending too much time. If you do this every week for the year, your students will learn about 40 new words that they may have not learned otherwise. I followed a simple 5-minute routine once a week, and then sprinkled it throughout the rest of my lessons as needed. Oftentimes, it would pop up in our conversations throughout that week! Here’s how I implemented my word of the week.
Word of the Week Routine
With our word of the week, I introduced it every Monday morning during our morning meeting. It was written on our board or on our focus wall. Sometimes they knew what the word was, sometimes they didn’t know. Either way, your goal is to add that word to your students vocabulary that week! Here’s a great vocabulary list to use for Kindergarten.
Here’s some more ideas to practice the word of the week
Use it in a sentence
Have students practice the word by using it in a sentence. You can either have your students say the sentence orally to a neighbor or write the sentence as part of your writing lesson. At the beginning of the year, it may just be your students repeating the sentence after you and practicing writing the sentence.
Make a connection
The single best way to store a word in our memory is to create a connection. If students have some kind of connection to the word, whether its a text to world, text to self, or text to text connection, they will be more likely to remember it and use it. For example, if the word is “tangled”, maybe they’ve had knotty hair that their mother has had to brush out. Or you can talk about how cords get tangled in the classroom. These connections will help them remember the word.
Draw a picture
A fun and easy way to reinforce the vocabulary word into memory is to draw a picture. This is a good option for students who are not quite writing independently. It is a way to “show what they know”. Have them draw the picture and then label it using the vocabulary word.
Add it to a vocabulary notebook
If you like the “draw a picture” idea, then you can try to have a vocabulary notebook! With this notebook, they would write the word, draw a picture, then use it in a sentence. You could do this as a weekly writing center or writing lesson after they’ve been taught that word.
Here’s a free printable to glue into a notebook or just print and use with your students. Just enter in your information and it will be sent straight to your email!
For more vocabulary activity ideas, check out this post here: 5 Simple Vocabulary Activities for Kindergarten.
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Vocabulary acquisition is essential to improving students reading and writing skills. The question is, how can we expose students to more sophisticated language and make sure it sticks? Word of the week is one of the ways.
Some Benefits of Word of the Week
As teachers, we know that unfortunately not all students come into our classroom with an adequate level of vocabulary knowledge. This can hinder their ability to communicate through their writing and speaking as well as impact their reading comprehension.
The more exposure to vocabulary we can give to students, the better.
Word of the Week can help students feel confident using more elaborate words in their oral and written communication. It also helps them become part of their personal vocabulary word bank.
The breakdown of the activities gives students the opportunity to really master the words as well as other words related to it through synonyms and antonyms.
The simplicity of Word of the Week and the impact it can make on students’ vocabulary is also a great benefit. Teachers love that it only takes a few minutes to incorporate daily and that students really enjoy the activities.
How to Implement Word of the Week in the Classroom
After reading about the benefits of implementing Robert J. Marzano’s Six-Step Process to help students master new vocabulary words, I introduced the Word of the Week. It was an addition to the other vocabulary acquisition opportunities we had going on in our classroom.
I developed a list of 36 words for my 4th graders and another list for my fifth graders. I chose commonly used words found throughout grade level text that were challenging to many of my students. Then, I created an organizer to help my students routinely implement the first 3 steps of Marzano’s process with ease. That included: 1. provide a description, 2. provide an example, and 3. construct a picture of the term.
This process is weaved into our classroom morning routine. It has been a great way to help increase students’ vocabulary acquisition, and has quickly become one of our favorite (and most competitive) vocabulary activities.
To help the routine run smoothly and efficiently, we follow the schedule below:
- Monday: Students write down the word of the week, the part of speech, and its definition. (This covers step 1 of Marzano’s Six-Step Process.
- Tuesday: They look up and discuss synonyms and antonyms. Having them find synonyms and antonyms helps them expand their vocabulary even further.
