How Unique Is the Target Vocabulary of Narrative and Expository Texts in Core Reading Programs?

• In Event: Examining Vocabulary Practices Through the Lenses of Linguistic Frameworks and Analytic Tools

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: This study examines the features of words identified for narrative and informational texts in third-grade texts of three core-reading programs (CRPs). A hallmark of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) is its emphasis on informational texts within English/Language Arts (ELA) instruction. A reason for this emphasis is that the underlying concepts of informational texts (e.g., energy, legislature) are often complex and require in-depth instruction (Nagy, Anderson, & Herman, 1987). Students may not immediately recognize the meanings of unique vocabulary in narratives (e.g., altercation; apologize) but they know the underlying meaning (e.g., fight; to be sorry) (Jenkins & Dixon, 1983). If the criteria appropriate for selecting vocabulary in narrative texts are used with informational text, the unique content of informational texts may not taught.

PERSPECTIVES: The framework used to study vocabulary comes from Nagy and Hiebert (2010). This framework, provided in Table 1, addresses eight criteria for word selection that are clustered into four groups according to the role of words in language (frequency and use across genres, topics, and subject areas), lexicon (morphological relatedness, semantic relatedness), students’ existing knowledge (familiarity, conceptual difficulty), and the lesson (text/larger curriculum). Teachers and test and material developers required information on the first three categories to make informed choices about the vocabulary that is taught in lessons.

METHODS: All of the words targeted for instruction in the third-grade programs of three CRPs were the focus of this study (Afflerbach et al., 2012; Beck et al., 2008); August et al., 2011). Data for frequency, dispersion, morphological family size, semantic membership cluster, length, age of acquisition, and concreteness-abstractness were obtained from various analytic tools (see Table 1).

RESULTS: Means for six of the features of vocabulary for narrative and expository texts are provided in Table 2. Distributions of the narrative and expository vocabulary within semantic clusters are given in Table 3.

Vocabulary for narrative and expository texts was similar on age of acquisition and word length but, in frequency (of both target words and morphological families), distribution of words across content areas, and concreteness/abstractness, the target words differed. Words in expository text were, on average, more frequent, concrete, and likely to appear across more content areas than target words for narrative texts. There were also differences in the semantic clusters for the two corpora (Table 3) with more of target words in narrative texts representing emotions/attitudes and character traits and more of the words in expository texts representing the natural environment and characters.

Differences in semantic clustering suggest that publishers are distinguishing between target words in expository and narrative texts. But the findings on dispersion, frequency, and age of acquisition counter typical perceptions of critical words in expository texts as “Tier 3” (i.e., words from specific domains) in that target words for expository texts were more likely to be frequent and within the oral vocabularies of grade-level students. These findings suggest that further attention is required to ensure that the words chosen for instructional lessons truly capture the uniqueness of vocabulary in narrative and expository texts.

Author

• Elfrieda H. Hiebert, TextProject