Any recommendation to increase vocabulary for 6th Grade/Middle school kids?

[Anonymous]

Heard from several difference sources that vocabulary is critically important for high school study, and it is recommended to start build it up at start of middle school.
Anyone has good recommendation on how to? and resources?

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Reading, reading, reading. One of my kids had a 7th grade teacher who went over a study about how vocabulary acquisition at back to school night a few years ago.
READING READING READING is the best and most efficient way to increase vocabulary.

[Anonymous]

There was a recent thread on this topic that I think you might find helpful:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/821708.page

I completely agree that reading is the very best way to pick up vocabulary. Your child doing independent reading is probably best for vocabulary (so that they are seeing the words), but I think you reading to them or using audio books would also give them exposure to new words. They don't have to be classics. You want books that will make your child want to read more. Quantity goes a long way.

All other approaches are a distant second. That being said, learning a foreign language can help strengthen their vocabulary in English.

Paying attention to roots, prefixes, and suffixes can go a long way.

Pay attention to your own vocabulary. Of ypu use a wider vocabulary, your child will pick up wprds from you. Also, when you come across words you don't know, make sure you look them up. It's good to model that behavior for your child.

Games like Scrabble, Bananagrams, Boggle, can get your child thinking about words.

If so inclined, there are multiple gimmicks to help people expand their vocabularies. If one or more is something the kid can enjoy and buy into, go for it! Otherwise, I wouldn't push very hard.

Freerice.com (advertising funded website that donates money to fight world hunger per question answered):

Webster's website has a word a day and some vocabulary quizzes:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/

Hoagies has a lot of links related to words
and vocabulary:

https://www.hoagiesgifted.org/language.htm

You can get paper word-a-day calendars.

[Anonymous]

Reading! It's probably why I, a college drop-out, have a much larger vocabulary than my husband who has a master's degree. I've always been a voracious reader while my husband rarely reads anything more than a paragraph.

I see it in my kids too, my 12 yo DD's vocabulary is really jumping quickly, while my 16 yo DS's is just okay. Guess which ones reads books and the other one reads just the ticker on the bottom of the ESPN screen?

[Anonymous]

Read. That's it.

That's why some of us crushed the verbal SATs back in the day without ever looking at a single flashcard or taking a review class.

It will also ensure that your kid doesn't write stuff like "toe the line" or "for all intensive purposes" or "cache" instead of "cachet" or "click" instead of "clique" or any of the other numerous howlers that appear regularly on DCUM from people who obviously never pick up a book.

[Anonymous]

Word Clues used to be the gold standard for 6th-7th graders. It’s divided between Greek and Latin roots, excellent foundation for standardized tests and will help them decipher unfamiliar words. I highly recommend.

[Anonymous]

OP, I agree with the reading posts, but to that I would add that DC must read a wide variety of material. Reading every book in the Alex Ryder series is not going to increase his vocabulary. He needs to stretch and read different genre - biographies, historical fiction, nonfiction, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Read. That's it.

That's why some of us crushed the verbal SATs back in the day without ever looking at a single flashcard or taking a review class.

It will also ensure that your kid doesn't write stuff like "toe the line" or "for all intensive purposes" or "cache" instead of "cachet" or "click" instead of "clique" or any of the other numerous howlers that appear regularly on DCUM from people who obviously never pick up a book.

Hate to break it to ya...but the proper spelling is indeed “toe the line.”

https://grammarist.com/usage/toe-the-line/

[Anonymous]

Prefixes and Suffixes and root words -- study them.

Here is a resource I use for the basics -- 5th grade 6th grade level:

https://www.amazon.com/ABeCeDarian-Student-Workbook-Michael-Bend/dp/1936226383/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=abecedarian+level+D&qid=1569758023&sr=8-1

[Anonymous]

Why are you cross-posting? Didn't you get enough answers already?

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/830145.page