Chapter 7 Adolescent Literacy

This chapter was one that I always challenged when I was a student in high school.  It talked of the value of words and definitions.  If you recall in my older post I scored high in reading comprehension so I always would read the word in context and discern its meaning that way and therefore neglected my studies in vocabulary and such.  This probably aggrivated my teachers to no end as it seemed I was throwing away opportuntiy, but in reality I was not taking the time to do work I felt was meaningless.  However looking back now I realize I was creating bad habits that effect me today.  The problem however lays with vocabulary.  No person likes memorizing a list of words they do not know because they do not hear them.  So we as teachers and professionals must increase our vocabulary and the difficulty of the reading we assign to affirm the words these students are literally being forced to learn.  Thats right we are forcing these students to learn vocabulary, for some it is second nature of being in school.  However for many it will be like pulling teeth that they will seem uninterested and lazy in their approach.  But, they do want to learn them they want to know all they can so nothing will surprise them. Showing them words they do not see on a daily basis however makes the information seem trivial and pointless.  So how do we approach this issue.  Very gently, simply putting a list in the students hand at the beggining of the year and saying learn these words by this date and so on is a terrible way.  I personally have not thought of an appropriate way to engage students in vocabulary other than constant testing and reminders and trying to use it text and worksheets.  this way is a little better than a weekly test, but it feels like there is a big meaty center i could be using as the core of it all that I am missing.  I will hopefully find a better way as I teach, but if not I might be able to steal one from a teacher better than myself.