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4. Teaching Self-Regulation Skills
– Implement metacognitive strategies like self-monitoring checklists and mindfulness exercises to enhance inhibitory control and emotional regulation.

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Increased Prevalence:
Studies indicate a higher rate of both ADHD and Autism diagnoses among deaf and hard of hearing children compared to the general population.

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In the realm of special education there is a significant shortage of teachers who are proficient in serving the needs of students who are deaf or hard of hearing (DHH). This scarcity not only compromises the quality of education for DHH students but also highlights systemic challenges within the educational landscape.

Causes of the Shortage:

1. Lack of Specialized Training Programs: One of the primary factors contributing to the shortage of DHH teachers is the absence of specialized training programs. Teaching DHH students requires unique skills and knowledge in areas such as sign language, auditory rehabilitation, and assistive technology. However, many teacher preparation programs have closed their doors to Deaf and Hard of Hearing Education majors at both undergraduate and graduate levels.

2. Low Retention Rates: Retention rates among DHH teachers are disproportionately low compared to those of teachers in other specialties. The challenging nature of the work, coupled with inadequate support and resources, often leads to burnout and disillusionment among DHH educators. Without effective strategies to support and retain DHH teachers, the shortage will continue to persist.

3. Limited Career Opportunities: Another contributing factor to the shortage is the limited career advancement opportunities available to DHH teachers. Many educational institutions do not provide pathways for DHH teachers to advance into leadership roles or pursue specialized areas of expertise.

4. Retirement Rates: Employment demographics indicate that baby-boomers made up approximately 40% of the labor market in 2008 with retirements between 2010 and 2020 expected to be the largest since WWII (Aaronson & Meckel, 2008). With the lack of teacher preparation programs, we have a high demand and low supply creating major concerns in the field of deaf education.

Concerns:

• The newly developed “quick fix” programs do not adequately address the specialized training needs for Teachers of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (TODHH), leaving aspiring educators ill-equipped to teach DHH students effectively.
• States are forced to hire teachers who do not have a background in deaf education, and have no choice but to provide emergency certification, in order to meet the minimum requirements of IDEA. Because TODHHs require a unique set of skills in order to teach students with hearing loss, the quality of deaf education is lacking.
• Programming for students with hearing loss may have an inadequate framework and service times may not meet the needs of the child with hearing loss.

Strategies for Addressing the Shortage:

1. Expand Specialized Training Programs: To address the shortage of DHH teachers, there is a need to expand and enhance specialized training programs. This includes incorporating coursework on sign language, deaf culture, and instructional strategies tailored to the needs of DHH students into teacher preparation programs.

2. Additionally, creating incentives such as scholarships or loan forgiveness programs for aspiring DHH teachers can help attract more individuals to the field.

3. Improve Support and Resources: Providing adequate support and resources is essential for retaining DHH teachers. This includes access to professional development opportunities, mentorship programs, and assistive technologies that enhance teaching effectiveness. By investing in the professional growth and well-being of DHH educators, educational institutions can improve retention rates and create a more sustainable workforce.

4. Foster Career Advancement Opportunities: Educational institutions should prioritize creating pathways for career advancement for DHH teachers. This can include opportunities for leadership roles, specialized certifications, and funding for advanced education and training. “Critical Need” pay for teachers who are in the field of deaf education, as well as recognizing and rewarding the expertise of DHH educators, institutions can incentivize talented individuals to remain in the field and contribute to its growth and development.

5. What to Do in the Meantime? Travel time for itinerant teaching positions can be quite daunting, often decreasing the level of service times that can be offered to students for hearing support services. Offering virtual services, while not always the preferred method of direct services, can be a temporary solution, as the TODHH can offer direct service times that are appropriate to meet the needs of the student and carry more students on their caseloads. 

“Grow your own” type of educational programs using the journeyman approach, can be an effective alternative, while providing on the job training to supplement coursework at the university level. 

