EDU 371: Phonics Based Reading & Decoding week 3 DQ 2

11 Word Banks and Word Sorts

We visited an elementary school in our area not long ago. When entering Sam’s first-​grade classroom, we were immediately struck by the variety of activity—​children were reading, working with words, writing—​literacy activity was everywhere. Little Jeremy soon approached us. “Hey!” he said, beaming. “I learned 17 words last week! Wanna see?” Of course we did, so Jeremy took us to his desk and proudly extracted several words from his word bank. “Here they are. These came from the poem we have been reading. Did I tell you I can read the poem? And these are from the science story we dictated to Mr. Johnson. Want me to read the words to you?” Jeremy was proud of his accomplishments and enthusiastic about the words he had learned. He was well on his way to becoming a reader.

Upstairs, in Chris’s fifth-​grade class, we saw small groups of students clustered around words written on slips of paper. Kids were talking and moving words around on their tables. Chris explained, “We just finished a social studies unit about the American Revolution. Students are sorting important vocabulary words into one of three categories: battles, government, or both. I’ve been eavesdropping. The discussions are fascinating, especially for words like liberty and independence. They’re really thinking!”

Beginning readers like Jeremy need meaningful, familiar text to read and reread. They also need to work with words, particularly to develop and maintain their sight vocabularies and to discover features of the graphophonic cueing system. Older students, like those in Chris’s class, need opportunities to think about and use academic vocabulary. Word banks and word sorts, the focus of this chapter, are very useful for these purposes (Stauffer 1980).

11.1 What Is a Word Bank?

A word bank is a collection of words that a child knows (or is in the process of learning). Beginning readers primarily use word banks to reinforce word learning. Beyond the beginning stages of reading, word banks are used as a reference for spelling and writing and as a source of words for instruction and practice in phonics or other related reading skills. Hall (1981) outlines several major functions for word banks:

• To serve as a record of individual students’ reading vocabularies

• To serve as a reference for writing and spelling

• To serve as examples and context for group language study or skills instruction

• To provide reinforcement through repeated exposure to words

Word bank words can come from anywhere. In fact, the child’s own name, family members’ names, and words related to outside‑of‑school interests often appear in children’s word banks. Inside the classroom, dictations, predictable pattern books, poems, and songs are supportive texts for beginning reading instruction. As children read and reread these texts, they learn the words within them. Older students also keep word banks, in which they deposit interesting or important words they encounter from the literature they read and the content areas they study.

Because word banks consist almost exclusively of words the child already knows, it’s easier for them to focus on the similarities and differences among words that are so necessary for word learning (Bear, Invernizzi, Templeton, and Johnston 2012). Children may also select some words to add to their word banks because of personal interest. Although they may not know these words at sight, they can usually decode them. In our summer reading program, we have found that the added incentive of learning "my words" enables successful learning. Working with too many unfamiliar words in isolation is frustrating, however. Asking children to underline the words that they know as they read individual copies of their texts is an easy way to find word bank words. This is a positive approach to word learning because the emphasis is on what students know and what they want to learn (Stauffer 1980).

Word bank cards should be rather small, about 1” × 2”, and sturdy, since children use them often. Index cards or oaktag work well. Envelopes work well initially for storage, but larger containers, such as plastic recipe boxes, are soon needed. Some teachers punch holes at one end of word bank cards, and children use large metal shower rings to keep the cards together.

Students’ word banks grow slowly and steadily. At first, cards can be stored in random order, but soon children need a system for organizing their words so that they can locate needed words quickly. Storing words in alphabetical order provides a natural reason for learning and practicing alphabetizing skills and sound-​symbol relationships. Suppose, for example, that a child has envelopes labeled with letters of the alphabet and that the envelopes are stored in alphabetical order. To locate a word, a child needs to think about the word’s beginning sound, decide what letter of the alphabet to look for, and find the corresponding envelope in alphabetical order. So even the process of finding a word offers many word-​learning opportunities!

When word banks become cumbersome because of the number of cards children have accumulated, the teacher may want to suggest that children add only a specific number of words from each text they read or add only new, special, or more difficult words. The sheer volume of accumulated words is an important indicator of learning for some students, though, so we urge caution in providing too many restrictions on the size of a child’s word bank.

