Basic. Six. Teachas, welcome back to school. Don't chat, jus’ does yo’ work. Students need to know how a word functions in various contexts. Often a synonym or antonym is all students need to understand a new word in context. A good way to be sure students understand a word’s definitions is to have them provide example sentences in which they use the word. Asking students to use more than one new word in each sentence they create can force them to look for relations among words. You might invite students to make up a story in which a new word features prominently. You might have students pair new words and use each pair to make a silly question. For example, if you can skip breakfast, can you skip a disease?

One variation of the Word Map is called the Four Square activity. In this activity, each student takes a sheet of paper and folds into four sections. The students write a word (such as soothing) in the upper left hand section of the paper, then write an example (soft music), a non-example (crying babies), and a definition (having a calming effect) in other sections.

Semantic Mapping involves a web-like graphic display. To begin instruction, students are presented with a concept that is central to understanding a subject. They then brainstorm words that are related to that concept. Check out this dictionary.

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