I post quite a bit about different activities that I do with my students in class but a lot of times I highlight what students are doing in the middle and end of a unit when they are ready to use the vocabulary rather than what I do to teach them the new words at the beginning. So here are some tips & tricks I keep in mind when teaching new vocabulary to my novice learners.
1. Start with less!
Especially with younger students, I don't usually start with the full list of vocabulary and any unit I teach only has about 10 voculary words or phrases. It helps that I try to pre-teach many vocabulary words BEFORE we get to a unit. See this post here for more on that.
Sometimes I start with just two and gradually add more in as we go through the unit. Sometimes I start with 4-5. For example, when we are learning greetings in kindergarten we start by saying hola to the teacher, "Hola maestra" and then to the dog and cat, "Hola perro. Hola gato." I have students repeat after me. I slowly add animals as the year progresses so that by the end of kindergarten they know almost all of the animals that we will later talk about in our first and second grade units. I do the same with colors. I start with green and red. Then I add yellow a few classes later and then later I will add blue.
Do I start with more sometimes? Yes, but I try to make sure that some of them are cognates so really it is still more like 4-5 completely new words.
2. Add visuals
With my students who aren't reading yet I always show a picture or a prop when I teach them a new word so that they associate the new word with the visual. No need to translate to English! I like to use a mix of clip art AND photo images. For example, I have cutesy llama emoji cards that I use for emotions but I also have flashcards with pictures of real kids with different facial expressions. It makes the language more "real" for students that way. For older students I do include the English for our conversational phrases like "I agree," or verb phrases such as "I want" or "I have."
3. Add music or a chant
How many product jingles can you sing? I bet quite a few. There are whole Tik Tok challenges where people sing along to old jingles. Companies do that because adding music makes it more memorable. It's the same with teaching new vocabulary. It also makes it more fun for your students!
I have a song or chant for just about everything we do in class. Here is an example I use for classroom supplies. If I don't have a chant then I find a song on youtube. Super Simple Español, Basho and Friends, and Calico Spanish are some of my favorite channels to find songs to teach and reinforce new vocabulary.
4. Add movement where you can
If I'm teaching sports then we act out that sport as we say it. Animals get their own movements - see this example here. When we learn body parts and colors the students point to them as we say them. Last year I made mini posters on half sheets of paper to hand out to kids because they all wanted to point to the words on the posters on my wall during different activities. Kids like to move and they don't get enough chances throughout the school day to do so - so let them move to help them learn!
5. Have students repeat after you.
This was is super basic but it's how we start. I do this when first introducing the new words and as a review in later classes but eventually the students don't need me anymore but how do you get to where they know and can use the vocabulary on their own? Stay tuned for a part two for activities and games to practice new vocabulary in class!
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