The shortage of DHH teachers represents a significant challenge within the education system that requires urgent attention and concerted action. Prioritizing the root causes of the shortage and implementing critical strategies to attract, support, and retain DHH educators, we can create a more inclusive and equitable learning environment for all students. It is imperative that policymakers, educational institutions, and stakeholders collaborate to ensure that every DHH student has access to qualified and dedicated teachers who can support their academic and personal growth. 

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Developing written language is a skill that requires a strong language base.  Like literacy-based skills, language and vocabulary are necessary for developing written language.  Students who are deaf and hard of hearing will require explicit instruction in reading and writing.  These two skills don’t progress independently of one another, but rather in a synchronous manner.  We know from research that there are five major components to literacy skill development.  Phonological awareness, alphabetic principles, vocabulary, fluency and comprehension are all intertwined to formulate a strong foundation for literacy.  As such, written language is based on a student’s language development.  Commonly, students with hearing loss will make the same errors in writing as they do in expressive language.  This is why it’s important to teach these skills simultaneously.  Typically, limited vocabulary, errors in syntax and semantics, and spelling errors make writing difficult for students with hearing loss. 

Listening to spoken language helps children determine proper semantics, syntax, and grammatical features of language.  This carries over into their writing, as they tend to write the way they have learned to communicate.  For students with hearing loss, the natural progression of skill development based on auditory features in language development, isn’t naturally acquired.  It has to be explicitly taught.   Teaching children about subject-verb agreement, spelling, sounding out words, semantics and syntax of written language all need to be explicitly taught. Students with hearing loss may make mistakes such as omitting possessives, omitting articles (a, an, the), run on sentences, repetitive use of vocabulary, punctuation errors and limited use of vocabulary.  In order to help students develop their written expression skills teachers and speech pathologists can use a variety of techniques to help their students with hearing loss.  Use of graphic organizers, teaching mechanics of writing, syntax of writing, parts of speech, sentence organization, rearranging words in a sentence to make the sentence more succinct, and expanding vocabulary are all ways to help students develop written language.  

Kristin DiPerri developed a course for Supporting Success addressing written language.  She states that students with hearing loss need to learn how to write through a sequence of instruction that is linguistically, conceptually, and developmentally appropriate for their needs. Unlike hearing children, some students with hearing loss do not have a first-grade language fully established PRIOR to Kindergarten.  Therefore, we have to teach language while we are teaching writing skills.  There must be a system or organized logical progression of instruction.  Providing opportunities for students to write independently is recommended in order to help students gauge progress in written expression.  It also helps teachers identify errors that need to be addressed in explicit targeted instruction. 

Author: Michelle Andros, MSEd

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Language is learned through exposure. Children pick up words that they hear (or signs that they see) in their environment as adults are communicating with one another. Approximately 80% of new words are learned by overhearing. For a child with hearing loss, there is a smaller listening bubble meaning that they have to be closer (or much, much closer) to the talker before they will be able to detect and/or comfortably hear what is being said. To develop spoken language, a child must be able to hear speech clearly and also hear themselves (auditory feedback loop). Children with very limited hearing or those who are hard of hearing but do not (consistently) wear amplification will not be able to develop language and speech at the same rate as age peers.

Brief Summary of Language and Speech Development

Communication options overview:
Ways to Communicate with a Child with Hearing Loss  Describes what communication choices or communication options means and provides a short summary and resource links. Brief information is provided on each of the communication choices as follows:

• American Sign Language (ASL)
• Cued Speech
• Signing Exact English
• Combined Communication Strategies
• Auditory Oral
• Auditory Verbal

VIDEO: I am Not a Stranger: A Deaf Child’s View of Growing Up in a Hearing Family. This video shows the perspective of a child who is deaf in a family with hearing parents. It includes three communication modalities in varying family scenarios.

Public Service Video on Communication Development in Early Childhood

Language is Caught, Not Taught (handout shown above)

Language Unlocks Learning handout

CID QUICK TIPS VIDEO –

Eliciting Language Using Sabotage

Why is it critical to check hearing for all children with speech/language delays?

