Words Their Way: Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction by Donald R. Bear, Shane Templeton, Marcia Invernizzi, Francine Johnston

From the Publisher

This book would be very useful for both university reading courses and classroom teachers.  I use Words Their Way both in my first grade classroom and with college students as a way to implement word study.

Kristi McNeal, CSU Fresno

Words Their Way’s developmentally-driven, hands-on instructional approach has been a phenomenon in word study, providing a practical way to study words with students.  The keys to this research-based approach are to know your students’ literacy progress, organize for instruction, and implement word study.  This streamlined text and the DVD and CD-ROM that accompany it gives you all the tools you need to carry out word study instruction that will motivate and engage your students, and help them to succeed in literacy learning.  Ordered in a developmental format, Words Their Way complements the use of any existing phonics, spelling, and vocabulary curricula.

Knowing Your Students

• Streamlined Chapter 2 provides step by step guidelines for assessing students.
• NEW! Words Their Way Word Study Resources CD: Assessment Planning and Additional Interactive Word Sorts contains computerized assessments to gauge students’ developmental levels.
• Word Study with English Learner sections in each chapter help you organize and adapt instruction to meet the needs of students whose first language is not English.

Organizing for Instruction

• NEW! Words Their Way DVD Tutorial: Planning for Word Study in K-8 Classrooms reinforces andillustrates classroom organization and management, as outlined in Chapter 3.
• Word Study Routines and Management sections in every chapter give you practical guidance on managing and implementing word study in your classroom.
• NEW! Tech Notes throughout chapters pinpoint opportunities for you to use the DVD and CD-ROM to prepare for instruction.

Implementing Word Study

• Classroom-proven, research-driven activities end each developmental chapter, giving you the instructional practices to get your word study instruction up and running immediately.
• NEW! Words Their Way Word Study Resources CD: Assessment Planning and Additional Interactive Word Sorts provides more than just assessments.  You’ll also find hundreds of additional word and picture sorts, games and templates, and an interactive Create Your Own section.
• The Appendix at the back of the book contains a comprehensive bank of word lists, word sorts, picture sorts, games and templates.

The theory behind and practice for word sorts allows even the novice teacher to understand how to use the assessments to organize instruction.  The organization of the last five chapters creates a useful resource for teachers.  Each begins with a research-based description and moves into sound instructional practices, giving the teacher a complete understanding of how to meet the needs of students.

Cathy Blanchfield, CSU Fresno 

Meet the Authors

• Donald Bear is Director of the E.L. Cord Foundation Center for Learning and Literacy at the University of Nevada, Reno, assessing and teaching students who experience difficulties learning to read and write.  A former preschool and elementary teacher, Donald currently researches literacy development with a special interest in students who speak languages other than English, and he partners with schools and districts to consider assessment and literacy instruction.
• Marcia Invernizzi is Director of the McGuffey Reading Center at the University of Virginia exploring developmental universals in non-English orthographies.  A former English and reading teacher, Marcia works with children experiencing difficulties learning to read and write in intervention programs such as Virginia’s Early Intervention Reading Initiative and Book Buddies.
• Shane Templeton is Foundation Professor of Literacy Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.  A former classroom teacher at the primary and secondary levels, he researches the development of orthographic and vocabulary knowledge
• Francine Johnston is Associate Professor in the School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where she teaches reading, language arts, and children’s literature.  A former first-grade teacher and reading specialist.

What People Are Saying

"This book would be very useful for both university reading courses and classroom teachers. I use Words Their Way both in my first grade classroom and with college students as a way to implement word study."
—Kristi McNeal, California State University Fresno

"The theory behind and practice for word sorts allows even the novice teacher to understand how to use the assessments to organize instruction. The organization of the last five chapters creates a useful resource for teachers. Each begins with a research-based description and moves into sound instructional practices, giving the teacher a complete understanding of how to meet the needs of students."
—Cathy Blanchfield, California State University Fresno

Product Details

• Table of Contents
• Forewords & Introductions

Table of Contents

Forewords & Introductions

Words Their Way: Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction, Third Edition, provides a practical way to study words with students. Based on research on developmental spelling and word knowledge, the framework of this text is keyed to five stages and instructional levels. Ordered in this way, Words Their Way complements the use of any existing phonics, spelling, and vocabulary curricula.

