by Carol Relf Kondrat

Created on: March 12, 2011   Last Updated: March 14, 2011

By definition, vocabulary is all the words of a language.  That is huge – no matter what language.  Learning any and all needed vocabulary seems insurmountable.  Teachers have a great undertaking to introduce and teach the vocabulary needed for the students to be able to read and understand what is needed for them to succeed in all subject areas.  It can be very boring and uninteresting.  There is no getting around teaching the students how to recognize, decode and understand words.  Make it interesting, challenging, and fun and they will learn without stress.    

Vocabulary is present in all subjects.  Reading in the first couple grades involves learning to read the printed word.  It involves sound blending and decoding to be able to pronounce the printed words.  In the initial stages, the students become proficient in recognizing and saying the words as they move along the printed line.  Comprehension of what is being read is very important in learning as they read.  Pictures are the beginning help for the student to understand what they are reading.  Pictures are worth more than words in the early stages of reading.  There is a gradual increase in the printed word and a decrease in pictures as the students move up the ladder of elementary grades.  Now they must depend more on the meaning of the words to develop comprehension.    

The Dictionary Game

I started this with my fourth grade class.  Part of the English content included vocabulary that the students were responsible for and were tested on.  I explained to the students that as with any game, there was necessary equipment and rules to follow to play.  Equipment was a list of words, a dictionary, pencil and paper.  That was easy.  Also, there was practice involved.  That was not so easy.  First, they had to make their own plays to practice: look up and record definitions of the vocabulary words.  I told them the definitions were for them, so write what they would be able to connect with each word.  They had to use the dictionary since that would be where I would look for the winning answers.  They had two work periods to prepare for the game.

The Game Day:

  I divided the class into two teams.  The teams sat in rows on each side of the room facing the center of the room.  The order of players was down each row; one side giving the clue from the definitions and the other side answering with the vocabulary word.  They could read one of the dictionary definitions, or give a one word clue.  The player who was to give the answer could answer himself for a score of 10 or call on his team to help for a score of 5.  If they were not able to give the correct answer, the answer was not disclosed and the word could go back into the plays for another try. I did it this way because there were words that had several meanings and could be used again.  Each team gave one word for the other team to tell meaning and then it reversed so the sides alternated with each word. 

The Dictionary Game was a fun way to learn vocabulary words for all subjects.  To play the game, the students had to learn the meanings of the words used in the game.  They found it more fun than just writing the definitions and learning them.  Practicing plays sounded more like fun.

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