By COURTNEY BROWN
A student’s command of a range of vocabulary can predict not only their academic success, but even their future job opportunities. This may seem like a bold statement, but in fact, research supports it! As Marzano and Pickering attest, “One of the key indicators of students' success in school, on standardized tests, and indeed, in life, is their vocabulary. The reason for this is simply that the knowledge anyone has about a topic is based on the vocabulary of that information.” (Marzano & Pickering, 2005). The correlation between a student’s mastery of academic vocabulary and their success becomes even stronger as they move into high school, where they encounter a broadening variety of discipline-specific vocabulary, in which each word may actually represent a new complex concept. Consider a solution in math vs. a solution in science; a ray in math vs. a ray of sunlight in a poem; function as a noun in math vs. function as a more general verb. As students reach higher grade levels, they face increased demands to gain more specialized knowledge and to differentiate between meanings in each context. It can be a little overwhelming! To make teaching and planning for vocabulary development more manageable, I find it helpful to begin by taking action in two ways.
Supporting students to manage unfamiliar language as they read
This includes offering students tools to identify words using context clues, replacing words, identifying words by their roots or similarities to other words, or for ELLS, using cognates. Many of these tools help students read fluidly and fearlessly, taking on the challenge of unfamiliar words as hurdles to jump or work around, not roadblocks that stop them. CPET’s Dr. Roberta Lenger Kang created a simple, adaptable Monitoring for Meaning resource that students can use to figure out, track, and archive words independently as they read. Students can keep the chart right it in their notebooks and regularly build it as they encounter new words.
Identifying specific vocabulary and concepts to teach in each unit
When you plan to teach the key terms for each unit and then strategically reinforce and review the words throughout, students have a much better chance of learning and recalling key words and concepts. Sorting and categorizing, using and seeing the words in a variety of contexts, and learning through games or puzzles helps new concepts take root in the minds of your students. Consider the impact of games such as Pictionary, Taboo or Jeopardy, all of which make learning vocabulary more engaging, and in turn can make vocabulary more memorable.
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By COURTNEY BROWN
As we move closer to the end of the school year and approach the high-stakes testing season, we know educators are grappling with the question: to test prep or not to test prep? When it comes to high-stakes exams that help determine whether or not students will graduate from high school (as is the case with some New York State Regents’ exams), which colleges they may have access to (based on their SAT or ACT scores), or whether or not they can move to a new grade level (as is the case for elementary students and their scores on NYC ELA and Math exams), there’s no doubt that schools and teachers should strategically plan for test prep. We need to be able to support students in meeting the demands of these exams, and to equip them with the skills and knowledge needed to have authority over the exam.
Preparation is key
Most standardized exams are their own unique genre — they ask questions in unfamiliar ways, and include tasks that may only exist in the specific format on the exam. Some exams may seem foreign to students because of their formatting, structure, and use of language. One way to think about the importance of test prep is to understand that taking a long, grueling exam once a year is similar to running a marathon. None of us would want to run a marathon without training for it, or without gathering advance information that will help us achieve our goal. While we should take time to prepare students for challenging, high-stakes exams, it’s crucial that we don’t overinform the focus of our curriculum or instruction. Instead, we should offer test prep strategies that allow students to exercise authority over the exam. To avoid narrowing our instruction to focus solely on test prep, it may be helpful to think of preparation as two components: understanding the content and skills related to the exam, and understanding the structure of the exam itself.
Understanding content and skills related to the exam
Allowing students to learn exam-related skills and content is best accomplished by strategically building key skills, standards, and understandings into your curriculum throughout the year. Ideally, you would also be able to scaffold these components in the years leading up to the exam. You can then periodically assess student learning throughout the year and re-teach, review, and reinforce areas that still need some work. Going back to our marathon analogy, we can think of this part of the test prep process as conditioning and training so that our students have the tools needed to run the race.
Understanding the structure of the exam
The second part of test prep involves getting to know the exam — it’s genre, language, scope, and scoring methods. We want students to have agency over the exam and an understanding of all its components. Students should have the opportunity to take a practice exam in its entirety, so that they have a chance to practice their pacing, and time to develop their own best practices for test-taking. Again, thinking about the exam as a marathon that our students are being asked to run, the more our students know about the course of the race, the more empowered they’ll be when developing strategies to tackle it.
If we regularly gauge student progress on as they learn the key skills needed to succeed on an exam, and assess their mastery of the exam’s sections, we can adjust and differentiate our teaching to offer students what they need to be as prepared as possible, while maintaining a positive and enriching experience in our classrooms.
To help get you started with implementing strategic, positive test prep, check out our RISE resource, which offers guidance for helping students gain access, agency, and authority over exams. 
By COURTNEY BROWN
The term teacher leader has gained momentum in recent years, and while we believe that teachers are always leaders — in their own classrooms, schools, and in society — the role of a teacher leader can be hard to define and tricky to inhabit. Teacher leaders work in a range of supportive roles in the the intersecting space between their fellow teachers and administrators leading departments or grade level teams, facilitating professional development sessions, and serving on committees for initiatives or projects. Understanding and bridging the needs of both administrators and teachers often demands new perspectives and mindsets, as well as a broad skill set.
For over 10 years, we’ve been designing promising practices to support individuals who inhabit this multifaceted role. This year, we’re partnering with an innovative team of administrators in the North Plainfield district of New Jersey to develop their very own cohort of teacher leaders. Through the creation of customized workshops, we’re offering the North Plainfield team a mix of relevant theories and hands-on, practical applications, as well as a supportive collaborative space — a community of practice in which everyone can safely share their struggles and successes, explore ideas, practice skills, and offer or receive feedback.
We examine the theoretical component by including a review of adult learning theory in each of our sessions. By discussing theory, individuals have time to investigate how they might manage the move from teaching students to facilitating and coaching their colleagues. Our discussions then lead to an application of this theory, allowing each team member to connect it to real-world scenarios. As they shift from theory to practice, our partners often explore the complexities of their teacher leader roles by utilizing a protocol for structured conversations. Two of our favorites, success and dilemma protocols, are simple, yet effective ways for colleagues or small groups to support each other in working through challenges, celebrating promising practices, and identifying next steps.
The development of confident, capable teacher leaders is an essential component of creating productive teams. Are you a current or aspiring teacher leader, looking to enhance your capabilities? Check out our Critical Incidents workshop series, designed to help educators identify the foundations of teacher leadership and build skills in facilitation, working with teams, and leading projects.
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CONTRIBUTORS
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The Center for the Professional Education of Teachers (CPET) is an organization based out of Teachers College, Columbia University that is devoted to advancing global capacities in teacher education, research, and whole school reform. CPET advocates excellence and equity in education through direct service to youth and educators, innovative school projects that promote students’ Write to Achieve, international research that examines and advocates the highest quality instructional and assessment practices today, and sustainable school partnerships that leverage current policy and mandates to raise literacy levels and embed collaborative communities of learning. Uniting theory and practice, CPET promotes rigorous and relevant scholarship and is committed to making excellent education accessible worldwide.
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