Vocabulary. Obviously this is part of oral language, but vocabulary is so important, especially to comprehension that it gets its own number, okay? And we can be adding to our vocabulary until the day we die. Um, it's not a closed set. We can just keep growing our vocabulary as long as we keep our marbles. My dad was 91 when he died, and he was learning new words until the day he died.

He was a, wordaphile. And when,when he died, I was given his 56 dictionaries, which gives you some idea of just how much he loved words. Some of you'll be old enough to remember the Webster's dictionary Came out in the sixties, big American dictionary with lots and lots of words in it.

I was, I was quite old before I realised that not everybody had in their lounge room a little lectern with a great big dictionary on it because my dad made a, a little mini lectern for the dictionary, and it was always open at the last page where he looked at something.

And when I was looking through it, now the Websters has a lot of words in it. Not many people would feel the need to add more, but my dad did. So when new words came up, for instance, on one page, I remember seeing tu that is the, uh, the currency of Vanuatu.

And he had inserted it in the appropriate place, tu currency of Vanuatu. And on other pages there were thing little annotations like compared to Collin's definition.So he was actually looking at different definitions across different, um, dictionaries. This is someone with a great deal of word consciousness, isn't it? Possibly OCD as well, undiagnosed. But word consciousness can be catching.

And if we become word conscious, we can, we can give, give that gift to our students because we judge people on their vocabulary, don't we? And little kids get judged on their vocabulary. It's an empowering thing to have a good vocabulary. And vocabulary are not just labels. They're not just words. They're, they're little power packed envelopes of concepts.

And the more things that we know about a word,the more likely it is that one of those things that we know about that word will click a connection with something else that we know or have read or have learned in some other way. And the more likely we are to be a very sophisticated comprehender. Because when a good reader reads a single word, as well as drawing it quickly from, from from their mental lexicon, other points of excitation occur in the brain because lots of words fire off other connections.

A word is not just a word, it can conjure up so many additional things. So when we give kids a good vocabulary, we empower them with, with all of that additional stuff. If they, if they, if they know the word red, that's good.

If they know scarlet and crimson and magenta, and if they know that rosy cheeked fluoride, if they know carrot topped, or if they know what in the red means, as opposed to being in the black, that one word has can have so many meanings across context, can't it? And so we, we need to build up kids' vocabulary, um, as part of enriching their comprehension, their oral comprehension, and their reading comprehension.

Narrator:

The three-tier model of vocabulary development, described by Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2013) is a framework to classify words.

The framework groups words starting from those that are most common in Tier 1 to those that are more specific in Tier 3. Isabel Beck’s distinction between the three types or tiers of vocabulary is very helpful in making choices about specific vocabulary to teach.

Tier 1 words are the common, everyday words that most children enter school knowing already – either in English or their first language.  They do not usually require explicit instruction, however, where they do, particularly for students learning Standard Australian English, they are easily explained and understood, as they are highly concrete nouns, verbs and adjectives. Some examples are 'small', 'big' or 'walk'. Tier 1 words will continue to be acquired from everyday life including through school life.

We can consider this text from the 2016 NAPLAN Year 5 and 7 Reading Magazine called ‘Please do not feed native animals.’ The first paragraph says "You might think that you are being kind to the native birds and animals by giving them your food scraps, but feeding them or leaving rubbish around that they might eat is cruel, not kind!" We can identify lots of Tier 1 words in this paragraph: 'think', 'kind', 'giving' and 'food' are all examples of Tier 1 words. They are common in everyday language.

Let’s now consider Tier 3 words. This set of words has a low frequency of use in everyday conversation. They are often limited to specific topics and domains, and Tier 3 words are likely to be new for all students so they can represent a level playing field for all students. Some examples of Tier 3 words might be 'Pantheon', 'diameter' and 'epidermis'.  In general, we learn these words when there is a specific need.

