Interactive Word Wall

Students seem to come to us at the beginning of each semester with a very limited vocabulary. Often times I take for granted they know words; many of them are words they should have learned years earlier. So not only am I introducing them to new terms but I find myself re-teaching basic vocabulary they are lacking. Each geography unit taught comes with vocabulary related to the unit. As they begin each new unit, students are required to record vocabulary onto note cards as well as the Word Wall located on the wall reserved for new and previous terms. To make the activity a little more fun or interesting for some students, they were placed into groups and asked to come up with illustrations related to each term. The students spent one day in their groups preparing their illustrations. The next day they volunteered to present their illustrations on the Smart Board. One person from the group went up front and drew their picture on the board while the students in the other groups tried to guess what term on the word wall was being illustrated. I used this activity at the middle school level, 6th grade, and it seemed to be successful at that level. Some students have an easier time remembering terms when they can relate them to an image.