- Wednesday: I share with them the use of the word in a sentence. Then, they write their own sentence. As they write their sentence, I walk around and read them. I provide scaffolding for those students who need it. A couple of the best sentences get chosen to be posted up in the classroom on an index card. (This covers step 2.)
- Thursday: Students illustrate their sentences. According to Marzano, “this third step in the process is crucial – having students represent their understanding of a new term by drawing a picture, pictograph, or symbolic representation. When students do this step well, achievement soars.”
- Friday: Students rate their understanding. This helps me get an idea of who is feeling confident and who still needs extra exposure. Students also share their worksheet with a partner. Giving students a chance to share is a form of best practice. We know that students tend to do their best work when they know they will be sharing their work with someone other than the teacher.
You can sign up below to receive this free worksheet in your inbox and start using it in your classroom immediately.
If you’re looking for more word work and vocabulary acquisition ideas, check out this Prefixes and Suffixes Blog Post. It also includes a FREE worksheet your students can fill out as you introduce a new Prefix and Suffix to them.
As you can see, Word of the Week can be a quick activity with many benefits. In as few as 5 minutes a day, students can truly master a variety of new words.
So what’s all the hype about Word of the Week? It comes down to the simplicity of the idea and more importantly the huge impact it can make in expanding your students’ vocabulary as well as improving reading and writing.
Vocabulary is a critical factor in the development of reading skills and comprehension. Unfortunately, not every student comes to school with an adequate level of vocabulary knowledge to support reading success. The more words your students know, the easier it will be for them to read and understand what they have read.
As we know, reading and writing skills are closely linked and each helps improve the other. Introducing your students to challenging words through Word of the Week can help to increase your students’ confidence to use sophisticated language in their writing and begin to understand the power of words.
If Word of the Week is something that you would like to try in your classroom, read on to access our Word of the Week teaching resources and information that you need…
Word of the Week PowerPoints – Foundation Year to Year 6
We have created a Word of the Week PowerPoint for each Primary School year level. Each presentation includes teacher notes, 40 slides and activities that introduce new vocabulary. Each slide includes:
- a new word
- the definition of the word
- an example sentence, showing the word being used in context
- a question or activity for the students to discuss
- words that are similar or relate to.
The vocabulary chosen for each year group has been carefully selected by our talented team of Resource Content Producers. There is a steady progression in the difficulty of the words across the year levels and the presentations for lower years include illustrations to support comprehension.
Word of the Week Flip Books
Our new Word of the Week Flip Books are a great addition to our Word of the Day/Week Collection. They are a brilliant alternative if you have limited access to an interactive whiteboard and a great addition to a Word of the Week classroom display. There’s a flip book for each year level.
We recommend giving these flip books justice by printing them in a larger size. You can either bind the flip book or punch holes at the top and use card rings or keyrings to hang your flip book.
Word of the Week for Lower Years
For lower years, Word of the Week should be all about getting your students excited about learning new vocabulary, having fun and exploring new words through play and discussion.
Word of the Week activities for lower years should include:
- brainstorming other words that have a similar meaning
- putting the world into real-world context
- making connections between words and the lives of your students
- exploring new vocabulary through movement, drama and actions
- games
- music.
Movement, Drama and Actions.
Can you imagine the buzz in the classroom when you ask your students to show you what sort of actions a beast would make?
Here are some other examples of how you and your students can explore new vocabulary through movement and drama:
- Word of the Week: giggle – What does your giggle sound like? How is your giggle different from your friends? Can you giggle like them?
- Word of the Week: paddle – What action would you use to paddle?
- Word of the Week: dance – What is your favourite dance move? Where did you learn it?
Remember that Word of the Week is all about loving language and having fun, especially for lower years.
Word of the Week Poster
For upper years, we have created a Word of the Week Poster that includes a variety of tasks to give context and meaning to a new challenging word. It is ideal to use as a whole class vocabulary activity or as part of your English Group Activities.
