Johanna,
How do you recommend the study of new verbs?
Marcia Alessi
On Apr 26, 2005, at 3:00 PM, Johanna Rubba wrote:
> Cognitive views of language propose that all of our knowledge is
> stored in units called schemas or frames. These are like screenplays
> for typical events -- getting up in the morning, applying for a job,
> going grocery shopping, attending a birthday party -- which allow us
> to recognize an event and behave appropriately. Schema theory has
> featured in studies of reading for some time now, because possessing
> and pre-activating a schema related to the topic of the reading
> ("anticipatory set") improves reading comprehension, and lacking a
> schema impedes it significantly.
>
> Schemas are the knowledge bases within which the definitions of words
> reside. "Sister" resides in a kinship schema; "candy" isn't just
> anything sweet (fruit is not candy), but also involves notions like
> "treat" (hence extensions to "eye candy" and "brain candy") and "not
> meal food". "Pet" as a sort of animal depends on the notion of
> domesticated animals that serve only as companions, which means they
> have to contrast with beasts of burden and food -- competing animal
> schemas.
>
> A few of you have mentioned putting words together that come from the
> same domain of experience -- nautical words, etc. This exploits
> schemas; it is easier for students to fit a new word into an existing
> schema by relating it to other aspects of the domain.
>
> Early-grade materials often do this: words about the sea; words for
> things in the kitchen, etc. For reasons I do not understand this does
> not continue much in the higher grades. I've seen some lists of words
> like "occupational" or "history" or "science", but a lot of the words
> on the list are not exclusive to that domain. They're in the list
> because they were in the reading.
>
> The other way humans organize their knowledge is in categories of like
> things. My first exercise when I teach about vocabulary is to ask my
> students to name 25 of the words they know that start with "m", _in
> alphabetical order_. This is very hard, of course. We don't store
> words in alphabetical order in our minds.
>
> Then I ask them to name ten kinds of fruit. The whole class starts
> calling out and we have 15 fruit names in less than a minute. Once
> again, teaching materials for young children often work with
> categories (animals; plants; occupations), but again, this disappears
> in the higher grades. Why? Using the natural ways the mind organizes
> words facilitates vocabulary expansion.
>
> I advise my students (for when they become teachers) to work with
> their kids to develop schema- and category-based "dictionaries". Each
> time they get a list of new vocabulary words, they work on adding them
> to these dictionaries. Word processing makes it very easy to adapt and
> change such documents.
>
> The game "Outburst" works on these two principles. It's a game in
> which teams have to guess ten words that are on a card that the
> "emcee" holds. Each list is based on either a category (Clint Eastwood
> movies, hobbies, populous cities, volcanoes of the world) or a schema
> (things you find in a bathroom, things associated with San Francisco,
> things you take to the beach, etc.). I also use this in class. It's
> really excellent for ESL teaching. But having kids make up an Outburst
> game derived from their "dictionaries" could be an entertaining way to
> review vocabulary. Only words from their dictionary earn points, just
> as in Outburst you get no credit for naming something that does not
> appear on the card.
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Johanna Rubba Associate Professor, Linguistics
> English Department, California Polytechnic State University
> One Grand Avenue • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
> Tel. (805)-756-2184 • Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone. 756-2596
> • E-mail: [log in to unmask] • Home page:
> http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
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>
Marcia Alessi
Language Arts & Social Studies
Sixth Grade
St. Paul the Apostle School
Los Angeles, California
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