Vocab Minilesson Notebook

For the minilesson, I will be focusing on Sing Down the Moon by Scott O’Dell. The lesson I will be focusing on is a word study based on some words that the Navahos used, that may be introduced for the first time to the students through this book.

Lesson Introduction

For my lesson, I would start by asking the students to pull out their Sing Down the Moon books. Next, I would have one student briefly give a summary of the book, just to get the students. Next, I would pass out the following word list, which contains 8 words that can be found in the book along with the page number that each can be found on. Next, I would take a word from the book (orchard p2), and I would use this word to demonstrate a word investigation. I would create my word investigation (See Tompkins p199) on the white board for the whole class to see. I would then pass out worksheets to the students, and tell them that they would be creating their own word investigation

Sample word list:

Barranca (p 1)

Mesa (p6)

Tortillas (p 39)

Turquoise (p 41)

Dwellers (p 68)

Fleecy (p 87)

Speckled (p 101)

Scorn (p 110)

The Worksheet/Assignment

The first part of the lesson would address the concepts and word meanings component of word study from Tompkins. In the first question, students would be asked to find the word on the page that has been given to them. Next, they would be asked to write down the sentence that it was found in. Following this, they would be asked to write down what they think the word means based on the sentence. For the second question, I would have the students first choose a word from the list, grab a dictionary and look up their word. Students would then read all of the definitions of their word, and choose the best fitting definition, and write that down. Next, I would ask to do a morphemic analysis of the word. This means the students would break the word down into different morphemes, or sounds. I would have the students record their word’s morphemic analysis. The fourth, fifth and sixth components of word study from Tompkins would be addressed in the next question. Using a thesaurus, would ask the students to find one or two synonyms, antonyms, homonyms (if possible) for their word. Next, I would have the students go back to their dictionary, and find a word history of the word. Finally, I would ask the students to write the word in a sentence, where it is used figuratively.

Post Assignment

When the students have completed all of the tasks of the assignment, I would ask them to get a sheet of paper and create their own word investigation. I would allow the students to finish their word investigations in class.

Rationale

My reasoning for choosing this lesson is that it involves all eight components of Tompkin’s components of word study. Using this assignment, students would learn a wide range of information about words, and make connections between words and concepts. This will allow them to go in depth of investigation of one of the words, and give them a deeper meaning of how it is incorporated into the text.