The teaching resource encourages students to deconstruct the word, identify it’s meaning and to use the word in a written context. This activity works very well as an English Group Activity or a whole class activity. You can easily support less confident students by encouraging them to work with a partner.
Word of The Week Homework Activity
Word of the Week provides a great opportunity for meaningful homework activities. Here are some ideas that you might like to include as part of your homework matrix:
- Create a Word of the Week poster to illustrate it’s meaning.
- Find and cut out examples of Word of the Week found in newspapers or magazines.
- Use word of the week in a conversation with your family and explain what it means to an adult.
- Write a synonym for Word of the Week.
- Find Word of the Week in a dictionary. Record the dictionary definition.
Word of the Week Roll a Dice Activity
Rolling dice is a great way to generate six different activities related to your Word of the Week. Use our Dice Roller Widget to take this activity to the next level.
When using the Dice Roller Widget, you could either roll 1 die for the whole class or roll up to five dice to assign different tasks to different groups. Simply roll the dice and ask your students to complete the corresponding activity. For example:
Roll 1 – Write your word in a sentence.
Roll 2 – Draw a picture to express the word.
Roll 3 – Write a newspaper headline that includes the word.
Roll 4 – Write the definition of the word.
Roll 5 – Find the Scrabble score of your word.
Roll 6 – Count the number of vowels and consonants in your word.
For independent fast finisher activity, allow your students to collect a die and work through the tasks, rolling the die until all six tasks have been completed.
Word Tile Total Activity
Your kids will love building your Word of the Week with these Giant Letter Tiles. They are available to download in Giant Uppercase Letter Tiles or Giant Lowercase Letter Tiles.
Word Tile Totals
If you are looking for a more structured task why not try our Word Tile Total Activity? This teaching resource encourages students to think mathematically while developing their spelling skills. It can also be used as one of your English Groups Activities or fast finisher activity to revise and revisit challenging vocabulary from Word of the Week.
Each week, encourage the students to spell out Word of the Week using the word tiles and to calculate the word score for the word. When you have recorded ten words, challenge your students to calculate their overall word tile total!
Word of The Week Revision
Remember that children need to be exposed to new vocabulary multiple times before they understand it. A great way to do this is to use your Word of the Week and revisit it daily by using our Word of the Day Spinner.
Simply add your Word of the Week or create a list of words that your students have learned so far and press spin for instant activities. You can even customise the activities by selecting from lower, middle or upper years activities.
Spin activities for middle years include:
- using the word in a compound sentence
- writing 3 clues which would help someone to guess the word
- writing a list of synonyms for the word
- writing a list of antonyms for the word
- brainstorming a list of other words related to the word
- …and lots more!
Whole School Initiative
Be that person who is brave enough to suggest a Word of The Week whole school initiative. Just think of the huge impact that you could create and the positive difference that you could make by expanding the vocabulary of the students across all year groups.
This is one of the easiest whole school initiatives to implement because everything you need is there at the click of a download button. All you need to do is provide each year group coordinator with the Word of the Week PowerPoint and the corresponding Word of the Week Flip Book! All your colleagues need to do is commit to sharing the word of the week on Monday morning and following it up with a few fun activities.
Big Words for Little Geniuses
By Sue Patterson, James Patterson, Pan Hsinping
Ages: 4-7
Published: 4th September 2017
Hardcover available at Booktopia
eBook Edition on iBooks and Google Play, Kindle edition on Amazon
This New York Times bestselling picture book is a fun book to share with your students. For each letter of the alphabet, a sophisticated word and its definition is given. Your students will love to learn this adventurous vocabulary. You might even have some trouble reading some of these words! But hey, there presents another learning experience as you model how to sound out tricky words and decode them! Here’s one for you…
Arachibutyrophobia (Ah-RACK-ee-byoo-tee-ro-FO-bee-ya)
Arachibutyrophobia is the alarming fear of peanut butter sticking to the top of your mouth!
