Reading Rockets offers a wealth of reading strategies, lessons, and activities designed to help young children learn how to read and read better. Our reading resources assist parents, teachers, and other educators in working with struggling readers who require additional help in reading fundamentals and comprehension skills development.

You are here: > Techniques for Teaching Reading Effectively > Reading 101: What You Should Know About > Vocabulary

Reading 101

Vocabulary

Click below to watch a short video clip that shows a bilingual kindergarten class learning new vocabulary.

Vocabulary plays an important part in learning to read. Beginning readers must use the words they hear orally to make sense of the words they see in print.

Consider, for example, what happens when a beginning reader comes to the word dig in a book. As she begins to figure out the sounds represented by the letters d, i, g, the reader recognizes that the sounds make up a very familiar word that she has heard and said many times. It is harder for a beginning reader to figure out words that are not already part of their speaking (oral) vocabulary.

Vocabulary also is very important to reading comprehension. Readers cannot understand what they are reading without knowing what most of the words mean. As children learn to read more advanced texts, they must learn the meaning of new words that are not part of their oral vocabulary.

Adapted from: Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read, 2001

Teaching Vocabulary

By: Linda Diamond and Linda Gutlohn (2006)

Consider some excellent lesson models for teaching vocabulary, explaining idioms, fostering word consciousness, instruction for English Language Learners, and mnemonic strategies.

Vocabulary: Instructional Guidelines and Classroom Examples

By: Partnership for Reading (2001)

This article provides examples of classroom instructional techniques as well as specific activities for helping students build their vocabularies.

Vocabulary: An Introduction

By: Partnership for Reading (2001)

The scientific research on vocabulary instruction reveals that 1) most vocabulary is learned indirectly, and 2) some vocabulary must be taught directly.

Questions About Vocabulary Instruction

By: Partnership for Reading (2001)

This article answers four common questions teachers have about vocabulary instruction, including what words to teach and how well students should know vocabulary words.

Vocabulary

Related articles

See also