Dear Parents and Friends of St Kevin’s,

The year is well and truly on its way and so is the learning of our students. This year we are focusing on improving our writing skills. The areas we have identified as requiring explicit teaching and targeting are vocabulary, sentence structure and audience. In this newsletter I would like to explain the importance of vocabulary not only in writing, but for all subjects taught at school.

Vocabulary is having an extensive knowledge and understanding of words and is a vital link to a child’s learning. This knowledge can never be underestimated.

Vocabulary crosses all subjects. In English we tend to use vocabulary to convey meaning, embellish our writing and evoke feelings or emotions. We would know these mostly as nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs. In fictional stories there are many examples “He crept into the pantry and quietly…cautiously…peered around the corner.” (Felix by Pamela Anderson, Penguin Publishing 2008).  This sentence is interesting to read, conveying anticipation, tension and a desire to read more. It is much better than “He walked over to the cupboard and looked around the corner.” Words such as crept, cautiously and peered, are examples of the vocabulary we expect children to understand, read and finally use in their creative writing.

Vocabulary is also extremely important in mathematics and science. Students need to know and understand words such as parallel, horizontal, perpendicular, curved, voltage, electrical, geography, environment, energy, responsibility, digital, analogue, addition, subtraction, estimate, landscape, portrait and the list goes on.

So how can we as parents and grandparents help?

Reading is paramount to establishing a thorough and extensive vocabulary. Reading to your child every night is a sure-fire way to increase your child’s vocabulary. Even in Years 5 and 6, children love being read to.

Round table discussions or travelling in the car stories! The more we engage in conversations that require more than one-word answers, the more our children will develop skills in speaking in sentences, using their word knowledge to convey a message or a story. Talk about every day events pointing them out to your children, using your vocabulary to describe them. Children mirror and copy what we say and do!! You as their amazing parents are the most important teachers in your child’s life. For example:

“Look at that spectacular sunset! It appears as if the sky is on fire with the bright, red sun, looking like a ball of flame!”

“Listen to the wind howling and the rain splashing against the windowpane.”

“This dinner is delicious. The mashed potato is as white as snow!”

Even in kindergarten a good vocabulary is important. This is when they learn beginning sounds and corresponding letter names. If children don’t have a good vocabulary then learning sounds is tricky e.g “a” for astronaut, “d” for daffodil, “e” for escalator, “v” for vase, “t” for television. A good vocabulary from early on builds both reading and spelling skills and contributes to excellent speaking and listening outcomes. One kindergarten child recently demonstrated their extensive vocabulary during show and tell “I have a something extraordinary to show today. This is my dinosaur that my Poppy made on his computer. I think it is spectacular and I love its blue face that looks like a puppy.”

We as adults must ensure our children develop an extensive vocabulary, because their future learning is dependent on it.

Enjoy the week learning with your children.

Mary-Anne Jennings