Research suggests that vocabulary is enormously important to children’s development and you as their teacher can make a huge impact on your students’ vocabulary knowledge. A wide knowledge of vocabulary improves all areas of communication — listening, speaking, reading and writing.
Word of the Week is a quick and easy way to make a massive difference to your students’ futures.
Don’t hesitate, just do it. Try Word of the Week in your classroom and spread the word.
We love hearing from you and getting a sneak peek into your classroom!
Share your photos on Instagram #teachstarter
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Hey everybody! Our idiom of the day is ”Drop someone like a hot potato,” which means “to end a romantic relationship with someone abruptly.”⠀
Origin: certainly, when someone gives you a hot potato, you’ll drop it immediately because it contains a lot of water in it. Else, you’d burn your hand. This term, dating from the mid-1800s, alludes to the only slightly older expression drop like a hot potato, meaning “to abandon something or someone quickly” (lest one be burned).
Hello guys! Our idiom of the day is “Cat got your tongue?”, which means “Have you nothing to say?“
⠀
This phrase has an interesting origin. In the 18th century, the English Navy had the practice of whipping erring sailors with a whip which had multiple endings. This whip was nicknamed “the cat” because it commonly had nine endings. So after receiving a beating, while the poor sailor lay in a corner sulking or not speaking, other sailors will walk up to him and tease “Did the ca
Our idiom of the day is “Every rose has its thorn“, which means that nobody is perfect and every person is riddled with flaws. Even a flower as beautiful as the rose has certain flaws but that does not take away its beauty
“Let your hair down” means “to relax and do what you want”.
Example: It’s been such a hard week at work. Should we all go out tonight and let our hair down a bit?
Origin: This phrase originated in the 17th century, when women were expected to wear their hair up in public, either in a bun, pinned on their head or in elaborate styles. The only time they could let their hair down was for washing or brushing, or when they were alone at home and could relax.
Meaning: to cause someone to stop doing something
There are many ways to show an idea using different words. This is to help English learners to master the language easily.
Meaning: a period of time during which an animal or person that might have a disease is kept away from other people or animals so that the disease cannot spread
Meaning: food that you need to grow and stay healthy
Meaning: a serious conversation between two people, usually close friends, in which they talk honestly about their feelings
Definition: to quickly make a meal or something to eat
Let’s learn 10 idioms about books! Enjoy!
[ U ] the use of leaves, branches, paints, and clothes for hiding soldiers or military equipment so that they cannot be seen against their surroundings:
a camouflage jacket
[ S or U ] the way that the colour or shape of an animal or
To take control of a task or job from another person
To go to a restaurant, club, event, etc. with someone you invited
Let’s learn some of the meanings of the phrasal verb TAKE OFF
Let’s learn some phrases that collocate with the word MAKE
Meaning: intended to be thrown away after one use or a few uses.
Let’s learn some interesting idioms about personality…
Let’s learn some of the word combination related to the measurement.
Through thick and thin, a shoulder to cry on, joined at the hip
Let’s learn some of the phrasal verbs connected with the word HOLD
Let’s learn some words related to THE COLD
Let’s learn some phrasal verbs of THROW
say this to show a better choice
Meaning: Can we change the plan to another time in the future?
Let’s learn some phrases that collocate with STRONGLY
Meaning: I can almost remember it.
meaning: you say this when you have finished 50% of something
How much do you know about the use of the word «HEAVY»? Let’s learn some collocations with this verb.
Meaning: to succeed in communicating an idea or piece of information to someone, or to be communicated successfully
Meaning: succeed in getting the right balance
a doorway, gate, or other entrance, especially a large and imposing one.
Meaning: to fail to use an opportunity to enjoy or get an advantage from something
something that is impossible cannot happen or be done
if something comes to hand, it is there for you to use – used especially about something that is there by chance
Meaning: following different direction or being different
including many different types of people or things:
Students from countries as diverse as Colombia and Lithuania use Cambridge textbooks.