An infant begins to communicate with his/her environment from the first months of life. However, true words do not appear until the age of 12-15 months, following a rather predictable sequence. Delay or failure of normal language development is not a rare situation in childhood and may be due to a variety of reasons. Among these, hearing undoubtedly plays a leading part in the language acquisition process. In a 2001 study, 654 apparently healthy speech-language delayed children underwent a thorough audiological assessment for determination of their hearing thresholds. Eighty-seven children (13.3%) showed various degrees of hearing loss. Most of them (55 children,

8.4%) suffered from sensorineural hearing impairment, while in 32 children (4.9%) a conductive hearing loss was discovered. The increased prevalence of hearing impairment found in this population

mandates a thorough hearing evaluation for every case of speech-language delay, even for those children who show no evidence of other handicaps. This will help in the early diagnosis of hearing loss, allowing proper management to be instituted as early as possible.

Psarommatis, IM, Goritsa, E., Douniadakis, D., Tsakanikos, M., Kontrogianni, AD., Apostolopoulous, N., (2001) Hearing Loss in speech-language delayed children. Int. J. Pediatr. Otorhinolaryngol, May 11; 58(3): 205-10.

Abstract.

Sound Foundation for Babies and Toddlers
Cochlear Corporation has a suite of resources to assist with listening and language development from birth to 6 years of age. Free download! The Sound Foundation resources, by Nancy Caleffe-Schenck, offer week by week activities that can be shared with families as a recommended website, or to augment activities discussed during early intervention. Each week includes a video tutorial and attention specific to audition, receptive/expressive language, speech, songs, rhymes, etc.

Materials developed at the Franklin Porter Graham Child Development Institute:

http://mtbt.fpg.unc.edu/more-baby-talk

Download

10 Ways to Promote the Language & Communication in Infants & Toddlers

The post Language and Speech Development Issues first appeared on Supporting Success For Children With Hearing Loss.

• The ability to read empowers success!
• Readers come from readers – those children whose parents themselves read and made a habit of reading daily to their child/children, have a higher interest in reading.
• Better reading ability leads to higher education which can be tied to longer life.
• The inability to read costs – from high school drop-out rates, to colleges that have to offer remedial reading courses, to lower paying jobs, to having fewer people in the workforce.

The ability to read is empowerment; it is self-confidence; and above all, it is independence.  Children begin their appreciation for books and stories in the arms of their parents and caregivers. By the time children are school-aged, the love of hearing/seeing stories read in the home is transferred to the classroom. It makes our job of teaching so much easier.

But for students with hearing loss, listening to stories sometimes takes more time and effort—more effort to hear and see, to process, and finally to comprehend the information presented.  It is of equal importance that we expend the time and effort to make hearing, seeing, processing, and comprehending a bit less difficult. To accomplish this:

Do

• Familiarize yourself with the book before you read it to the child/group.
• Read aloud/sign the title, author’s name, and illustrator’s name every time you read no matter how many times you read the same book.
• Tell the child/group something about the writer and illustrator.
• Take note of the text elements and adjust the emotional register of your voice/signs/body language to accompany the feelings of the characters or the intensity of the plot.

Don’t

• Make every page in the book a time to quiz the child/group.
• Read too fast.
• Feel like every book has to be tied to the curriculum.
• Use reading as a punishment.

How can you critique and/or improve your read-aloud skill?

Check your reading rate of speech:  You will need a timer, a book of choice, and a computer with access to a speech to text feature such as Google documents. Open a blank document, enable the speech-to-text feature, start your timer for 1 minute, and start reading at your normal rate of speech.  When 1 minute is up, stop reading, and check the word count.  I did this recently, and found that I read at 160 wpm.  Adults talk at approximately 200 words per minute, but most children only process about 125 words per minute.  It took me a few tries to get my word count down to 125 words per minute.  The slowest I felt comfortable reading was around 140 words per minute. I now know, like most adults, I need to slow down my read-aloud rate.

Check your enunciation: The speech-to-text feature is also a great tool if you want to check whether you are enunciating words properly. In Texas, we have a tendency to runallourwordstogether.  Making a conscious effort to enunciate words properly, especially target words and phrases, is difficult but it can be done.

