ERIC ED402560: Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth during Reading Comprehension. Reading Research Report No. 76. PDF
Preview ERIC ED402560: Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth during Reading Comprehension. Reading Research Report No. 76.
DOCUMENT RESUME ED 402 560 CS 012 671 AUTHOR Schwanenflugel, Paula J.; And Others TITLE Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth during Reading Comprehension. Reading Research Report No. 76. INSTITUTION National Reading Research Center, Athens, GA.; National Reading Research Center, College Park, MD. SPONS AGENCY Office of Educational Research and Improvement (ED), Washington, DC. PUB DATE 97 CONTRACT 117A20007 NOTE 27p. PUB TYPE Research/Technical (143) Reports EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Grade 4; Intermediate Grades; *Reading Comprehension; Reading Research; *Story Reading; *Vocabulary Development Narrative Text; Text Factors; Word Knowledge IDENTIFIERS ABSTRACT A study investigated the development of vocabulary knowledge in elementary school children as a function of story reading for partially known and unknown words. Subjects, 43 fourth-grade low-middle to middle-class children from a rural elementary school in the southeastern United States, participated in a vocabulary checklist in which they provided definitions or sentences for words they knew (known words), and checked off words they did not know the meaning of but were familiar with (partial- knowledge words). Children then read stories containing some of these words. The remaining words served as a control. Vocabulary growth was gradual for both known and unknown words. Moreover, word factors rather than text factors were more important in the development of vocabulary knowledge. (Contains 35 references, 3 notes, and 2 tables of data.) (Author/RS) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth During Reading Comprehension Paula J. Schwanenflugel Steven A. Stahl University of Georgia Elisabeth L. Mc Falls University of South Florida U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement ED CATIONAL RESOURCES J INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. ti BEST COPY AVAILABLE National Reading Research Center READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 76 Winter 1997 2 NRRC National Reading Research Center Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth During Reading Comprehension Paula J. Schwanenflugel Steven A. Stahl University of Georgia Elisabeth L. Mc Falls University of South Florida READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 76 Winter 1997 The work reported herein is a National Reading Research Center Project of the University of Georgia and University of Maryland. It was supported under the Educational Research and Development Centers Program (PR/AWARD NO. 117A20007) as administered by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education. The findings and opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the position or policies of the National Reading Research Center, the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, or the U.S. Department of Education. 3 NRRC National Reading Research Center National Advisory Board Executive Committee Phyllis W. Aldrich Donna E. Alvermann, Co-Director Saratoga Warren Board of Cooperative Educational University of Georgia John T. Guthrie, Co-Director Services, Saratoga Springs, New York University of Maryland College Park Arthur N. Applebee James F. Baumann, Associate Director State University of New York, Albany University of Georgia Ronald S. Brandt Patricia S. Koskinen, Associate Director Association for Supervision and Curriculum University of Maryland College Park Development Jamie Lynn Metsala, Associate Director Marsha T. DeLain University of Maryland College Park Delaware Department of Public Instruction Penny Oldfather Carl A. Grant University of Georgia University of Wisconsin-Madison John F. O'Flahavan Barbara McCombs University of Maryland College Park Mid-Continent Regional Educational Laboratory (MCREL) James V. Hoffman Luis C. Moll University of Texas at Austin University of Arizona Cynthia R. Hynd Carol M. Santa University of Georgia School District No. 5 Robert Serpell Kalispell, Montana University of Maryland Baltimore County Anne P. Sweet Betty Shockley-Bisplinghoff Clarke County School District, Athens, Georgia Office of Educational Research and Improvement, Linda DeGroff U.S. Department of Education University of Georgia Louise Cherry Wilkinson Rutgers University Peter Winograd Publications Editors University of Kentucky Research Reports and Perspectives Production Editor Linda DeGroff, Editor Katherine P. Hutchison University of Georgia University of Georgia James V. Hoffman, Associate Editor University of Texas at Austin Dissemination Coordinator Mariam Jean Dreher, Associate Editor Jordana E. Rich University of Maryland College Park University of Georgia Instructional Resources Lee Galda, University of Georgia Research Highlights Text Formatter William G. Holliday Angela R. Wilson University of Maryland College Park University of Georgia Policy Briefs James V. Hoffman NRRC - University of Georgia University of Texas at Austin 318 Aderhold Videos University of Georgia Shawn M. Glynn, University of Georgia Athens, Georgia 30602-7125 Fax: (706) 542-3678 (706) 542-3674 INTERNET: [email protected] NRRC Staff Barbara F. Howard, Office Manager NRRC - University of Maryland College Park Kathy B. Davis, Senior Secretary University of Georgia 3216 J. M. Patterson Building University of Maryland Barbara A. 