Ways to help students master academic language

 Teaching students academic and discipline-specific language in the classroom isn’t about getting them to stockpile “big” words. Rather, researchers concur, when students know the contextual meaning of words in academic or informational texts, it allows them to unlock new and difficult materials—in the process making them better readers, which in turn exposes them to even more high-level vocabulary. 

Experts tend to think about vocabulary in tiers, says Todd Finley, an English education professor at East Carolina University. Tier one includes basic, everyday words that students hear often in conversation. Tier-two words, often referred to as academic vocabulary, aren't commonly used in conversations but they’re likely to show up across content areas, making them important to teach. They include words like “summarize,” “hypothesize,” and “analyze.” Third-tier words—vocabulary students will encounter in discipline-specific textbooks, informational passages, and assignments—are especially important to deliberately teach because they’re critical for understanding key concepts in a text. “No student comes to school adept in academic discourse—thus, thoughtful instruction is required,” Finley writes.