We can return to our example text. The final bullet point says “Feeding animals can encourage them to look for food in residential areas or nearby farms. This is dangerous for both the animals and residents.” The words 'residential' and 'residents' have specific meanings to do with location of living. These are examples of Tier 3 words from the text.

The final tier for consideration is perhaps the most important but often the overlooked tier. Tier 2 words occur across a variety of domains and subjects. They appear more frequently in texts than in oral language, so children are less likely to learn them without engaging with texts. They usually have multiple meanings based on the context they are used in.

Tier 2 words are essential for building formal academic language and they add precision and sophistication to texts. They add precision by providing new ways to express concepts that are already understood. For example, 'miniscule' is a more precise way of saying the Tier 1 word 'small', or 'saunter' instead of 'walk' or 'atrocious' instead of 'bad'. These words require explicit teaching as they are unlikely to be part of children’s everyday oral language.

As we return to our example text, we can see many examples of Tier 2 words. One of the bullet points says “Animals that rely on being fed by humans may become aggressive. They gather near areas of high human activity such as campsites and walking tracks …” Words such as 'rely', 'gather', 'aggressive' and 'activity' are examples of Tier 2 words that add precision and a more academic way of expressing common concepts.

Now that we understand the tier framework, it is important to think about where we need to focus our time and attention.

In general, Tier 2 are the words that we need to focus our teaching of vocabulary on from kindergarten through to high school. Focusing on these words promotes high expectations, supports reading comprehension and encourages precision in writing. Tier 2 words are necessary for abstract and symbolic thinking. It’s incredibly important that students learn and develop a large vocabulary and deep understanding of Tier 2 words.

[End of transcript]

First of all, it's really important. The vocabulary is really explicitly and purposefully taught within the classroom. Um, and that we give children lots of opportunities, lots of really authentic opportunities, um, to develop that vocabulary. It's particularly important to be teaching tier two words, which are academic words that are able to be applied across contexts. And they're words that children tend not to develop an understanding of intrinsically.

They need that really explicit, um, instruction as to what a word means and how it can be used. I find in my instruction with children, it's really important to give them, as I said, lots of opportunities to hear, say, play, and experiment with the vocabulary they're developing.

Teacher

This story is called Feathers, and it's the story of a sandpiper's journey across many towns and cities. And as he goes, he's spreading hope.

The sun rose on a crisp, cloudy day. The Sandpiper stretched its wings in the chilling breeze. It knew it was time to leave. So it took flight.

The bird continued on its way. It flew over snow capped mountains and deep river valleys. It flew through long nights where the spit of gunfire bit into the darkness.

[aside] I wouldn't like to be the people living there.

When morning came, it flew low over fleeing families, walking in lines like ants.

On this page, it said that when morning came, it flew over fleeing families. Fleeing is a word that's used to describe running away from a dangerous situation. So in the story, the families are trying to get away from something dangerous. And remember on the page before we saw that there was a war going on. So I'm thinking that's what they were fleeing from.

Okay. Say the word with me. Fleeing.

Students

Fleeing.

Teacher

Fleeing. All right.If a zebra was being chased by a lion, it would be fleeing. Or when a storm's coming and the rain starts to pour down, you'll often see ants fleeing for their holes. I want you to have a think about something else that could be fleeing from a dangerous situation and turn to your talking partner.

[partner talk between students]

Student

A zebra with a lion?

Teacher

A Zebra would be fleeing a lion, wouldn't it? Because that's very dangerous.

All right. Kobe, what did you think of that would be fleeing.

Student

I thought when like a shark was chasing a fish.

Teacher

Yeah, the fish would be fleeing, Definitely. And I like how you used the word in a sentence too. All right. Eva, what did you think of that would be fleeing?

Student

I thought, a human could be fleeing from an earthquake.

Teacher

Yeah. Like some of the people in the story had just been through an earthquake, haven't they?

I bet they were fleeing when the ground started to shake. Okay. What's the word that means to run away from a dangerous situation?

Students

Fleeing.