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The Perspective Series presents a tions nationwide. wide range of publications, from calls for research and The NRRC's mission is to discover and document commentary on research and practice to first-person those conditions in homes, schools, and communities accounts of experiences Instructional schools. in that encourage children to become skilled, enthusiastic, Resources include curriculum materials, instructional lifelong readers. NRRC researchers are committed to guides, and materials for professional growth, designed advancing the development of instructional programs primarily for teachers. sensitive to the cognitive, sociocultural, and motiva- For more information about the NRRC's research tional factors that affect children's success in reading. projects and other activities, or to have your name NRRC researchers from a variety of disciplines conduct added to the mailing list, please contact: studies with teachers and students from widely diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds in pre-kinder- Donna E. Alvermann, Co-Director garten through grade 12 classrooms. Research projects National Reading Research Center deal with the influence of family and family-school 318 Aderhold Hall interactions on the development of literacy; the interac- University of Georgia tion of sociocultural factors and motivation to read; the Athens, GA 30602-7125 impact of literature-based reading programs on reading (706) 542-3674 achievement; the effects of reading strategies instruction on comprehension and critical thinking in literature, John T. Guthrie, Co-Director science, and history; the influence of innovative group National Reading Research Center participation structures on motivation and learning; the 3216 J. M. Patterson Building potential of computer technology to enhance literacy; University of Maryland and the development of methods and standards for College Park, MD 20742 alternative literacy assessments. (301) 405-8035 The NRRC is further committed to the participation of teachers as full partners in its research. A better understanding of how teachers view the development of literacy, how they use knowledge from research, and how they approach change in the classroom is crucial to improving instruction. To further this understanding, the NRRC conducts school-based research in which teachers explore their own philosophical and pedagogi- cal orientations and trace their professional growth. Editorial Review Board NRRC Mary Graham Suzanne Clewell Peter Afflerbach McLean, Virginia Montgomery County Public Schools University of Maryland College Park Rockville, Maryland Rachel Grant Jane Agee University of Maryland College Park Joan Coley University of Georgia Western Maryland College Barbara Guzzetti JoBeth Allen Arizona State University Michelle Commeyras University of Georgia University of Georgia Frances Hancock Janice F. 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Sweet University of Texas at Austin Lehman College -CUNY Office of Educational Research and Improvement Veda McClain Tom Reeves University of Georgia University of Georgia Louise Tomlinson University of Georgia Lisa McFalls Lenore Ringler University of Georgia New York University Bruce VanSledright University of Maryland College Park Randy McGinnis Mary Roe University of Maryland University of Delaware Barbara Walker Eastern Montana University-Billings Mike McKenna Nadeen T. Ruiz Georgia Southern University California State University- Louise Waynant Sacramento Prince George's County Schools Barbara Michalove Upper Marlboro, Maryland Fourth Street Elementary School Olivia Saracho Athens, Georgia University of Maryland College Park Dera Weaver Elizabeth B. Moje Athens Academy Paula Schwanenflugel Athens, Georgia University of Utah University of Georgia Lesley Morrow Jane West Robert Serpell Rutgers University Agnes Scott College University of Maryland Baltimore County Bruce Murray Renee Weisburg Auburn University Elkins Park, Pennsylvania Betty Shockley-Bisplinghoff Barnett Shoals Elementary School Susan Neuman Allan Wigfield Athens, Georgia Temple University University of Maryland College Park Wayne H. Slater John O'Flahavan Shelley Wong University of Maryland College Park University of Maryland College Park University of Maryland College Park Margaret Smith Marilyn Ohlhausen-McKinney Josephine Peyton Young Las Vegas, Nevada University of Nevada University of Georgia Susan Sonnenschein Penny Oldfather University of Maryland Baltimore Hallie Yopp University of Georgia County California State University 7 About the Authors tion. His research interests are centered around a Professor of Paula J. Schwanenflugel is issues in reading instruction at the primary grades Educational Psychology and a Research Fellow of and the relationship between vocabulary knowledge the Institute for Behavioral Research at the Uni- and reading comprehension. versity of Georgia. Her research interests are in the areas of reading, semantics, and vocabulary is currently a doctoral Elisabeth L. Mc Falls development. student in the Applied Cognition and Development program of the Educational Psychology Depart- Steven A. Stahl is a Professor of Reading Educa- ment at the University of Georgia. Her research tion at the University of Georgia and a principal interests are in reading and vocabulary develop- investigator at the National Reading Research Center. He was formerly at the Center for the ment, particularly socioeconomic variables related to reading. This report forms part of the findings Study of Reading at the University of Illinois. from a Master's thesis submitted to the University After teaching reading in elementary schools in of Georgia under the direction of the second author. New York and Maine, he received his doctorate in reading from the Harvard