When most children in the class have more than 200 words in their word banks, it may be time to discontinue their active use. Students’ ease in reading words in teacher-​made sorts is another sign for termination. If students can read teacher-​selected words easily, they may not need word banks anymore (Bear et al. 2012). Many children keep word cards with them even after the entire class eliminates work with word banks, however. Some keep cards of their individual spelling demons for easy reference. Word banks for English language learner (ELL) students might contain both first language and English versions of new words, perhaps accompanied by simple sketches. Older students also find word banks useful for learning foreign language vocabulary or for subject area study.

11.2 Using Word Banks

Having a large sight vocabulary doesn’t guarantee reading success, but it certainly helps. The more words a reader knows by sight, the fewer times he or she must stop reading to figure out unknown words. Reading interesting, easy, familiar material affords children many opportunities to encounter words repeatedly in meaningful contexts, thus increasing the possibility that they will become sight words.

Instruction also helps children acquire sight words. Stauffer (1980) describes the overall instructional approach as cue reduction. Initially, children encounter words in the context of a familiar text. Children listen to and look at the words as the teacher reads them. A gradual cue reduction occurs when children read with the teacher, and more cues are reduced when children read chorally without the teacher or take turns reading parts of the text by themselves. Next, children read the whole texts independently, underlining words they know. Finally, the child reads the underlined words apart from their context, and known words are added to the word bank. Such a meaningful and context-​rich instructional approach, based on the idea of gradual cue reduction, helps facilitate the acquisition of sight vocabulary.

Beyond the general principle of cue reduction, a great deal can be done with word bank words. Next, using Hall’s (1981) broad categories, we suggest many uses for word banks.

Recording Individual Reading Vocabulary

Jeremy, whom we introduced at the beginning of this chapter, was very proud of his 17 new words. Children often benefit from concrete proof that they are learning. In many classrooms, children keep simple charts in their reading folders that record the date, perhaps every two weeks or so, and the number of words in their word banks.

Teachers can keep track of students’ individual reading vocabularies as well. Since word banks contain words that students know (or want to know), not simply those the children have seen or the teacher has introduced, their contents provide a safe estimate of word learning. Quick calculations of quantity, quality, and rate of learning can provide indications of a child’s ease and progress in learning to read as well as the overall size of the child’s sight vocabulary.

Class activities with word bank words offer natural opportunities to differentiate instruction. Students who are learning English can add pictures or other visuals to their word bank cards, which will facilitate their word learning (Helman and Burns 2008). Moreover, concepts can be taught with words of different difficulty levels, which is useful in Response To Intervention environments. Imagine the variety of words that might be selected in response to teacher questions like these: “Find words that could take the –ed ending” or “Find words that could be used to describe someone.”

Because no two word banks are alike, teachers sometimes worry that children are not learning high-​frequency words. This concern is almost always unfounded. Since a high-​frequency word is, by definition, used frequently in written text, the odds are great that children will encounter it often and eventually learn it. Nevertheless, to set their minds at ease, teachers may wish to keep high-​frequency word lists in students’ reading folders. Periodically, students can mark the words on the list that they know by sight, perhaps by using a different symbol each time (a check mark in October, a plus sign in December, and so on) to show growth.

Word-​learning information can be shared with parents. Children can complete simple charts (or better yet, computer-​made certificates) to take home each month. These feature the number of new words learned that month and the total number of words in the word bank. In some classrooms, children use the computer to create triple-​spaced lists of their word bank words. Mary, a first-​grade teacher, notes that “this is an easy way to introduce elements of word processing. Besides that, children take their lists home, cut the words apart, and play word games with their families.” What a positive way for parents to learn about their children’s reading progress! And the children get the added benefit of having everyone at home congratulate them for their learning.

Serving as a Reference for Writing and Spelling

Since children know the words in their word banks, it’s fair for teachers to expect the words to be spelled accurately in final drafts of children’s writing. For this expectation to be realized, it must be clear to children.

Word banks can also be used to focus on issues related to language in writing. For example, teachers might ask students to find possible synonyms for commonly used words (e.g., good or said) from their word banks. In some classrooms, we have seen charts of alternatives to common words posted on walls for easy reference. These charts, usually titled “Instead of _______, try . . . ,” contain lists of synonyms from students’ word banks. Matt’s second-​graders have a chart of words to use instead of nice, including kind, friendly, good, pretty, beautiful, and favorite. Matt says that the list grows steadily during the year and that he frequently sees students looking at the list while writing.

