Tier 1: eyes, hat, blanket, walk
Tier 2: automatically, encouraged, negative, future
Tier 3: Alabama, territory, Georgia, Christian
It would be important to understand all of these words in order to comprehend the novel; however, I agree with Tompkins in that it is most important that students focus on Tier 2. This is because in Tier 1, students already know most of the words because they are basic; therefore, it would be silly to focus a lesson on words that a majority of the students already understand. Furthermore, Tier 3 words are words that students do not see very often. They call them "specialized" because they are usually specific to the particular story students are reading at the time. This leaves Tier 2, where it is words that students do not use regularly use in conversation, but they are likely to use in a school setting. Because of this, it would make sense that students focus on Tier 2 because it expands their vocabulary one step further from Tier 1. On top of that, after focusing enough time on the Tier 2 words, they'll understand the words enough to be able to use them on their own like in writing assignments.
A Word Study activity that students could participate in in a Word Poster. When doing this, students choose a word, write it on a poster, draw a picture that represents the word, and writes a sentence including the word. This activity is very beneficial because it allows students to analyze words from many different viewpoints. By drawing a picture of the word, it ensures that students understand what it is visually. It also allows them to put it in some sort of context. For example, if a student was doing a Word Poster for "hop", they could draw a picture of a bunny hopping. Not only would this picture demonstrate that they understand the correct definition, but it also shows that they can relate it to a real-life situation. Furthermore, by putting the word in a sentence students are allowed to expand on their thinking even more. On top of that, putting the word in a sentence requires that students not only have a general idea of what the word means, but they understand it completely.
I also chose a word poster!! I think an important thing to add to this lesson would be having the children choose a word that they are unfamiliar with in order to expand their vocabulary. Once they have picked a word that they are not use about, i might have them discuss the words with others or look up the word in a dictionary or on the internet. This way the children will not only pick a word they don't know but then they will have an understanding of that word in order to really draw the picture and write a sentence with the word in a meaningful way.
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