1. Nonlinguistic Representations
Although the name of this strategy may sound complex, the strategy really is not. Vocabulary terms are often difficult because of their abstractness, therefore, it may help your child if they can relate to the word in several different ways. A nonlinguistic representation can be made by simply folding a piece of paper into four equal squares. In the top left square, you will write the vocabulary word. In the top right square, you will create a visual representation, which is a picture that you can use to jog your memory of the word's definition. In the bottom left square, you will write out the definition of the word. Finally, in the bottom right square, you will list or draw something that you can associate with the particular vocabulary word. Please refer to the example that I have provided on the right using the word "centimeter."
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2. Do you know it or not?
The first thing you may want to do with a list of vocabulary words, or mathematical terms, is to see which ones your child is familiar with. It may save a lot of your time by identifying the words that your child is not so familiar with to work on rather than laboring through an entire list of words. You want to start by creating a chart on a piece of paper that has three columns labeled, "know it," "sort of know it," and "don't know it." For the words in the "know it" column, ask them to explain the definitions of the words. For the words in the "sort of know it" column, ask them to make a guess at what they think the word means. Having this handy will help you to know which words to focus on.
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3. Structural Analysis
Often times, larger words can be broken down into their smaller counter parts in order to comprehend the overall meaning. Take for instance the example displayed on the right. The metric system uses words such as centimeter, millimeter, and kilometer that can be broken down into two parts, which allows for a much simpler comprehension. As you can see, the word centimeter breaks down into "cent" and "meter." "Cent" means one hundredth, therefore, centimeter means one hundredth of a meter. This can also be referred to as "chunking" a word.
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4. Pre-teaching
Before you help your child get started on their math homework, try to work with them to identify some key vocabulary words that they will need to understand in order to complete their assignment successfully. Once you have identified these words, it is important for you to not only tell your child the definition, but also to discuss its meaning. A brief discussion on each word will allow you to gauge how comfortable your child is with the particular word.
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5. Vocabulary Notebook
Help your child keep a vocabulary notebook. Within this notebook, allow your child to put down anything that they need to help them understand and apply the meaning of the word. They can put down the definition, along with examples, pictures, associations and more. Leave room between words so that your child can add ideas as they discover them. This will give your child something to refer to as they complete an assignment or give them something physical to study when they are preparing for a quiz or test.
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