Serving as Examples for Group Language Study and Skills Instruction

In general, it’s easier to learn something new using what we already know. Several years ago, for example, our young friend Lee was trying to tell one of us about her new interest—​lacrosse, which she described as “kind of like field hockey but you can’t body check and there’s a net on the stick.” By relating the unknown game to one we already knew, Lee was able to explain her new interest. This same principle applies to one of the most powerful uses for word banks—​that is, using words children know to teach them about language or to teach skills and strategies that will help them grow as readers. The examples we provide here illustrate how this instruction can work.

Judy knew her Title I students needed to learn about hard and soft c. As she listened to children read, she noted situations where lack of this knowledge was hampering children’s decoding ability, so she planned a lesson to introduce these sounds. She prepared by finding pictures of common objects that had the two c sounds—​celery, cereal, circle, circus; cat, car, comb, comics, cup, cucumber. She showed the pictures to children and asked them to say the words. Then she showed the pictures again, this time asking children to listen carefully to the beginning sounds of the words. Children quickly discovered that the words began with either the s sound or the k sound. Together Judy and the children sorted the words into s sound or k sound categories. Judy used magnets to attach the words to the chalkboard, where she also labeled each picture.

At this point, Judy asked that children find all the words in their word banks that began with c and to make three groups of words—​s sound, k sound, and other (to accommodate words like chop and church). After individuals had completed this task, they shared with the larger group. Judy made two large charts containing everyone’s s sound and k sound words. When the list was complete, she asked children to look for spelling similarities among the s sound words and k sound words. Children were quick to hypothesize about the vowels after the c. Judy concluded the lesson by asking children what they had learned and how that new information might help them if they encountered unknown words that began with c. By developing new knowledge (the two sounds of c) based on words children already knew, Judy focused their attention where she wanted it—​on the beginning sounds.

Judy’s instruction is an example of a closed word sort, an activity in which students sort word bank cards into predetermined categories. Here are some examples of categories that teachers can use in different word sorts:

• Words that contain/don’t contain some word family

• Words with/without some phonic element

• Words with/without affixes

• Words that are/are not naming words, describing words, action words, and so on

• Words that do/don’t express feelings or some other feature

Within just a few minutes, students can complete several different types of sorts with the same set of words. With every sort, students get practice on each word in their word banks, each time from a different structural, syntactic, or semantic perspective. And, with each sort, students develop deeper knowledge and insights into important word and intraword characteristics.

Maintaining a sight vocabulary requires practice with the words. Two instructional activities, open word sorts and odd word out, which is a type of closed word sort, are effective practice techniques. Word sorts are small-​group activities that invite students to categorize or classify words. Students either use their word bank words or other sight words for word sort activities. If other words are used, the teacher makes small word cards for students to manipulate.

An open word sort is a divergent thinking activity. Students may group words however they wish—​there’s no right answer. Instead, the focus is on the process that students use to arrive at groupings and the reasons for their choices. Students may work individually in an open word sort, but pairs or triads are often more successful because of the talking that occurs as students consider possible groupings. The teacher simply tells students to put word bank words (or other sight words) into categories that make sense and reminds them to be ready to explain their groupings to others. After a few minutes of discussion and grouping, children either explain their categories, or the teacher asks students to share their word groupings with others in the class, who are invited to guess the categories.

As mentioned earlier, the teacher provides categories in a closed word sort. Other than this, the activity is completed just like an open word sort. Although closed word sorts tend to yield more convergent responses, the goal is not only to produce “correct” responses. Again, students’ thinking and reasoning processes are of primary importance.

Kay and her kindergarten students worked with blocks and then dictated a language experience story, “The Crazy Monster,” about what their block monster looked like:

The Crazy Monster

The crazy monster has lots of eyes. The crazy monster has two hats. The crazy monster has twelve eyes. The crazy monster has six pairs of eyes. He has two necks and two heads. The crazy monster is scary. The monster is funny. The monster has two eyes on each head.

After reading the text to the children and reading it with them, Kay gave children individual copies of the text to read with partners and on their own. Two days later, to prepare for word study, Kay selected several words from the text and printed each on a 3” × 5” index card:

eyes, heads, funny, necks, twelve, monster, crazy, scary, six, two

She and the children used these word cards for an open word sort and for playing odd word out.

For the open word sort, Kay put the word cards on the carpet so all the children could see and manipulate them. She then invited pairs of students to find words that could go together. Here’s what the children decided:

• twelve, two, and six “because they’re number words”

• crazy and monster “because the monster’s crazy”

• scary and funny “because they both end in y”

• heads, necks, and eyes “because they’re parts of the body” (Another child added, “Yeah, but it could also be that they all end with s.”)

