Digging Deeper into Tier 2 Words

By Doug Buehl,
Madison East High School teacher
Member, Wisconsin State Reading Association

May 2005

Would you ever expect a prognosticator to be recalcitrant? Or are there times when a prognosticator might come off as jaunty? Might a prognosticator sometimes feel precarious? Is it likely that a prognosticator might desire to be infallible? Do prognosticators occasionally make spurious decisions?

What do you think? Are there circumstances that might lead you to conclude that each question could be answered in the affirmative? What might some of these conditions be? Could you give some examples?

To look at this issue from another perspective, how well would you have to understand each of the italicized words to respond to the questions? Do you bring an in-depth and flexible knowledge of each of these words to those times when you meet them in “real life,” or are these words rather hazy and indistinct? What does it mean to really “know” a word?

Last month’s column discussed vocabulary in terms of three levels: tier 1 words, which are predominately learned from spoken language; tier 2 words, which we most frequently encounter in written texts; and tier 3 words, which are content-specific and represent the concepts to be learned in various academic disciplines. The italicized words above are all examples of tier 2 words, those words which we hear relatively infrequently but which authors expect us to know when we are reading a variety of texts.

Vocabulary researchers like Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2002) argue that intensive and effective vocabulary instruction is neglected in our classroom routines. They advocate an array of practices for vocabulary building that focus on tier 2 words, which are the cornerstone of successful reading comprehension.

The strategy
Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2002) describe vocabulary instruction that is “frequent, rich, and extended.” For an emphasis on vocabulary to be effective, they maintain, students must reach beyond mere identification of a definition; instead, students need an environment that prompts them to assume true ownership of words. Therefore, vocabulary is taught primarily as a vehicle for more precise written and spoken expression, as students become increasingly comfortable managing these new words as they encounter them as readers and listeners.

Last month’s column advocated teaching vocabulary as “explanations.” The following strategies represent additional steps for teaching tier 2 words.

Step 1: Examples and nonexamples of a new word help students grasp subtleties of use and gradations in meaning. Students learning the word recalcitrant might be provided with the following dichotomy to choose from:

Which is recalcitrant?

• when a person really doesn’t want to do something but she goes ahead and does it; or
• when a person resists doing something she doesn’t want to do and only does it unwillingly or if forced.

Notice that the nonexample and example feature similar descriptions to force students to develop more precise understandings of a new word. The nonexample should display some of the qualities of the target word, but should lack something essential to the word’s meaning.

An explanation of recalcitrant must go beyond merely disliking something. When someone is recalcitrant, she “digs in her heels” and can be difficult, even stubborn to deal with. A recalcitrant person might resist following orders, or “going along.” The first statement above describes a reluctant but generally cooperative person; the second is more clearly a recalcitrant person.

Step 2: A further extension asks students to consider how new words could possibly be paired. The questions opening this month’s column reflect this strategy, as students are asked to speculate how one new word (prognosticator) might be meaningfully paired with other vocabulary they are investigating. This strategy challenges students to avoid conceptualizing narrow, calcified contexts for a word, and to instead explore situations that could make such a pairing meaningful.

For example, prognosticator – someone who makes some sort of prediction – could be paired with jaunty, a confident, self-assured way of presenting oneself. Students first must verbalize why the two words might be paired, and then formulate a sentence illustrating how the two words could interrelate.

One student might observe that a prognosticator might be highly confident that his predictions will turn out to be accurate, so he might deliver them in a jaunty manner. A possible sentence might be: “The jaunty weather prognosticator promised us a rainstorm by nightfall.”

Paired words are especially effective when they represent unexpected links. Students will have to continue to deepen and refine their knowledge of both words to craft meaningful possible connections.

Step 3: A variation of the paired word strategy engages students to posit their own matched pairs. Provide students with two lists of targeted tier 2 words (include words that are new with several that have been previously studied). One method would be to feature 10 new words in List A and 10 previously learned words in List B. Or words could be interchanged between the two lists.

Next ask students to create five pairs that link List A words with List B words, and to defend why their pairs can be justified. The final step involves the creation of a sentence that juxtaposes the two words in some sort of meaningful context.

Using the words presented at the beginning of this article, a student might select precarious from List A to pair with jaunty in List B. The student’s reason for the pair is that the words seem to get at opposite ideas. A sentence might be: “You wouldn’t expect a person to be feeling jaunty if he found himself in a very precarious situation.”

Posted May 11, 2005