Using the State Curriculum: Reading/ELA, Grade 8

The teacher should select a word that is being overused by students and declare that word "outlawed" during class. Next, students should use a print or on-line resource to determine synonyms and antonyms for the outlawed word. Given all the new words, small groups of students should arrange these words in a gradient from strongest to weakest and then groups should compare and justify their gradients. Finally, students should create a class dictionary where they can replace the outlawed word in writing and speech. This activity can be completed multiple times to expand the class dictionary.

The teacher should create a list of unfamiliar but useful words. Next, the class should be divided into small groups of no more than three students. Each group will be given a word from the list and instructed to research its meaning and origin through an online source. Once students have gathered information on their word, they should create a plan to teach the word to the remainder of the class. The plan should be innovative and technology driven. It might be a movie, a power point, etc…. The teacher should approve each group's plan, and each group should prepare their presentation to deliver to the class.

Before this activity, the teacher should prepare a series of challenging antonym pairs like inferior/superior, vast/modest, domineering/submissive, or accurate/mistaken. Enough pairs should be created so that each student in the class can receive one word. To that end, a single word should be written on a single card, and a single card should be given to each student. Next, students should learn their word's multiple meanings, antonyms, and pronunciation through a print or online source. Once students know their words, direct them to find their word's antonym partner in the class. Then the pairs of students should share/teach their word pairs to the remainder of the class. A running list of these antonym pairs can be displayed for the class.