The third edition of our text broadens and strengthens an already acute vision of today's classrooms. We provide more support for upper elementary, middle, and secondary students and their teachers, and add a new focus on English Language Learners. Issues of classroom management are also examined in every chapter, beginning with a deep focus in Chapter 3.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New! ELL Teaching Notes throughout chapters help you to adapt your word study lessons to better suit English Language Learners.
• New! CD-ROM integration. Notes throughout each chapter point to ways to integrate the materials found on the free CD-ROM with chapter content.
• New! Companion Website margin notes integrate this great online supplement with the text, leading you to additional related content to be found on our Companion Website, available at
• An "Adaptable for Other Stages" symbol indicates activities that can be adapted to other developmental levels.

TEXT ORGANIZATION

We have organized this text so that it can be easily used in 4 number of ways. To explore the nature of word study and the type of classroom organization and environment that enhances implementation of word study, wesuggest you begin reading this text at the beginning—with Chapter 1. If you want to jump right in and explore word study activities with your students, we recommend that you skim Chapters 3 through 8, look for activities related to the developmental levels of your students, and examine a few closely. Then try one or two out with a small group'of students. Remember that additional materials are available on the free CD-ROM enclosed in the text.

Chapter 1: The first chapter presents an overview of how words are learned, a discussion of reading, spelling, and writing development, and a rationale for word study phonics, spelling, and vocabulary instruction in the classroom.

Chapter 2: The second chapter presents the assessment process in a step-by-step manner to administer, score, and analyze students' spelling. There are now nine inventories, including a Spanish spelling inventory, and based on our recent research we made refinements in the word lists and scoring guides to make instructional planning easier. Guidelines for interpreting spelling errors by English language learners are presented.

Chapter 3: In this chapter we clearly present ways to organize word study in a classroom setting. The planning activities integrate word study into reading and language arts programs.

Chapters 4 through 8 focus on particular stages of literacy development. We hope you will be pleased to see a more explicit scope and sequence of word study instruction for each developmental stage. Sections of developmentally appropriate activities, tabbed in color for easy location, accompany each of these chapters. Often presented in a game-like format, these activities are actually minilessons that draw upon what students are learning concurrently in developmental reading and writing.

We have included activities that are especially interesting to students and can be easily integrated into the many contexts in which reading and writing activities occur. In each activity, students examine words and their sound and spelling patterns, and they reflect on how words are organized, how they are spelled, and what they mean.

Chapter 4: This chapter is dedicated to Word Study for Learners in the Emergent Stage. The accompanying activities address phonological awareness and vocabulary development as well as alphabet knowledge and concepts about print and the orthography.

Chapter 5: Chapter 5 examines Word Study for Beginners in the Letter Name-Alphabetic Stage. Here we present a systematic scope and sequence for phonics instruction appropriate for beginning readers, including explicit directions for teacher-directed word sorts and suggestions for more open-ended explorations.

Chapter 6: In this chapter we focus on Word Study for Transitional Learners in the Within Word Pattern Stage. The sequence of word study for this stage focuses on vowel patterns, and the accompanying activities support the development of automatic word recognition and fluency.

Chapter 7: This third edition includes an even stronger focus on intermediate and advanced readers and writers. In this chapter we look at Word Study for Intermediate Readers and Writers: The Syllables and Affixes Stage. We outline a systematic curriculum for vocabulary and spelling instruction of multisyllabic words. The activities begin with consonant doubling and end with the study of the basic prefixes and suffixes.

Chapter 8: Chapter 8 is strengthened to include even more on Word Study for Advanced Readers and Writers: The Derivational Relations Stage. Throughout this chapter, the spelling-meaning connection is the fundamental principle we use to teach students Greek and Latin bases and roots. The scope and sequence is clearly described, and the activities will advance students' vocabularies.

Appendix: In the Appendix you will find all of the reproducible materials in one place. It begins with the assessment materials that were discussed in Chapter 2. We have added more games, assessments, word lists, and sorts to this edition, all of which are available, along with game templates,-in the Appendix. These pages are perforated for your convenience.