Language Arts - Grade 3 TEKS 3.8A - Developing an Extensive Vocabulary by Rachel Bean

Category:  Language Arts
Grade Level:  3rd Grade
Objective: 

Language Arts TEKS 3.8A  Reading/vocabulary development.
The student develops an extensive vocabulary.  The student is expected to develop vocabulary by listening to and discussing both familiar and conceptually challenging selections read aloud.

Music TEKS 3.4B  Creative expression/performance.
The student creates and arranges music within specified guidelines.  The student is expected to create rhythmic phrases.

Behavioral Objective:
The student will develop vocabulary words from the poem Bicycles and be able to form a musical rhythm to a phrase from the poem.

Materials: 
Dry-erase board, five 5x7 index cards, five thesauruses, five dictionaries, dry-erase markers, and three types of non-tuned instruments.

Book: Around the World in Eighty Poems
By: James Berry     Illustrated by: Katherine Lucas
Published by: Chronicle Books in 2002
Bicycles (p. 46)

Activities: 
Students will listen to the poem read aloud.  Then have the student divide into five groups.  Handout the 5x7 cards to each group.  A phrase from the poem should already be written on the cards.  The students will choose a word from that phrase to act out and develop the meaning.  The students will then share their dramatizations.  Then have the children look up a word in their phrase that may be unfamiliar or challenging to them.  Have them share what they found.  Choose one of the words that they came up with and write it on the dry-erase board.  An example of a word they may come up with is petrified.  Ask them what this word means and where they could look if they did not know what it meant.  They may say, for example, dictionaries and thesauruses. 

Hand out a dictionary and a thesaurus to each group.  Have the students look up the word that was chosen (petrified) in the dictionary to confirm the meaning.  Then ask them to look up a synonym of that word.  This will develop the students' vocabulary through words that are familiar to them and unfamiliar, as well.  Have them share with the class the synonym they found.  For example, the word chosen was petrified; a synonym for petrified can be fear.  Next, choose a group's synonym.  Then have each group come up with a rhyming word for that synonym.  For instance, the synonym was fear and a rhyming word would be hear.  Share with the class one group's synonym.  Have the class come up with a sentence using the two rhyming words that were chosen.  For example, "We fear to hear," or "fearing and hearing."  Write the words on the board: fear, petrified, and fearing and hearing.  These will be the vocabulary words that the students developed from the poem, but not directly from it.

Process:

• Say the words as a an entire group.

• Re-divide the class into three groups.

• Have group #1 practice saying the one beat word.  Example:  Fear, fear, fear.

• Then move to group #2, and practice saying: fearing and hearing, fearing and hearing, fearing and hearing.

• Have group #3 practice saying: pe_ _ trified, pe _ _ trified, pe _ _ trified.

• Add body percussion to the words; start with a steady beat (one syllable word).

• Drop the words and have body percussion alone.

• Have each group choose a type of non-tuned instrument.  Make sure each group has a different type.

• Add instruments to the beat of the words and phrases, while saying the words at the same time.

• Then leave off the words and just have the beats with the non-tuned instruments.

• Once everyone is comfortable with his or her parts, add the chant rhythm.

	Beat 1	Beat 2	Beat 3	Beat 4
High = snap = triangle	pe			trified
Middle = clap = guiro	fear	ing   and	hear	ing
Low = pat = drum	fear	fear	fear	fear

Evaluation: 
Observe the students developing a meaning of a word that is unfamiliar to them by acting it out.  The students will be responsible for coming up with a challenging word from the selection and a synonym for that word.  Observe the students in brainstorming a synonym for the challenging word.  Observe that the students are able to come up with a meaning to their challenging word and a synonym for it using dictionaries and thesauruses.  As well as knowing how to use the dictionary and thesaurus, the students should be developing their vocabulary by exploring new words.  The students will be responsible for creating a sound piece in their small groups.  Observe the students creating a rhythmic phrase out of the selected words.