Check your body language or signing from the viewpoint of the child/group:  Video record yourself reading and/or signing a book.  It’s best if you can record yourself at the natural time you read to your students.  Check your posture, the gestures you use, the sentence structure and signs you use.  Turn the sound down and watch the recording. Does the story flow? Are the signs correct?  Does your body language match the tone of the story? See principles of reading to Deaf children in ASL.

Check your engagement level:  With proper permission, record yourself reading to your class or student so their reactions can be seen on the video.  Are they interested? Are they engaged?  Can they hear/see you? How many times are you stopping to quiz the audience?  What kinds of questions are the students posing?  How many times are you interrupted?  An alternative to recording yourself is to ask a trusted colleague to observe you and give positive and constructive feedback. Have a short list of behaviors for the observer to focus upon.

Telling stories is an art.  With practice it can be done well.  When you think about it, there is a story waiting to be told in every subject area. Reading aloud doesn’t have to be confined to English Language Arts class.  Stories of discovery and invention in science and math, stories of victory and loss in history and sports, stories of imagination and perspective in art, stories of overcoming the odds despite disability, race, gender, and society norms – the list is endless.

I like to close my student sessions with  a story just for fun, allowing the student to choose the book from three or four I’ve brought along.  Most of the time, it’s a positive end to our time and the books are remembered well when/if  they are read again. Whatever the age of the students you serve, I encourage you to read-aloud to them.

Sources:

• Trelease, J. (2013). The read aloud handbook (7^th). Penguin Books.
• Cole, E.B. & Flexer, C. (2016). Children with hearing loss: developing listening and talking. Plural Publishing.
• Hart, B. & Risely, T.R. (1995). Meaningful differences in the everyday experience of young American children. Brookes Publishing.

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Did you know…?

• Approximately 60% of English words are of Greek or Latin origin
• Twenty prefixes make up 97% of prefixed words in printed school English, and just four of those (un-, re-, in-, dis-) make up the first 58%
• Words with inflectional endings (plurals, possessives, s-v agreement, tense markers) account for most words students see/read
• By middle school, a student needs to have learned approximately 9,000 word families to comprehend academic reading texts

The ability to manipulate and analyze words is a critical skill for reading success. As teachers, we know that. A vocabulary goal is likely written into many IEPs. Whether signed, spoken, or both, word knowledge is what sets apart good readers.  However, the task of learning the number of words being used each week is daunting for a student with language delays.  In addition, a teacher can feel completely overwhelmed by the expansive number of words she is required to teach that student, knowing those language delays are present. Using time wisely is imperative and prioritizing which words and word parts are of the most importance becomes crucial.

Where to begin? I found myself beginning by choosing the most obscure words in a text, thinking that they needed the most emphasis. Now I know this was not the best way to go about teaching vocabulary. A better way for teachers to use their time and skill is to teach the highest frequency words and word parts first.  For example, since the prefixes un-, re-in-, and dis- make up roughly 58% of all prefixed words, this is a great place to start. With inflectional endings such as plurals and possessives making up most of the words students see and read, they are another great place to begin.

As for word lists of the most commonly used content area vocabulary, https://lead4ward.com/resources/ is very helpful and provides lists by grade. I am also excited that Supporting Success has added two new resources for effective vocabulary instruction: Academic Vocabulary for Middle School Students by Greene and Coxhead, and the Vocabulary Handbook, by Diamond and Gutlohn. Each book includes excellent research-based lists for content areas and strategies for teaching the words our students really need to know to comprehend increasingly complex subject matter. Need help knowing exactly where to start? The Academic Vocabulary book includes a free downloadable Vocabulary Size Test to use with your students. The Vocabulary Handbook includes a pre/post-test for students to test their knowledge.

Another great resource for vocabulary instruction is Latin and Greek Roots, by Stokes. If you like hands on activities, Latin and Greek Roots has multiple activities using minimal preparation and common objects. Here you will find a fun way to teach words and word analysis.  What are you waiting for?  Seize the day!

