Vocabulary teaching is important

Large numbers of pupils have been identified with low levels of vocabulary (1), linked to factors such as low income, Developmental Language Disorder (DLD), English as an Additional Language (EAL) and Special Educational Needs (SEN). Oral vocabulary in young children has shown a further downward trend since the COVID lockdown (2). Vocabulary is linked to many important life outcomes, including academic attainment, behaviour, mental health and employment (3). Given the impact of vocabulary and the wide spectrum of pupils needing support, it is important to develop effective and inclusive vocabulary instruction for the mainstream classroom.

Effectiveness of vocabulary instruction

Those who attended the May 2021 Link Live conference may remember hearing about my research into vocabulary teaching with Year 1 children to examine whether vocabulary teaching could improve not only reading comprehension but also skills related to word reading.

The study compared traditional teaching of word meanings (definitions, use in a sentence, discussion) to an integrated method that also incorporated the sound structure of vocabulary (syllables, rhyme, phonemes, clear articulation). This combined sound-meaning approach originated from the field of speech and language therapy to support children with word retrieval difficulties. Research evidence suggests that this is a useful intervention strategy for pupils with vocabulary challenges throughout the primary and secondary school years (4).

Vocabulary, phonological awareness and phonics are linked

My study investigated whether focussing on both sound and meaning could also support whole class vocabulary teaching, particularly in the early school years. This would appear to be a good option because until around age 8 there is a clear relationship between children’s oral vocabulary, phonological awareness and phonic reading, coinciding with a time when their phonological skills are still developing, for example phonological awareness, speech and phonics (5).

School staff and speech and language professionals recognise the role of vocabulary in reading comprehension (6). The idea that vocabulary also influences phonemic awareness and decoding is less well recognised, although it is an area of current research interest (7). It is important for education staff to understand the reciprocal nature of vocabulary and phonological teaching to inform how we teach these skills.

The amount of vocabulary a child knows has an influence on their level of phonemic awareness and phonics. One suggested reason is that as vocabulary size increases, words need to be stored in a more segmented way (8), first in terms of larger segments (syllables and rhyme) and later as separate phonemes. So, for example if a child knows the word ‘cat’ and then learns ‘cap’, this would prompt the words to be stored separately. My study was interested in whether the sound-meaning strategy could capitalise on these relationships to jointly boost oral language and word reading skills in younger pupils, two important areas of instruction in this age group.

“The amount of vocabulary a child knows has an influence on their level of phonemic awareness and phonics.”

Research and resources

The paper, which has now been published in the Reading and Writing journal (9), provides evidence that the combined sound-meaning approach is effective for whole class teaching in younger grades/classes. The study found that teaching the sound structure and meaning of new vocabulary together delivers outcomes that are equivalent to or higher than a meaning-only approach, both for taught vocabulary and phonic reading.

The interconnected nature of vocabulary and word-level reading suggests that instruction could be carried out in a more integrated way to allow simultaneous opportunities for vocabulary and phonemic learning, particularly in younger pupils and those who struggle with language and literacy. You can read more about the study and its results in the September edition of Reading Research Recap, which provides a link to the paper and a user-friendly video summary: www.tinyurl.com/mrx4swh2

You may also find it helpful to download the free sound-meaning teaching template used in the research study: www.tinyurl.com/2s4zy5x7 Please feel free to email me directly with any comments or for further information: r.brooks@sheffield.ac.uk

References

  1. Oxford University Press. (2018). Why closing the word gap matters: Oxford language report. Oxford University Press.
  2. Bowyer-Crane, C., Bonetti, S., Compton, S., Nielsen, D., D’Apice, K., & Tracey, L. (2021). The impact of Covid-19 on school starters: interim briefing 1: Parent and school concerns about children starting school. Education Endowment Foundation.
  3. Roulstone, S., Law, J, Rush, R, Clegg, J and Peters, T. (2011). Investigating the role of language in children’s early educational outcomes. Research report DFE-RR134. Department for Education.
  4. Lowe, H., Henry, L., & Joffe, V. L. (2019). The effectiveness of classroom vocabulary intervention for adolescents with language disorder. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research, 62(8), 2829-2846. https://doi. org/10.1044/2019_JSLHR-L-18-0337
  5. Wagner, R. K., Torgesen, J. K., Rashotte, C. A., Hecht, S. A., Barker, T. A., Burgess, S. R., Donahue, J., & Garon, T. (1997). Changing relations between phonological processing abilities and word-level reading as children develop from beginning to skilled readers: A 5-year longitudinal study. Developmental Psychology, 33(3), 468-479. https://doi. org/10.1037/0012-1649.33.3.468
  6. Clarke, P. J., Snowling, M. J., Truelove, E., & Hulme, C. (2010). Ameliorating children’s reading-comprehension difficulties: A randomized controlled trial. Psychological Science, 21(8), 1106-1116. https://doi. org/10.1177/0956797610375449
  7. Wegener, S., Beyersmann, E., Wang, H., & Castles, A. (2022). Oral vocabulary knowledge and learning to read new words: A theoretical review. Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, Online first, 1–26. https://doi.org/10. 1080/19404158.2022.2097717
  8. Metsala, J. L., & Walley, A. C. (1998). Spoken vocabulary growth and the segmental restructuring of lexical representations: Precursors to phonemic awareness and early reading ability. In J. Metsala & L. Ehri (Eds.), Word recognition in beginning literacy (pp. 89- 120). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
  9. Brooks, R., Warmington, M., & Thomson, J. (2024). Evaluating the impact of vocabulary instruction on oral vocabulary, phonemic awareness and nonword reading. Reading & Writing. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-024- 10564-1
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