Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

Reflections on Vocabulary:
Tier 2 Vocabulary in The Garden of Abdul Gasazi
Richelle E. Colucci-Nunn
Drexel University

Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

Reflections on Vocabulary:
Tier 2 Vocabulary in The Garden of Abdul Gasazi
As an avid reader with a strong sense of word consciousness (Graves & Watts-Taffe as
cited in Tomkins, 2014), I was delighted to read Kucans (2012) suggestions to create energized
verbal environments environments in which words are not only noticed and appreciated, but
also savored and celebrated (p. 362). Although I was limited to the story I could use for this
lesson by my cooperating teacher, and therefore limited in my vocabulary choices, I was able to
identify three words that I believed would provide opportunities for students to work with
phonology, orthography, morphology, and syntax, in addition to semantics.
All three Tier 2 words (Beck & McKeown as cited in Kucan, 2012) -- bellowed, bolted,
and exhausted -- or their root words provided rich opportunities to explore multiple meanings
and shades of meaning, and exhausted provided an opportunity for students to work with syntax
and Latin suffixes. I had planned several activities for each word, to be implemented over the
course of three days (since the interactive reading took up most of the first days lesson), but I
was not able to get to every activity.
I found that I was trying to accomplish too much with one lesson; the next time I
implement this lesson or a lesson like it, I would do less work with the story to allow more work
with the vocabulary. I now understand that the story choice itself is a critical component; this
story simply begged for discussion about whether the dog was actually turned into a duck, and to
limit that discussion would have been a shame. I would also eliminate the prediction component
of my warm-up for the reading; this activity was not necessary to meet the objectives for this
lesson.

Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

The activity that was most successful for the students was the mind map for bolted. The
students came at it from a different perspective than I had anticipated when I developed this
lesson and the sample mind map, but the end result was that their mind map reflected an
understanding of the similarities and differences between the different definitions, as well as the
connections between some of the noun and verb forms of the word. Regrettably, I did not take a
photograph of the mind map we created as a class on the whiteboard before it was erased by the
conscientious student helper-of-the-day, and the students versions were created on individual
white boards that were erased immediately following the activity.
The thumbs-up, -down, and sideways semantic activity for bellowed was helpful to me
as a teacher, because I was able to assess whether students understood the connotation of
bellowed. There were several students who struggled with this activity; for the
synonyms/antonyms and shades of meaning activities, I made sure these students were paired
with students who demonstrated thumbs-up and down understanding so that peer mentoring
could occur.
Even with this intervention, however, some of the semantic concept maps did not reflect
an understanding of the shade of meaning for bellowed; this is in part due to the definitions
provided by the classroom editions of dictionary and thesaurus, which did not refer to the pain or
anger connotation of the word. Some students picked up on that connotation when I explained it
during the thumbs-up activity, but some students appeared to only use the dictionary and
thesaurus definitions when completing their semantic word map. (See Appendix A for an
example of each).
The continuum activity for bolted was also not as successful as I had hoped; I attribute
this to insufficient practice with the word and its synonyms or related words. The students would

Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

have benefited from creating a mind map or Venn diagram of the run definition of bolt and its
synonyms. The word bolted may also not have been the best choice for a continuum activity,
since its synonyms have connotations other than speed. I was, however, able to turn this to my
advantage; I used the discrepancies to point out that reader factors as well as text factors
(Tompkins, 2014) contribute to understanding of a word or its use in the text and also to point out
how just the right word choice can make a difference in the picture that is painted for the reader
by the author. (See Appendix B for examples.)
Due to time constraints, I was not able to provide students with a choice between
completing the semantic concept map or writing a story or cartoon using any form or definition
of the three words, because their compositions would have been too rushed, even if I did not
have them follow all stages of the writing process (Tompkins, 2014). This was disappointing to
me, because after seeing the creativity expressed in the greeting card lesson I had delivered a few
days prior, I had anticipated reading some very interesting stories and cartoons.
However, the students all seemed to enjoy completing the semantic maps, especially the
sketch option for word association. The semantic maps also worked for differentiation in
assessment. For example, I was able to assess one student as having demonstrated mastery of the
word bolt from his sketch and the identification of a synonym not listed in the thesaurus, even
though the student did not get to write a sentence using the word in the time allotted. (See
Appendix C.)
I really enjoyed planning this lesson and greatly anticipated helping students dig into
(garden reference!) these Tier 2 words, but ultimately, this lesson fell short of my expectations. I
did not come away from the lesson with the feeling that students had an opportunity to truly

Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

savor these words and develop an appreciation for how choosing a word with just the right
nuance will make their writing more interesting and powerful.
Although this lesson was not as successful for the students as I had hoped, it was very
successful as a learning experience for me. Not only did I gain an appreciation for how
providing students with short but repeated practice with Tier 2 words over several days will help
them construct rich representations of word meanings (Kucan, 2012, p. 365), but I also learned
that sometimes, less is more. I will therefore plan activities that can be completed in 10-15
minutes a day rather than trying to fit too much in, the result of which is only a superficial
exposure or practice for the students. I am confident that I can take what I have learned from
delivering this lesson so that I can be successful in future lessons on Tier 2 words.

Running head: REFLECTIONS ON VOCABULARY

References
Allsburg, C. (1979). The garden of Abdul Gasazi. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Company.
Kucan, L. (2012). What is most important to know about vocabulary? The Reading Teacher,
65(6), 360.
Tompkins, G. (2014). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (6th ed.) Boston, MA:
Pearson.