None of the remaining tier two words are good candidates for more intensive instruction. Captivity is important to the story, but fairly concrete and easily taught. The same is true for undergrowth and bamboo, though these are not as important to the story. Despised and cautious, though not as concrete, can be accessed through their more common synonyms hated and careful, though a discussion of the difference between despise and dislike, perhaps placing it on a continuum with dislike, hate, despise, and detest, would be a useful exercise. All of the tier three words highlighted are needed to understand the passage. Since this is an excerpt from a full length novel, it is likely these words are explained in context in earlier chapters. Which Words Do I Teach? Practice Identifying Tier 2 and 3 Vocabulary for Instruction Grades 9-10 Passage 1 – Informational: Hoose, P. (2004). The Race to Save Lord God Bird. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Excerpt from Chapter 1: “Specimen 60803” Any species in nature, from the tiniest insect to the Blue Whale, is a collection of design experiments, field-tested and remodeled again and again over thousands of years. By looking carefully at the way a bird is built and then thinking backward-asking questions like “Why would a wing be so long? Or “Why are its eyes on the side of the head instead of the front?”—it’s possible to get some sense of how the bird got its food and defended itself, how widely it traveled, and what role it might have had within its ecosystem. Of course my attention goes first to the amazing bill. It’s not really made of ivory like an elephant’s tusk, but of bone, covered by a sheath of a special protein called keratin. It’s broad at the base, and rooted deep into the bird’s thick-boned skull to absorb the shock of pounding a tree. Its slit-like nostrils are fringed with hair to keep out sawdust. An Ivory-bill needed this big, stout crowbar of a bill to pry strips of bark off a tree, because its favorite food lay just underneath. The Ivory-bill ate some fruits and berries when they were in season, but mostly it ate grubs-the larvae of beetles.
None of the remaining tier two words are good candidates for more intensive instruction. Captivity is important to the story, but fairly concrete and easily taught. The same is true for undergrowth and bamboo, though these are not as important to the story. Despised and cautious, though not as concrete, can be accessed through their more common synonyms hated and careful, though a discussion of the difference between despise and dislike, perhaps placing it on a continuum with dislike, hate, despise, and detest, would be a useful exercise. All of the tier three words highlighted are needed to understand the passage. Since this is an excerpt from a full length novel, it is likely these words are explained in context in earlier chapters. Which Words Do I Teach? Practice Identifying Tier 2 and 3 Vocabulary for Instruction Grades 9-10 Passage 1 – Informational: Hoose, P. (2004). The Race to Save Lord God Bird. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Excerpt from Chapter 1: “Specimen 60803” Any species in nature, from the tiniest insect to the Blue Whale, is a collection of design experiments, field-tested and remodeled again and again over thousands of years. By looking carefully at the way a bird is built and then thinking backward-asking questions like “Why would a wing be so long? Or “Why are its eyes on the side of the head instead of the front?”—it’s possible to get some sense of how the bird got its food and defended itself, how widely it traveled, and what role it might have had within its ecosystem. Of course my attention goes first to the amazing bill. It’s not really made of ivory like an elephant’s tusk, but of bone, covered by a sheath of a special protein called keratin. It’s broad at the base, and rooted deep into the bird’s thick-boned skull to absorb the shock of pounding a tree. Its slit-like nostrils are fringed with hair to keep out sawdust. An Ivory-bill needed this big, stout crowbar of a bill to pry strips of bark off a tree, because its favorite food lay just underneath. The Ivory-bill ate some fruits and berries when they were in season, but mostly it ate grubs-the larvae of beetles.