As children read less and fail to build up a vocabulary, the author of a new book says in an interview the vocabulary deficit is a worrying trend that threatens confidence, future job prospects, relationships, and even the ability to understand jokes.
"Every child should have a dictionary. Just by looking up a new word, the process mentally glues it into the memory. Words are slippery customers – you need a definition and understanding of the various contexts it might be used in," asserts literacy and child development specialist Professor Tom Nicholson in an interview.
He cautions,"If you want your child to be successful at school across all subjects, then building a good vocabulary is critical. In this increasingly technological world, we don't have the same opportunity to build vocabulary. Reading is seen as boring and useless. Parents are the last bastion of defence against this peer culture where kids don't see the need to build vocabulary."
Nicholson is the co-author of Teaching Reading Vocabulary which has just been published by the New Zealand Council for Educational Research (NZCER). Nicholson is a professor of education at Massey University, Auckland, who specialises in teacher education, literacy and child development. He also directs a reading clinic for struggling readers. The other author is Sue Dymock, a senior lecturer in education at the University of Waikato and Director of the Hamilton Children’s Reading Centre.
Teaching Reading Vocabulary presents five research-based vocabulary strategies that every student can use: making use of context clues when reading; breaking words into meaningful parts and understanding the structure of the English language; creating vocabulary concept maps; exploring the multiple meaning of words and figurative language; and searching the dictionary and thesaurus to build knowledge of meanings, synonyms, antonyms and word origins. The book is priced at NZ$37.60.
Says Nicholson, "It is not clear why many adults and students lack the enthusiasm for reading. It may be that reading is seen as seen as wasting time when they could be doing something more productive." Whatever be the reason for not wanting to read, New Zealand research suggests that students are definitely becoming less enthusiastic about reading.
He refers to a 2008 National Education Monitoring Project which suggested that the reading habits of the young are showing a downward trend. "In 2008, only 21 percent of year-four and 20 percent of year-eight pupils ranked reading as one of their top three leisure activities. This was a 10 percent drop from the same survey in 2000."
The educator feels children should not only be encouraged to read more, but also to use a dictionary and a thesaurus. While these might seem old-fashioned tools in the minds of today's electronic generation, he says, "The dictionary and the thesaurus are highly under-used ways of improving children's vocabulary. Together, they are the 'holy grail' of vocabulary learning. They are both a gold mine of information but they are very different."
He explains why children often find it hard to make friends with these resources. "One reason why we think it is so important (for teachers and parents) to get students excited about the dictionary and the thesaurus is that many pupils do not seem to like using them, even though these resources are often available in class. They are available, but the problem is that they are usually sitting in a corner, ignored, like wall flowers at a dance," says Nicholson.
Nicholson outlines a few criteria for teachers and parents to buy a good dictionary for their children:
- Does the dictionary have clear, easy-to-read print?
- Does the dictionary give the part of speech of the word?
- Does the dictionary have a pronunciation guide?
- Does the dictionary give a definition?
- Does the dictionary give the origin of the word; that is, what language it comes from?
- Does the dictionary give an illustrative context that shows how the word is used in a sentence?
- Does the dictionary show other words that come from this word?
- Does the dictionary give similar words with the same meaning; that is, some synonyms?
He points out, "Some school dictionaries meet this criteria, but they may not use all the criteria for each word."
The literacy specialist maintains, "It is one thing to look up the meaning of a word in a dicitonary; it is quite another to know how to use it in a sentence. The good thing about reading is that if you come to a new word while reading, it is in a context and you can use contextual clues. Using both contextual clues and the dictionary are a powerful way to get a full understanding of unfamiliar words.
But can vocabulary increase without reading books? Nicholson answers, "Obviously, yes. Just watching television or movies can sometimes have you reaching for a dictionary, for example, when the weather forecaster says that the next few days will be salubrious (that is, favourable), or when a character in a movie says that she is discombobulated (that is, confused)."
He refers to a 1988 study which analysed the type of words found in printed text, television texts and adult speech. The researchers had found that students are 50 percent more likely to learn new words by reading rather than by listening to adults or by watching television/movies.
And reading has other plus points too. "These benefits include not just increased vocabulary, but also fluency, general knowledge, verbal skills and comprehension."
Nicholson also explains the value of rich context clues in text. "Reading is a good way to learn new words because writers are very often considerate to their readers in terms of helping them to work out the meanings of words. When we come across a new word in a text, it is often in an appropriate context and there are often other clues in the text that are provided by the author to help the reader work out the meaning of the word."
He says it is the resistance to reading and learning new words that teachers and parents need to actively combat by encouraging young readers to consider the dictionary and thesaurus as "their best friends." Parents can do this by making sure their child actually has a dictionary and by modelling use of it in everyday life, such as when they hear an unknown word on television, radio or in a conversation.
“Possessing a good vocabulary enables and empowers people of all ages to be understood in social, educational and work situations. It would stop a lot of fights in the playground and in life if people had the ability to express themselves with words more competently," he says.
Nicholson-Dymock's book contains free-to-copy worksheets that will help students practise their vocabulary skills and also build their knowledge of the structure of the English language. "The activities are not busy work. They are designed to give students an awareness of what the dictionary and thesaurus can do; that is, how they can strengthen their knowledge of words and expand their capacity to express themselves orally or in writing."
