Oral language development
Vocabulary
Students commence school with varying levels of vocabulary knowledge. Vocabulary learning
involves acquiring new words as well as understanding existing words in greater depth.
Vocabulary instruction should commence as soon as students start school and initially be
development.
Word meaning gradually develops from partial to full and flexible understanding of words.
Students develop an understanding of a word’s role in language through repeated exposures
to the word in a variety of contexts (Juel & Deffes 2004). Students are more likely to recall
new words quickly and accurately if they need to retrieve the words frequently. Teachers
should program repeat experiences where students initially hear and use target words several
times a day and then every day for a short while until the words are well established.
To develop a deep understanding of a word, students need knowledge of:
• how it sounds (phonological representation)
• how it is used as part of language
• its multiple meanings
• its morphology, ie how the meaning changes with changes in structure
• how the word connects with other words and information, for example
– semantic clusters (words that have related meanings, eg jacket, coat, jumper, sweater
or iris, lily, rose, daffodil)
– thematic clusters (words related to the same theme, eg dog, lead, collar, walk, park,
panting, pat)
– morphological groups (laugh, laughed, laughingly, laughable)
• how it is written
• how it is used in idioms, jokes, slang and puns (Johnson, Johnson & Schlicting 2004).
Vocabulary knowledge is important to the development of speaking and listening, reading
and writing. Vocabulary knowledge assists students to make connections with their existing
background knowledge and to make inferences.
Teachers can support vocabulary learning through:
• providing repeated exposure to new vocabulary and repeated opportunities to use it
in a range of contexts
• planning and programming for the introduction of new vocabulary and strengthening
understanding of existing vocabulary.
Introduction of new vocabulary
The teacher should select a limited number of instructional words that:
• can be presented in a variety of ways and that can be connected with other words
and concepts, enabling students to build strong representations (Beck et al 2002)
• are important to the understanding of a text (ie to understand the main idea or concept)
or appropriate to a text type
• occur regularly in texts (common words)
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Support Materials for Students with Special Education Needs
English K–6
Speaking and listening
IMPLEMENTATION
