Vocabulary Self-Collection Strategy

	Text Link	Rationale for Choosing	Text Frame(s)	Strategy Used and Resource
Engagement Example	Artificial Sweeteners: Friends or Foes?	This article is relevant and informative to students and their diets. It gives just enough scientific evidence in simple text so that students can still comprehend the focus.	Concept/Definition	Power Notes (Buehl)
Guiding Example	Rewritable paper: Prints with light, not ink	This article tackles the ever growing problem of wasting paper. It offers an alternative paper that uses chemicals as the ink that disappears after the chemical reaction is complete.	Concept/definition Problem/solution	Bookmark Technique (McLaughlin)
Extended Thinking	Why Metals Have a Blast in Water	This article was chosen because it involves explosion and that always gets a student’s attention. It explains the chemistry behind metal reactions.	Problem/Solution Proposition/Support	Sketch to Stretch (McLaughlin)

The words chosen for my graphic organizer are 

            “Artificial Sweeteners: Friends or Foes?”: chemoreceptors

            “Rewritable paper: Prints with light, not ink”: oxidation

            “Why Metals Have a Blast in Water”: repel

The graphic organizer I chose to use is Vocabulary Self-Collection Strategy or VSS. This strategy involves students choosing a word from a text they deem important and what to learn more about it. After the students are done reading the text they are instructed to choose a word from it, indicate where they found it, what they think it means, and why it should be on the class vocabulary list. Below is my VSS I completed.

1.  Word: Chemoreceptors

Where it was found in the text: “Our tongues are covered in taste buds full of chemoreceptors- cells that send messages to the brain when they interact with certain chemicals.

What it means: It is a cell that has receptors on it that sends messages to a brain about how something tastes.

Why it should be on the vocabulary list: It should be on the list because learning about this certain receptor will lead to an easier understand about other receptors.

 2.  Word: Oxidation

Where it was found in the text: “Oxidation steals one or more electrons from a molecule.”

What it means: It means that one atom is losing an electron to another atom making the latter oxidized.

Why it should be on the vocabulary list: It should be on the vocabulary list because it is an important chemical reaction to learn about and understand.

3. Word: Repel

Where it was found in the text: “After the electrons flee, positively charged atoms remain behind. Like charges repel. So those positive atoms push away from each other, creating spikes.

What it means: To back away from

Why it should be on the vocabulary list: It should be on the list because it describes how atoms act when losing or gaining electrons in reactions. If an atom loses an electron it becomes positively charged and pushes away or repels from other positive atoms. 

I like this strategy because I feel like it involves context clues as well. It makes the student think for themselves about what they feel the word means rather than being told or looking it up in a dictionary. It gives them the freedom to choose what words they believe to be relevant to the course and their education. Once students have chosen the words the teacher can then incorporate them into lessons and assignments to emphasis their importance and meaning for the students. 

References:

McLaughlin, M. (2015). Chapter Five: Using Comprehension Strategies to Guide Thinking.       In Content Area Reading: Teaching and Learning for College and Career Readiness (pp.     75-77).Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Kowalski, K. (2015, January 15). Rewritable paper: Prints with light, not ink. Retrieved 
    from https://student.societyforscience.org/article/rewritable-paper-prints-light-not-              ink?mode=topic&context=104

Marr, I. (2012, February 1). Artificial Sweeteners: Friends or Foes? Retrieved from                            https://learn.thinkcerca.com/student_assignments/1715015/lesson_steps/1      

Ornes, S. (2015, February 18). Why metals have a blast in water. Retrieved from Society for      Science & the Public - Student Science:https://student.societyforscience.org/article/why-      metals-have-blast-water?mode=topic&context=6