Resources:

• Easterbrooks, S.R. & Beal-Alvarez, J. (2013). Literacy Instruction for Students who are Deaf and Hard of Hearing. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Greene, J.W. & Coxhead, A. (2015). Academic Vocabulary for Middle School Students: Research-based Lists & Strategies for Key Content Areas. Baltimore, Maryland: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., Inc.
• Diamond, L. & Gutlohn, L. (2019). Vocabulary Handbook. Baltimore, Maryland: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., Inc.
• Stokes, P.D. (2012). Latin and Greek Roots: Teaching Vocabulary Using Hands-on Activities and Common Objects. Austin, Texas: PRO-ED, Inc.

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Students with hearing loss, whether hard of hearing or deaf, are at high risk for deficits in syntax due to their imperfect perception of the English language. Word endings, tense, and other grammatical features are often lost when these ‘bits and pieces’ are not perceived. Extra direct instruction in grammar and syntax is usually necessary for students with hearing loss, as their missing bits often result in poorer comprehension – whether of conversation or the written word. These deficits can be glaring when a student turns in a written assignment.

The challenge: Effectively teaching grammar and syntax is a daunting task. Hearing peers largely absorb correct syntax through listening alone and have a good handle on it as they begin to develop reading skills. As early as kindergarten, typical students following the general education curriculum should be able to (with adult assistance) speak/sign, read, and write a grammatically correct sentence as simple as “I like pizza.” to as complex as “My brother rides his red bike around the park after school.” By the fourth grade, typical students should be able to speak, read, and write sentences as simple as “I like pepperoni pizza from Pizza Hut.” to as complex as “Jason, Kim and I rode in my mother’s dark blue Suburban to the movies on Friday night where we saw three of the most popular students in our school.”  By middle school, typical students are responsible for the intricate content of novels. They are often given a prompt or topic as a writing assignment and a few ideas at which point they are on their own to generate the rest. Where typically hearing and developing students gradually absorb syntax with minimal extra instruction, students with hearing loss often have to work hard to keep up with this rate and complexity of typical development.

What we need to know about syntax skills whether students use spoken language or a sign system:

• Can the student speak/sign a sentence with a subject and a verb?
• Use tense markers?
• Use singular and plural forms? Many times, the /s/ on the end of plural words is not heard. The same can hold true for the possessive ‘s. If the student uses ASL, plural is shown by repeating the sign, such as CHAIR-CHAIR-CHAIR for “chairs”
• Use articles and determiners? (the, a, that, this, etc.).
• Are there any descriptive words being used? Prepositions?
• For ASL users, is the student using classifiers? Nonmanual markers?

Assessment: As with other areas of instruction, it always helps to start with the basics – identifying the student’s challenges. As part of a functional assessment for syntax, taking language samples is a great way to take inventory of what a student knows. Use a smart phone to record a student as you read a book together or discuss a topic. Try to obtain about 50 utterances, which may take more than one session with some students. After doing recorded language samples several times, you will begin to feel adept at listening and looking for patterns in the student’s language. Other assessment methods are provided as follows.

Does the language make sense? (Is it sequential?)

When language samples have been analyzed, gaps can be determined as can targets for instruction.  Whatever your method for obtaining data whether it is language sampling, formal tests, or functional assessments suggested below, syntax is an important piece of the reading and  comprehension puzzle and must be assessed!

Other tools for gathering functional data:

Test of Grammatical Structures (TAGS)   PRESCHOOL and ABOVE

Part of the Preschool Language Pack, the CID Teacher Assessment of Grammatical Structures (TAGS) is a series of three rating forms developed to evaluate a child’s understanding and use of the grammatical structures of English. The rating forms provide a representation of grammatical structures for children with hearing loss who develop grammatical structures in smaller increments and at slower rates compared to children who are typically developing. This starter kit is a guide to using the CID TAGS system for teaching and tracking receptive and expressive language development in oral children who are deaf and hard of hearing. It can also be used to evaluate sentence structure for children who use sign language. The TAGS rating forms enable teachers to:

• determine present levels of syntax skills
• determine syntax goals for IEPs and lessons
• track syntax development over time and
• report syntax progress to parents and other professionals

