Writing Center 8
Vocabulary
Goal Students will participate in word study activities in order to learn and use new vocabulary in writing. Basic Center Materials White board Dry erase markers Eraser Picture and/or word cards related to content
Preparation Teacher will: Prepare picture/word cards organized by categories (clothing, furniture, states). These words may come from content area word banks. Plan read alouds and interactive writing lessons to familiarize students with riddles. Use words from word banks to write riddles. Demonstrate how to play the game “Picture This” by describing an object from the word bank using its attributes. Game Directions: 1. Students play in pairs. 2. Player 1 chooses a picture/word card and thinks of attributes to describe the object. Player 1 says “Picture This” and orally gives one clue about the word/picture. 3. Player 2 uses a white board and marker to record a guess of the answer to the “Picture This” riddle. 4. Player 2 shows the board and reads the guess to Player 1. If the guess is correct, the two players switch roles. If the guess is incorrect, Player 2 gives additional clues one at a time until Player 2 correctly identifies the word/picture.
Procedures Students will: Find a partner and choose a group of cards. Play “Picture This” trying to use precise language giving as few clues as possible for your partner to guess the riddle. Phonemic Awareness/Phonics
Beyond the Basic Center Additional Center Ideas: 1. Prepare a restaurant center with menus, props, and order pads. Students assume roles of the customer and server. Customers read and order from the menu while the server writes the order. 2. Gather an assortment of magazines. Students search for pictures that correspond to a given category (tools, ocean animals, school supplies). On a large sheet of paper, students write the category and glue chosen pictures. Students write labels or captions for pictures to create a personal word bank. 3. Use interactive editing to begin a content area word bank. Post word bank where students can easily access it as a resource. Provide graph paper for students to create a word search using the content area words. Students solve each other’s word searches. 4. Read aloud and discuss books that contain idiomatic expressions. Demonstrate how to use an idiom dictionary to find meanings of unusual expressions. Prepare sentence strips with a variety of idiomatic expressions. Students choose an idiom to write in a sentence and illustrate. Provide an idiom dictionary as a resource. Illustrations may be serious or comical. 5. Encourage students to look for words that have common derivatives. Discuss word origins and how many words come from Greek and Latin roots. Explore this principle using interactive writing. Prepare word cards that contain common roots (bio, geo, graph) and star shaped pieces of paper. Students choose a word card and write the root in the center of the star along with its meaning. Students generate other words that have the same root on the other points of the star. Provide a dictionary as a resource.
Additional Resources Brown, M. The Important Book. HarperCollins Publishers, 1951. ISBN 0060207205 Charlip, R. Fortunately. Simon & Schuster, 1993. ISBN 0689716605 Frasier, D. Miss Alaineus: A Vocabulary Disaster. Harcourt, 2000. ISBN 0152021639 Fry, E., Kress, J., Fountoukidis, D. The Reading Teacher’s Book of Lists, Third Edition. Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1993. ISBN 0130348937 Hambleton, V. So, You Wanna Be a Writer?: How to Write, Get Published, and Maybe Even Make It Big! Beyond Words Publishing, 2001. ISBN 1582700435 Lassen, C. R., Sea Treasures. The Book Company, 2001. ISBN 1740470664 Terban, M., Dictionary of Idioms (More Than 600 Phrases, Sayings, and Expressions). Scholastic, 1996. ISBN 0590381571 Young, S. The Scholastic RHYMING Dictionary. Scholastic, Inc., 1994. ISBN 0590494600