Word Savvy

Integrated Vocabulary, Spelling, and Word Study, Grades 3-6

Plot

Tired of assigning weekly spelling lists that your students memorize for the test only to have them misspell the words in their daily writing? Then join Max Brand in his fifth-grade classroom where word learning is integrated fully into literacy workshops. Using spelling investigations, word study notebooks, reading logs, and writers' notebooks, students learn to savor new words, puzzle over confusing pronunciations, and test new spelling strategies. Max moves beyond the concept of the word wall by using the walls in his classroom as a collective writer's notebook. Students choose and illustrate words, phrases, and sentences from books to create colorful, ever-changing displays throughout the room. Thirty-plus sample lessons in Word Savvy detail everything from teaching vocabulary in content areas to developing anchor charts for word learning throughout the year. Teachers will be able to create a reflective classroom environment where language development is at the heart of learning. Discussions, reading, and writing are opportunities for explicit instruction of word concepts, helping students become responsible for their learning as they use these concepts in revising, editing, and inferring the meaning of new words they encounter.