Grammar Chipper Chat     GRADE K-5

These materials allow you to explore 16 of the grammatical structures found on most language assessments (i.e., CELF, TOLD). Each grammar area has 20-30 color-coded question cards with a sentence prompt on one side and images on the reverse side. The student fills in the missing word on the question side using the pictures as cues. A functional assessment can be performed using these cards. A subset of cards in each of the 16 areas (i.e 3-4 cards) can be shuffled together and presented in random order to the student. Additional cards can be presented in the areas in which there are errors to verify that there is a lack of functional use (up to 10 cards per problematic area). Refer to Brown’s Stages to assess or intervene in sequence of development. A valuable means to pinpoint issues and monitor progress in syntax learning.

Cracking the Grammar Code  GRADE 5 – ADULT
Within the 149-page FREE downloadable  Syntax Skill Pretests and Simple Skill Activities
sample book, there are pretests teachers can use to identify students’ skill levels. Each pretest has a rubric to diagnose specific skills in the broader category. The pretests and answer keys are provided for the following syntax skill areas: Nouns, Articles, Conjunctions, Verbs, Pronouns, Adjectives-Adverbs-Prepositional Phrases, Finding the Subject, and Subject-Verb agreement. A passing score is 80% on any of these functional assessments. If your student does not pass various parts of the pretest the specific lesson to start on within the Cracking the Grammar Code workbooks is provided.

Download the Free Syntax Skill Pretest book and start assessing your students ASAP!

Formal, norm-referenced testing

There are a number of test instruments typically administered by speech language pathologists that will assess a student’s level of syntax development. If a student has received an evaluation by a speech language pathologist in the previous 6 months it is often useful to review those results for insights into specific areas of syntax deficit that have already been identified.

Teachers of the deaf/hard of hearing often perform assessments related to students’ listening comprehension ability, specifically the ability to recall and understand information presented by others. Two popular assessments for this purpose also provide some information about student syntactic understanding or use. While not an extensive investigation into syntax, if a TDHH is performing one of these tests anyway, it may provide a starting place to focus additional syntax assessment, for example with the Cracking the Grammar Code free syntax skill pretest book.

Oral Passage Understanding Scale (OPUS)

For ages 5.0 to 21 years, the Oral Passage Understanding Scale is a measure of listening (auditory) comprehension. It evaluates a person’s ability to listen to passages that are read aloud and recall information about them. This ability is key to success in the classroom and social situations. It also measures memory skills, which are integral to listening comprehension. OPUS identifies how well a person can integrate and apply knowledge in three structural categories of language:

1. 1. Lexical/Semantic: knowledge and use of words and word combinations
2. 2. Syntactic: knowledge and use of grammar
3. 3. Supralinguistic: knowledge and use of language in which meaning is not directly available from the surface lexical and syntactic information.

Measuring higher-level comprehension skills, including inference and prediction, yields more detailed information beyond simply whether or not the individual can comprehend. These skills require deeper processing abilities.

Test of Narrative Language-2 (TNL2)

For ages 4.0 – 15-11, the TNL2 provides a format that shortcuts the typical lengthy language sample analysis process. No transcription is necessary. Children’s answers to the comprehension questions and their stories can be reliably scored from audio recordings (use your Smart Phone!). The instructions are scripted and clear examples are used for scoring. The TNL should be of great benefit in identifying students who have adequate language, but issues using their language ability for ongoing interactions in an age-appropriate manner.

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Various factors come into play when pre-teaching vocabulary is identified as an accommodation and/or specialized instruction.  Pre-teaching vocabulary requires close collaboration with classroom teachers. Lesson plans may be difficult to obtain, finding signs for many specialized topics can be a challenge, and time limitations make deciding which vocabulary is the most important to teach is equally challenging.

Teachers of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing must have curriculum expertise for multiple grade levels, including staying abreast of the words and concepts being taught. One resource created by Texas educators is https://www.lead4ward.com. Concepts and vocabulary introduced in each grade, along with previous concepts to be mastered are included for all core subject areas from kindergarten to high school. This academic vocabulary can be extremely helpful in planning your pre-instruction.

