In this opening chapter of Vocabulary at the Center, veteran teachers Amy Benjamin and John T. Crow explain how words can function as "gateways" to student knowledge and academic achievement. Continue reading...

If "Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally" saved you in learning the order of operations in mathematics, then you should check out what Nancy Frey and Douglas Fisher have to say in Learning Words Inside and Out about using keyword mnemonics to help commit words to memory. Continue reading...

In this excerpt from his new book Beyond Cut and Paste, ed-tech guru Jamie McKenzie explains why having your students turn their backs on you may be a good thing in the laptop classroom! Continue reading...

Teachers, are you wondering how you can use Visual Thesaurus word maps to introduce new concepts to your students? Check out this excerpt from Sharon Walpole and Michael C. McKenna's Differentiated Reading Instruction for some ideas. Continue reading...

Since there never seems to be enough time for in-class vocabulary instruction, this excerpt from Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction, by Isabel L. Beck, Margaret G. McKeown, and Linda Kucan, can help teachers decide which "Tier Two" words to prioritize. Continue reading...

In this excerpt from Active Literacy Across the Curriculum: Strategies for Reading, Writing, Speaking, and Listening, Heidi Hayes Jacobs advocates developing students' "word power" by borrowing methods from the foreign language classroom. Continue reading...