• scary and six “because they’re s words”

In the diversity of children’s responses, we see that they thought about word meanings, word parts, and sounds to arrive at their answers.

In the “odd word out” activity, the teacher provides at least two related words along with one unrelated word, and children guess which word doesn’t belong, again providing reasons for their decisions. Kay placed these two groups of words on the chalkboard using magnets: twelve, two, six, and monster, and eyes, funny, heads, and necks. Children easily found the odd words. Students can also play odd word out with partners using their own word bank words.

Former first-​grade teacher Francine Johnston (1998) explored three ways to support young children’s development of sight vocabulary. Children in three first-​grade classrooms read three easy books each week. On a rotating basis, they also participated in three types of follow‑up activities: repeated readings, in which they simply read and reread the stories at least 10 times each; sentence strips, in which they read text-​only versions of the books and reassembled the stories from sentence strips; and word banks, in which children read text-​only versions of the books, developed word banks, and participated in many of the word study activities we describe in this chapter. Although children learned words with all three methods, Francine found that children of all ability levels learned the least number of words with repeated readings and the greatest number of words with the word bank activities. The word bank activities gave “students in each achievement level a slight edge over the students in the next higher level who simply read and reread the text” (p. 671).

All three of these examples—​Judy, Kay, and Francine—​demonstrate an important principle of word study with word banks: working from the whole to the parts. In each case, the teacher began with something that was meaningful for students—​pictures, a dictated text, or simple storybooks. Children were familiar and comfortable with these wholes before the teacher focused their attention on parts—​sounds, words, or both. This balance among wholes and parts can be tricky to achieve but is well worth attaining. Too much exclusive attention to whole texts can lead children to memorize or to rely too heavily on picture cues (National Reading Panel 2000). Too much exclusive attention to words or word parts can be overly abstract and confusing for children. In whole‑to‑part instruction, children “begin with the full support of the text, but they also work with sentences, words, letters, and sounds in a way that demands close attention to print” (Johnston 1998, p. 668). This balance enables children to maximize their word learning.

Providing Reinforcement through Repeated Exposures to Words

Word banks are excellent sources for independent practice activities and word games. Since some of these activities involve children sharing word bank cards with others, the teacher may want to ask children to write their initials on the backs of their own cards. This will facilitate cleanup after the activities.

Although classified as primarily word study or concept development, many of these activities and games engage children in categorizing and sorting known words. This not only anchors the words in children’s sight vocabularies, it also helps them discover the parts of the words, useful in solving the mystery of unknown words. Indeed, categorizing, sorting, and finding similarities and differences is a very powerful learning activity (Marzano, Pickering, and Pollock 2001). Several authors have described many other word bank activities (Bear et al. 2012; Fresch and Wheaton 1997; Garton, Schoenfelder, and Skriba 1979; Hall 1981).

Word Study

• Children can sort word bank cards according to consonant or vowel sounds. The teacher can provide a key word (“Find words with the vowel sound you hear in box”), a chart can be used to organize children’s sorting (“long a, short a, other”), or the sorts can be left open for student exploration.

• Children can sort by word families (e.g., ‑it or -ate).

• Students can sort words by function (e.g., naming words, action words, describing words).

• Children can sort words according to the numbers of syllables they contain.

• Learners can find words that contain (or could contain) prefixes or suffixes.

• Students can fold pieces of paper into three columns and select word bank words that begin with different consonants (or contain different vowel sounds) for each column. Then they look through old magazines or junk mail like catalogs to find pictures of objects that match the selected sounds. These are pasted into the appropriate column.

• The teacher can ask children to find all the words in their word banks that could have -ing (or other endings) added. These can simply be shared, or children can sort the words according to a spelling rule, such as words that need a doubled consonant (e.g., hop—​hopping, bat—​batting), and words that do not (e.g., read—​reading, rain—​raining).

• Children can play Go Fish or Match (see Chapter 14) with beginning sounds, ending sounds, rhyming words, or vowel sounds. Singular and plural forms, synonyms, contracted and uncontracted forms, and other categories can also be used. ELL students can match pictures and English words or English words and words from their first languages.

• Students can practice their words with a partner occasionally as a quick warm‑up.

• A student can select two word bank words to read to a partner and then ask one or more of the following questions: Do they begin the same? Do they end the same? Do they have the same vowel sound? Do they rhyme?

