Benchmark Three

What Mr. Logan learned from Benchmark Three

            Most of my students grew--- some staggeringly well in every category but one: Language Standards. What is in that category? Basically, vocabulary-- I admit it, I put no attention to building their vocabulary this year beyond pointing out vocabulary in the literature I made them read.

            As always, I used the data to inform instruction. I had a few options to address their vocabulary deficiency. I have five different series of vocabulary programs (black line masters for workbook pages,) each of differing merit. I opted not to go with any of them for one simple reason. If you are a parent of one of my students, ask them about this.

1.      If a vocabulary chapter had ten words, when I polled my students, only 2 of them were new to them. That means that the exercises designed to reinforce their memory, usage, and comprehension of these words would be wasted effort for 80% of their words. Absolutely no one has time to waste after losing 9 days of school to winter closings and 12 days of schedule interruptions (delayed openings).

2.      The lists that students would have to memorize for tests are discovered in a vacuum. It is highly probable that students will encounter these words, but inauthentic learning is off-putting to students. They see it for what it is and react to it as “busy work.” Again - Absolutely no one has time to waste.

           

            So does this mean I waved the white flag at the problem as being insurmountable and unsolvable? Have you met Mr. Logan? My detractors say I am stubborn and cocky. My fans say I am confident and driven. I can live with either comment--- it’s all about connotation versus denotation. We opted for a different choice. “Choose Your Own Vocabulary.”  I asked students to abandon context clues once a day when they encounter words that are unfamiliar, uncertain, or are totally new.

2.      These words have to appear naturally, within the 24 hours since our last class meeting. Acceptable sources include: an article they read in another class, a chapter out of a textbook, a word they encountered surfing the web, a word they encountered in their free-read novel, or a word they encountered while reading a periodical for fun.

3.      Students were not allowed to just look up random words.

4.      Students brought the word, spelled correctly, defined, with root word, prefix, and suffix already identified.

5.      Each table created a database and shared it with me and their group mates.

6.      The first ten minutes of every class from the past two weeks has been utilized for the groups to share their words with each other and then the scribe shared the words with the class.

            The feedback that students gave about the experience is pretty powerful. In a class of 20 students, students have the opportunity to be exposed to twenty different words each day (theirs and 19 others). Using an informal poll, students gave feedback that more than fifteen of the words they encounter from each other are new. Out of those 15 words, they reported that they could see themselves using five or more in writing or speech immediately.

            Let’s put those soft numbers in perspective. This means that students are potentially acquiring 25 words each week from each other that they will begin using in their writing immediately. Students also shared that they enjoy learning from each other more than a random list generated by a textbook publisher.

            Here is a sample list of words that students encountered yesterday in my period 4 English 8 Class:

·         Opusculum

·         Terminus

·         Phenom

·         guile

·         Intelligible

·         Beguile

·         Robust

·         Arsenal

·         Incapacitated

·         Vigilant

·         Coalition

·         Diagnosis

·         Nombril

·         osmosis

·         cumbersome

·         monocle

·         ratification

·         egotistical

·         inkling

            Where are these words coming from? Most of these words are coming from their academic day. Many are from social studies, world languages, and science. When teachers, who do not teach ELA, ask what they can do to help improve ELA State Testing scores—the answer is pretty simple. They are already doing it. This is not the English classroom that GenX or Baby Boomers experienced, and that’s a good thing. It’s potentially better. The key component to all of this is that the kids still have to do their lesson to learn their lesson.

            Manny Scott, an inspirational speaker and original member of the Freedom Writers (Hilary Swank starred in the movie by the same name about this group of teens) shared with members of an audience-- mostly educators and business professionals, with a handful of teens: “A Texas rancher challenged me when I repeated the phrase ‘You can drag a horse to water, but you can’t force it to drink.’ He said you can pry its mouth open, force some salt down its gullet, and then it will be happy to drink!”

            I have been ruled by a desire to find that metaphorical salt for my students this year and I have found it in an unlikely source. Whereas I have, in general, 80% participation with homework, Choose Your Own Vocabulary achieves well over 95%. Why? I’m not sure--- I don’t really want to look a gift horse in the mouth and ask, but if I were to conjecture, I would say the social element of bringing the words, hearing what words others brought, and hearing the teacher’s commentary motivates them. Now for the rest of that salt…

            That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.