Vocabulary- Prefixes

Did additional work on prefixes so students use these prefixes rather than not e.g. unhappy instead of not happy.

Prefix	Meaning	3 words	Images
non	from, down, away reverse, opposite	Decode, decrease, deduce	decrease
mis	wrongly, badly, unsuitably	misplaced, misunderstood, misfortune	misplace
in	middle, surround, within	incorrect, inheritance, inflatable	incorrect
pre	before, previously	previous, precise, predator	predator
pro	professional, experienced, advanced	professional, protein, property	protein
il	Adjective, describing	illegal, illustrator, illusion	illusion
de	down, away, remove	degrees, dentist, define	degrees
ex	Not including	Example, expert, exchange	exchange

Root words

Today for vocabulary we studied root words. The students had difficulty working out the root word when we did the word of the day.

Root Word A root word has no prefix or suffix — it's the most basic part of a word.	Meaning	Words with the root word
act	verb:do something noun: a deed or pretence	Action, actor, actress
form
port
Auto
audi
graph
tele
photo
path
omni
mit

Vocabulary Building- Time

To begin the lessons on time I started with the vocabulary. I introduced International Timeline and International Date line  amongst other words. For consolidation students made word clouds and then posted on their blogs. During the course of the week I heard these words being used during problem solving.

Round Robin Writing

Tried round robin writing yesterday for the first time. The students enjoyed it..were so enthusiastic. It was good to see all students contributing to the writing. Also the help given by co members to improve or clarify ideas. The downside was that a few stories lacked sequence or was a bit immature. The students complained was that the 5 minutes given to write was too short.  I will try this type of writing again with 7 minutes  for writing.

Analysing reading assessment

The results from e asttle reading assessment showed that my target group was at the national standard. One student had made accelerated progress. When I analysed the reading comprehension I found that she was prepared to take risks with the vocabulary. I was happy that 14 out of 22 students were at level 4.

Aligning my Inquiry across our Community of Learning

Strange but True! I read Andrea's blog post and found that it closely aligned with mine - but my inquiry is in Reading while hers was in Mathematics.

Vocabulary in Maths

Having planned to link vocabulary across all curriculum areas, to improve reading of my targeted students, this is an example in Mathematics.

Rebecca's Blog post showing vocabulary being emphasized across all learning areas, Mathematics in this instance.

I am still working on frontloading vocabulary across all the curriculum areas.  I have yet to assess if there is a difference in the students reading levels.

Term 3

30 July 2017

The week started slowly because many students were sick and others had difficulty getting up in the cold to be on time. Maths is taught in the morning but I have a group who are late daily and miss out. Taught the 4 operations this week using the standard algorithm. Division will need to be revisited a few times- many started from the right. Taught division of fractions with a selected few.  Students did not realise that a whole number over one is still a whole number.

Students enjoying the incredible science by Auckland University.

Did peer marking using e asttle marking rubric on explanation writing. Worked with students through marking aspect.

Sports Camp training is in earnest now and we are finalising numbers and codes.

Teaching Inquiry - What's my why?

Something was not right.  It did not take long to figure out that my students were having problem reading, understand and writing because their vocabulary was limited.  The challenge to improve their vocabulary became my teaching inquiry.

It is important that my students are helped with their vocabulary, and I think that it is worth spending time on this.

I have therefore focussed my teaching inquiry to:

investigate through a variety of approaches, strategies and scaffolds, the effect of the meaning , use (oral,written) and form ( grammar) of words in accelerating reading comprehension.