New York is a very culturally/ethnically diverse city.
very different from each other: We hold very diver
Speak or write at length in a vague or trivial manner.
‘he waffled on about his problems’
to look or seem the same as surrounding people or things and therefore not be easily noticeable:
We tried to blend into the crowd.
They have adopted local customs and tried to blend in with the community.
Be unable to decide between alternatives.
‘I’m in two minds whether to go back’
seeming dishonest or false:
There’s something fishy going on here.
involve (someone) deeply in an argument, conflict, or difficult situation.
«the movie’s about a journalist who becomes embroiled with a nightclub owner»
synonyms: involve, entangle, ensnare, enmesh, catch up, mix up, bog down, mire
«she became emb
to be similar to an older member of your family in appearance or character:
He takes after his mother/his mother’s side of the family.
Meaning: experience a change
go to the dogs
If a country or organization is going to the dogs, it is becoming very much less successful than it was in the past.
the state of having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone. «the law’s ambivalence about the importance of a victim’s identity» synonyms: equivocation, uncertainty, unsureness, doubt, indecision, inconclusi
(of troops) move into position for military action.
«the air force began to deploy forward»
bring into effective action; utilize.
«they are not always able to deploy this skill»
holding tightly onto something, or keeping an opinion in a determined way.
to think about something that happened in the past
to recognize that something is not as it appears to be or that something dishonest is happening:
He’s been working late with her every night this week — I smell a rat!
The existing state of affairs, especially regarding social or political issues.
‘they have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo’
to remove something that is covering the surface of something else Strip the beds and wash the sheets. strip something off/from something We need to strip the wallpaper off the walls first.
in one’s mind’s eye: In one’s imagination. ‘his face was very clear in her mind’s eye’
Meaning: find out the relationship Scientists have established the relationship between lung cancer and smoking.
Unduly complacent or proud regarding one’s personal achievements or qualities; self-satisfied. ‘his website is smug and self-congratulatory’ ‘John took exception to the self-congratulatory tone of the report’
Meaning: If an idea or hope materializes, it becomes real
Meaning: to be so good that another person or thing does not seem important or worth very much
Meaning: If a machine or device such as a clock or battery runs down, it loses power, or if you run it down, you cause this to happen
Meaning: to be feeling or performing well
Meaning: expressing or suggesting physical, especially sexual, pleasure or satisfaction
Meaning: to make a particular quality or detail noticeable
Meaning: If you do something without fail, you always do it
Meaning: to persuade someone gently to do something or go somewhere, by being kind and patient, or by appearing to be
Meaning: to cause someone to be upset
Meaning: to understand completely the meaning or importance of something
Meaning: thinking now about something in the past
Meaning: If someone is unbending, they often make fixed judgments and decisions that they are unwilling to change
Meaning: to react in a very angry way to something that someone says or does
Meaning: to like someone less because they have done something wrong or behaved badly in the past
Meaning: for the reason that, because
Meaning: treating someone as if you are more important or more intelligent than them
Meaning: to tell people secret information
Meaning: to continue to demand something, although you have been told you cannot have it
Meaning: a job in which there is no chance of progressing to a better, more important job
to agree to do what people have asked you to do
the largest part or most of something
to show someone’s secret feelings
Meaning: a competition in which women are judged on how physically attractive they are
Meaning: a good thing that seemed bad at first
Meaning: to respect or obey a decision, a law or a rule
Meaning: to gradually accept a sad situation, often the death of someone you love
Meaning: accept the argument
Meaning: to say something nice about someone or to someone
Meaning: to begin to happen
Meaning: To do something slowly because you don’t want to do it.
Meaning: to visit someone in order to welcome or talk to them:
«She walks around all day with her head in the clouds. She must be in love.»
Open up: begin shooting, talk freely, open the door
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