Knowledge of Vocabulary Creates Classroom Success

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Vocabulary knowledge is highly correlated with reading comprehension and general academic success. Oxford Dictionaries defines vocabulary as “the body of words used in a particular language” (Oxford Dictionaries, 2013, para. 1). Vocabulary knowledge can be demonstrated in two ways: receptively or expressively. Knowledge of the words we see and hear would be described as the individual’s receptive vocabulary. Expressive vocabulary consists of the words that are used to convey information, by either writing or speaking. Typically, receptive vocabulary is larger than expressive vocabulary. Although individuals may understand the general idea of a word in their receptive vocabulary, they might lack the knowledge of the true definition that would be needed in order to use the word in their expressive vocabulary (Kamil & Hiebert, in press). Vocabulary development is important for a variety of reasons.
Children’s vocabulary development is important from an early age. Studies have shown that children who are regularly read to have larger vocabularies and better success at decoding words when reading (Burgess, Hecht, & Lonigan, 2002). Children’s vocabulary at age three is a strong predictor of their language and reading comprehension in third grade (Hart & Risley, 1995). Further, it has been shown that children with poor vocabulary skills struggle with reading comprehension.
Not only does vocabulary play a crucial role in reading comprehension, it is also highly correlated with academic success (Lehr et al., 2004). As students progress through the grades, the vocabulary necessary to succeed in higher grades becomes more extensive. Typically, academic vocabulary demands appear in children’s 3rd and 4th grade books (Chall, Jacobs, & Baldwin,...

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...ice activities for the spelling words that pertain to each unit. These activities include phrase completion, identifying misspelled words, adding prefixes, adding suffixes, and sentence completion.
Statement of the Problem
The problem to be investigated is whether the students are increasing their vocabulary through the current methods used in the classroom. Students’ vocabulary knowledge will be assessed through expressive knowledge of current vocabulary words. Those results will be compared to standardized vocabulary measures to determine the relationship to overall vocabulary ability. The following questions will be explored:
1. Are 4th grade students in Grand Forks public schools learning vocabulary using the Reading Street curriculum??
2. Is 4th grade students’ vocabulary knowledge of weekly spelling words related to overall vocabulary ability? (PPVT, EVT)

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