Teaching Reading: A Balanced Approach for Today's Classrooms

Pamela Farris, Northern Illinois University
Carol Fuhler, Iowa State University
Maria Walther

Vocabulary Instruction in a Balanced Literacy Program

True or False


1	Blanchowicz and Fisher (2000), after numerous reviews of research studies, suggest four guiding principles for teaching vocabulary acquisition. These four principles place responsibility for learning on the teacher.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


2	The average first grader can be expected to know between 1,000 and 2,000 words.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


3	When choosing which vocabulary to directly instruct to students, teachers must consider whether students could use contextual skills or structural analysis to understand the word.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


4	When engaging in word webbing, it is important to have students work independently.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


5	It is best to directly instruct students in structural analysis techniques.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


6	Students who are "word conscious" may find that it impedes their writing flow because they are so conscious of the impact of using the appropriate word.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


7	Homonyms are words that sound the same, but are spelled differently--e.g., hole and whole.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


8	The final stage in Graves' (1987) stages of learning words is to classify and enrich the meaning of known words.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


9	Students who participate in wide reading will not need any other vocabulary instruction.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.


10	A strong reason to teach students to use contextual clues to comprehend words is that there is not enough time to directly instruct students in so much vocabulary.
		A)	True.
		B)	False.

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