• The teacher can suggest a word. Children find additional words from their word banks based on inflectional or derivational forms (e.g., rain—​rains, raining, rainy, rained, raincoat).

• Learners can play Change Over, which is like Crazy Eights. Words played must match the beginning consonant sound or medial vowel sound from the previous word. A wild card allows the player to change to a new consonant or vowel sound. The winner is the first person to use all his or her cards.

• Children can play Word War (see Chapter 14).

• Berne and Blachowicz (2009) tell of second-graders who made this game to use with their word bank words. They made a stack of “types” word cards—​e.g., words that start with B, words with three syllables, action words, and so on. One at a time, children select a “type” card and roll dice (or just one if you want the game to go faster). They then pull word bank cards that match the criteria (type and number). If a child doesn’t have enough of a particular type, play goes to the left. The player who uses all his/her cards first wins.

• One partner names a word bank word. The other partner finds a word bank word that comes before (or after) in alphabetical order.

Concept Development

• Children can sort word bank words into semantic categories, such as people words or color words. They can also look for some of these words in old magazines or in junk mail and create collages.

• Children can find words that have more than one meaning. They can also look for synonyms, antonyms, or homonyms.

• Students can make and share sentences using their word bank words.

• Children can use word bank words to make short sentences as long as possible.

• Learners can make compound words using words from their word banks. Children may want to make up and then illustrate their own compound words as well.

• Partners can use both their word banks to write a story.

• The teacher can prepare modified cloze exercises: The dog is _______ the table; I saw a _______ balloon; Tim has a _______ . Children find as many words from their word banks as possible to complete the sentences.

• Children can make riddles using their word bank words:

• • I am small.

  • I am brown.

  • I eat carrots.

  • I am a _______ .

• Students can create picture dictionaries using their word banks as a source.

• Children can find word bank words related to concepts being discussed in science or social studies. Or they can complete concept sorts, such as a seasons sort in which children find and categorize word bank words that belong with spring, summer, and so on.

• Class members can play Word Bingo. Each child lays out 9, 16, or 25 words, face up, in rows like a Bingo card. The caller says, “Turn over a word that . . .” and gives a characteristic common to some of the words. For example, a word that begins or ends like [another word], a word that has an ending, a word that tells something to do, a word that names an animal, a word that has two syllables, your shortest word, your favorite word, and so on. The winner is the first child to turn over an entire row, column, or diagonal.

Word Banks for Stories and Content Study

An alternative (or complement) to a master, ongoing word bank is a temporary one based on a story or content area study. These temporary word banks can be developed based on texts that students read or on teacher read-​alouds.

Before reading a story to students (or asking them to read it), the teacher asks students to write down or remember interesting words they encounter during the reading. After the reading, a group list is written on the board or chart paper; the teacher can add a word or two (12 to 24 words is a good number). Students then write the words on word bank grids, which are simply plain sheets of paper with one vertical line and three horizontal lines, resulting in eight rectangles (one word is written in each rectangle). They cut the grids into individual word cards, look over the words, and then put them in envelopes for storage.

Over the next several days, students can do open and closed word sorts, play word games, practice the words, and use them in their talk and writing. Before long, they learn the words, and they also practice examining the words for important word features. When most students have learned the words, a new story word bank can be developed.

Blachowicz and Obrochta (2007) studied a process they called “tweaking”—making small modifications to read-​alouds in grade 1 content area instruction to focus more on content words. Teachers looked for words within each read-​aloud text that could be used for “vocabulary visits.” Before reading, teachers asked students to list all the words they knew about the topic under study. These words were put on a poster along with the teacher-​selected vocabulary. Then the teacher showed a picture that was related to the topic and asked students to identify more related words, which were added with sticky notes. While the teacher read aloud, students used “thumbs up” when they heard a target word. After reading, students made word bank cards and did semantic word sorts with them. These small modifications enhanced students’ word learning.

These examples illustrate the versatile nature of word banks, as well as the whole‑to‑part model that supports student learning so well. Students begin with a whole text, choose and study individual words from it, and finally, through word sorts and other activities, examine the intraword features of the words. As a bonus, students learn the important notion that good writing contains interesting words.

Children learn about words and written language as they successfully encounter words, stories, and other types of texts. They learn individual words in the same manner that they learn to read, through repeated exposure in familiar, dependable contexts. Word banks show evidence of this word learning while providing fertile ground for additional learning. Word sorting activities reinforce the recognition of the words themselves. Equally important, they offer children the opportunity to generalize about sound-​related characteristics of words.