Graduate School of Educa- National Reading Research Center Universities of Georgia and Maryland Reading Research Report No. 76 Winter 1997 Partial Word Knowledge and Vocabulary Growth During Reading Comprehension Paula J. Schwanenflugel Steven A. Stahl University of Georgia Elisabeth L. McFalls University of South Florida example, might be tied to other words inlogical Abstract. The experiment investigated the develop- relations ("A bear is an animal"; Collins & ment of vocabulary knowledge in elementary school Loftus, 1975), to associated concepts (forest, children as a function of story reading for partially circus, other woodland animals, etc.), to spe- known and unknown words. Fourth-grade children participated in a vocabulary checklist in which they cific memories ("The black bear we saw in the provided definitions or sentences for words they garbage dump in Cranberry Lake"), and so on. knew (known words), and checked off words they did A less familiar word might be tied to a less not know the meaning of but were familiar (partial rich set of semantic associations. For example, Children then read stories knowledge words). calliope may be tied only to the broad category containing some of these words. The remaining of "musical instruments" and to memories of words served as a control. Vocabulary growth was a circus. As the word is encountered in each gradual for both known and unknown words. More- new context, the information from that context over, word factors rather than text factors were is added to the already existing knowledge more important in the development of vocabulary store, adding to the richness of a word's repre- knowledge. sentation in memory, until, presumably, there Consider what might happen when a reader is some saturation point where the word is encounters an unknown word. Assume that the sufficiently well known so that it could be reader is able to create an orthographic repre- understood in every context that it appears. For sentation of the word, or some sort of unified most people, the word bear is that well known, representation of the word's letters as Adams and there is room to grow on one's notion of (1990) suggests. When a word is familiar, this calliope. representation is tied to multiple types of These words are known, more or less, by semantic information. The word bear, for most adults. But consider a word that is proba- 1 9 Schwanenflugel, Stahl, & Mc Falls 2 bly unknown, like minatory in the following little success identifying words that have been blanked out from naturally occurring contexts. context: "Oh, all right," I grumbled. I turned off the Because of this paradox between the fact water and went into the living room to do my that contexts tend to be individually uninforma- stretches. Peppy didn't understand why I tive and yet so important to vocabulary learn- wasn't limber and ready to go as soon as I ing, it is important to understand how such got out of bed. Every few minutes she'd give learning takes place. The purpose of this paper a minatory bark from the back. When I is to examine the process of vocabulary growth finally appeared in my sweats and running from context, looking not only at the rate of shoes, she raced down the stairs, turning at acquisition from context, but also examining every half landing to make sure I was still the effects of three sets of factors(1) chil- coming. (Paretsky, 1988) dren's prior word knowledge, (2) differences The reader probably could come up with a between words, and (3) text factorsin chil- rough pronunciation, although there is some dren's incidental word learning. We will use ambiguity about whether the "i" in the first the term vocabulary growth to refer to both the syllable is short or long. But beyond that, the changes in word meaning that occur as a word reader would have little to go on from the goes from being completely unknown and context. Most words are learned from context unrecognizable to at least somewhat known and (Nagy & Herman, 1987; Sternberg, 1987), yet recognizable and the changes that occur during most contexts are uninformative by themselves the accretion of word meaning for words that (Schatz & Baldwin, 1986). That is, the vast people can ascribe some degree of recogniz- majority of a person's word growth can be ability and meaning. accounted for by exposure to words in written and oral context, not through direct instruction The Growth of Word Meaning of some sort, but individual encounters with a word in a natural context are not likely to yield As word learning grows, a person's notion much useful information about that word. In a of a word's meaning grows from the first series of studies, Nagy, Herman, and Anderson encounter with the word, where the word's (1985; Nagy, Anderson, & Herman, 1987; meaning is totally unknown, to a partial knowl- Herman, Anderson, Pearson, & Nagy, 1987) edge of the word, to richer and richer under- found that children do learn between 5 % and standings of the word's meaning. With words 20 % of previously unknown words from a like calliope and bear, we can clearly see how single exposure in context. Nagy and Herman knowledge of a word's meaning may get richer (1987) suggest that this process of learning with more and more experience. An expert on words from context could account for the wind instruments, or a mechanic working for majority of observed vocabulary growth in a circus, may have as rich a notion of calliope Schatz and Baldwin school-aged children. as an average person has of bear. What is less (1986), however, found that adults had very NATIONAL READING RESEARCH CENTER, READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 76 10
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