Vocabulary Lesson

We’re nearly done reviewing yesterday’s words when a voice floats up from the back corner of the classroom. “Why are we learning these words? Who even says ‘persevere’?”

I bite my lip to keep from laughing as I face the class. “Persevere? Of all the words, persevere is the one that bugs you?”

Giggles. Yes.

It’s the second day of second semester. Most students have all new classes, but Reading class has only sort of changed. Sure, some students from Semester 1 have “graduated”; they are now reading at least a grade 8 level, so we’ve sent them off into the wilds of their regular classrooms. And some students have opted to take a break; we might think they still need reading support, but they need some time away to consider whether the hard work of improving their reading is worth it for them. Some students have opted in; someone has suggested that they might benefit from extra support, so they’ve joined our class. But the truth is that most students from the first semester are back for a second semester of improving reading skills – because learning to read takes time. This means our class is now a mixture of students who are deeply familiar with our routines and students who have no idea what we’re doing.

What we’re doing is getting ready to watch CNN10. Coy Wire, the anchor, is a fixture in our classroom. Every day, he brings us ten minutes of news, building background knowledge that was previously unavailable to many of our students because, well, reading. We started working with vocabulary in October, after Coy told us that “the perpetrators of the brazen heist at the Louvre were still at large” and I realized that our students didn’t know 

• what or where the Louvre is 
• what a heist is 
• what brazen means
• what perpetrators are and
• what it means to be “at large”. 

Oof.

Too often, information swims right past these students, and their defense mechanism is ignoring whatever is going by. In October, I paused the show, and we developed a routine: say the word, tap the word, spell the word, define the word. Then we discuss the issue at hand: what on earth is Coy talking about? CNN10 is supposed to be 10 minutes long, but it often takes us 20 minutes to get through. Last semester, students mastered words like consensus, unprecedented, to mint, autonomous and scintillating. Their pride was almost tangible.

But that was then, and now it’s the second day of the new semester and the back of the room wants to know if anyone actually says “persevere.” Challenge accepted. 

“Hold on,” I say. “I’m going to find the first adult I can who is not teaching and bring them back here to see if they know these words.”

The giggles become shocked laughter. 

“I’ll be right back.” And I am. I return with Amy, an EA from down the hall. Not only is she extremely cool looking with her shaved head and stretched ear piercings, it turns out that she is the aunt of one of my students. Immediate credibility. 

“Ok,” I say dramatically, “have I prepped you in any way?”

Amy says no. 

“Have I whispered the answers ahead of time?”

No.

With a flourish, I turn to the class. “Are you ready?”

Yes.

I ask Amy if she knows the word “icon” and she gives the class a withering look.

“Seriously?”

They tumble over each other to assure her that they already knew that word and I just put it on the board for… reasons. They encourage me to continue.

“Segregate.” She nails it.

“Perpetual?”

“Goes on and on – like it lasts.”

I pause for an extra beat and take a deep breath.

“Ok, this is the challenge: Do you know what ‘persevere’ means?”

She does. 

“Do you think people use the word ‘persevere’ or is it one of those useless school words?”

Amy looks a little incredulous. “Um… people use it a lot.”

I give the class a triumphant look. They reluctantly agree that I *might* be right about ‘persevere’. Amy goes back to her classroom; we go back to CNN10. I begin making a list of hard words from today’s show:

Endure
Appeal
Scathing

And then… out of the blue Coy says that someone has “persevered.” Everyone sits up. Giggles. Grins. The back corner looks slightly abashed (not that they know what abashed means). I get side-eye and someone says, “I bet he won’t say it tomorrow.”

We shall see, friends. Or perhaps I should say, we will persevere.