Tips for vocabulary instruction:

1. Scaffolding– Learning the meaning of a new word may be more effectively taught when students can relate new words to prior knowledge. Effective teachers relate new vocabulary to what a child is likely to already know rather than to a dictionary or glossary definition. For example, when teaching the word ‘severe,’ the student may learn it better when it is related to a personal experience (e.g. a severe injury) than to a story about the weather. For some students with hearing loss, teaching the word injury will be required while learning the word severe.

2. Explicit Instruction – Put away your assumptions about what you think the student knows and teach to be sure the student can say/sign the word, recognize it in print and in visual representation, discuss the word’s multiple meanings, and use it in its various contexts.

3. Discussion – For deeper understanding, discussion is paramount. The term “discussion” is not to be confused with “questioning.” Discussion, in a group setting, involves questions or comments going from student-to-student with the teacher acting as a facilitator where questioning usually goes from teacher-to-student, back to teacher, and then to another student, with content being more strictly controlled by the teacher. Discuss:

a. the definition
b. multiple meanings
c. produce synonyms and antonyms
d. practice using the word in reading and writing, and
e. provide examples and non-examples of appropriate use of the word.

4. Visual/graphic organizers– Visual/graphic organizers show relationships between words and make information easier to manage. Our students need to be able to identify attributes and categorize words in various ways.

Some types of visual organizers include Venn diagrams, flow charts, KWL charts, sequential organizers, semantic maps, and graphs.  Without word organization, students end up with a “laundry basket” of new words rather than a file cabinet. And isn’t it easier to retrieve something from a file cabinet than a laundry basket?

5. Repetition, repetition, repetition – Repetition is necessary for students to master vocabulary words. Along with repeated exposure, seeing and using a new word or phrase across content areas and activities will help deepen word knowledge. Up to 12 exposures may be necessary to develop deep understanding of a new word, and students who struggle with reading may need additional opportunities (Easterbrooks & Beal Alvarez, 2013).

Which vocabulary words?

• Tier 1 words are words students are likely to know (happy, mom)
• Tier 2 words appear in many contexts and across content areas (equal, state)
• Tier 3 words are content-specific (chromosome, biosphere)

While some of our students may have to be taught Tier 1 words before moving on, targeting vocabulary instruction for Tier 2 words may be the best use of your time for students in the general education setting.   These are words that will be seen and heard frequently and across subjects. Taking advantage of pre-teaching these words in multiple contexts and forms (with applicable prefixes and suffixes) will address higher order thinking skills as well. There are many sources for Tier 2 word-lists, such as this free resource that appears on  Teachers Pay Teachers:  https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/FreeDownload/FREEBIE-Vocabulary-Targets-Word-List-K-5-Tier-2-Words-2095007

Other sources for vocabulary instruction include Cracking the Grammar Code 4 Book set with a Vocabulary Enhancement Simple Picture Glossary Supplement (Homelvig & Rugg); Latin and Greek Roots: Teaching Vocabulary Using Hands-On Activities and Common Objects (Stokes); 100% Curriculum Vocabulary-Primary and Secondary Editions (Eggleston & Larson). See complete catalog.

Systematic vocabulary instruction including pre-teaching is essential not only for increased knowledge of the world around  our students, but also for increased confidence in reading, writing, and comprehension.

Sources:

• Price, L. (2014). Visualizing vocabulary: Improving word association & retrieval skills [.pdf]. Retrieved from https://successforkidswithhearingloss.com/ Webcast available from The Online Itinerant.
• Knoors, H. & Marschark, M. (2014). Teaching deaf learners. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Easterbrooks, S.R. & Beal-Alvarez, J. (2013). Literacy instruction for students who are deaf and hard of hearing. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Gambrell, L.B. & Morrow, L.M. (2013). Best practices in literacy instruction (5^th). New York: Guilford Press.
• Schirmer, B.R. (1994). Language and literacy development in children who are deaf. New York: Macmillan.
• Hart, B.O. (1963). Teaching reading to deaf children. Washington, D.C.: Alexander Graham Bell Association for The Deaf, Inc.

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