Vocabulary Strategy
List‐Group‐Label‐Define
Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt
Edition: New York: Berkley JAM, 2002
Statement of Purpose: Developed by Hilda Taba (1967) to help students work with
new terminology and technical vocabulary, the list‐group‐label strategy helps
students brainstorm previous knowledge about a topic, pools group knowledge to
learn collectively, and introduces new vocabulary. In addition, this strategy requires
students to engage with categorization and organization skills. While this strategy
usually centers around one topic within the novel’s context, it teaches students
important skills of pooling knowledge, organizing information, and learning new
vocabulary—all skills that they can apply in other classes and reading/writing
assignments. The additional “Define” segment of the strategy teaches students how
to find the definition for words they don’t know from the List‐Group‐Label exercise
(and eventually any word from their assigned reading of the novel), and associate
them within the groups and labels on the class wall. Being familiar with the Civil
War context and terminology will help students with comprehension and reading
fluency as they encounter these words in the novel, and give them the tools to
understand new words they encounter in the novel.
Context: This strategy works best as a pre‐assessment activity before reading
Across Five Aprils. Because the novel alludes to many of the events of the Civil War
without fully explaining the context of the war, it is important for the teacher to
assess what students already know about the Civil War and what students still need
to know to understand the novel. The novel contains several undefined war terms
such as “Mason‐Dixon Line,” “Emancipation,” and “Armistice” that might be
confusing to students without a context for the war. This strategy introduces
students to new vocabulary within the civil war context from their classmates that
are crucial to their understanding of the novel. This strategy will likely take about
30‐40 minutes depending on how long it takes for students to group, label, and
define the terms.
Directions:
1. This activity should be done shortly before starting Across Five Aprils and
after at least one pre‐reading activity that starts students thinking about the
Civil War.
2. Hand each student 2 large sticky notes and write the word Civil War on the
board. Ask students to think quietly of all the events or terms they known
that are associated with that era.
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3. Ask each student to write down two terms associated with the Civil War (one
on each sticky note in large letters). Be sure to tell them that no one in the
class can have the same word, so students should think of very specific or
less common words.
4. Have each student put their sticky notes up on the board in front of the class
as soon as they write them down. This should take less than 5 minutes to
introduce the activity and get the words up on the wall.
5. Ask students to arrange the words into groups, by associating words with
each other, but not labeling the groups yet. Ask students to raise their hands
if they have a suggestion for where a word should be moved. Students
should have previously learned about coming to a consensus as a group, but
you may need to remind them of the rules. Probably not all of the students
will agree on where each word should be placed, but remind students that
some words can go into many categories, and pick the category that the
majority of students seem to vote for. Students may get excited and start
calling out and interrupting each other as they offer suggestions. If it gets too
rowdy, remind students to raise their hands.
6. To refine the categorization skills of students, assign labels as a class to the
various categories that have been developed. For each category, you might
take a few suggestions from students before coming to a consensus on which
one to use, as labeling can be a refining process to narrow down to a more
precise word.
7. After students have created categories, ask students to pick two words from
the combined collection that they are unfamiliar with. Explain that students will
take these two words and create a Four‐Square poster for a large word wall in
the classroom to help students as they read about the Civil War in the novel. In
addition to the words from the List‐Group‐Label strategy, put up a list of war
terms from the book they may also choose:
•Industrialism
•Mason‐Dixon Line
•Secession
•Emancipation
•Copperhead
•Armistice
8. Hand out two 8X11 pieces of postor board to each student and show them an
example of a Four‐Square poster. Students should divide the poster into four
sections and write the word in one space, define the word in one space (using
a dictionary and any research they do), draw a picture of the definition in one
space, and write a contextually rich sentence using the word in another
space. You may need to show them examples of a contextually rich sentence.
Students may complete the posters for homework
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9. After teaching this strategy, make a poster for each of the labels the class
came up with and put them on the classroom wall. When students bring
their posters in they can place their words under the appropriate category,
and students can refer to these words and definitions throughout the novel.
10. As students continue to read the novel, have them keep a running list of
words they do not know and have them continue to add to the word wall
with additional Four‐Square posters throughout the unit.
Materials: 2 large sticky notes for every student, 2 pieces of 8X11 poster for each
student, examples of a Four‐Square
Assessment: The LGLD encourages students to teach each other as they pool their
knowledge together on the topic of the Civil War in preparation for reading the
novel. It teaches students to organize their thinking and to look up words they don’t
know and associate them within an appropriate context so they will remember the
new vocabulary. This skill will help students in their future reading with
comprehension and fluency.
Summary and Segue: At the close of teaching this strategy, remind students that
this strategy of brainstorming, pooling knowledge, and organizing can be applied to
writing papers and exploring new topics. In a later assignment after starting the
novel, have students write a short paragraph on each of the categories, using some
of the terms inside and giving an overview of the civil war era. This will allow them
to apply the words into writing and cement the strategy of categorizing. Also remind
students that this strategy of looking up words they don’t know is a great way to
increase their vocabulary as they read any novel. When students bring back their
Four‐Squares. Have them briefly present their words to the class as they put them
up on the wall so they are all exposed to the definitions before beginning the novel.
This will help them remember them more easily when they come across similar
terms in their reading.
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Sample List‐Group‐Label
Civil War
List:
‐slavery
‐white slave holders
‐underground railroad
‐Abraham Lincoln
‐Emancipation Proclamation
‐secession
‐Confederacy
‐Union
‐General Grant
‐Battle of Gettysburg
‐General Lee
‐deserters
‐democracy
Groups and labels:
Civil War Political Actions
-draft
‐armistice
‐Mason‐Dixon line
‐secession
‐Emancipation Proclamation
‐underground railroad
‐soldiers
‐massacres
‐Mason‐Dixon line
‐industrialism
‐armistice
‐race
‐guns
‐Battle of Bull Run
‐Federals
‐Army of Potomac
‐draft
‐Fredericksburg
‐death
‐uniforms
Causes of War
‐slavery
‐Industrialism
‐race
War Components
‐guns
‐death
‐uniforms
Battles in the Civil War:
‐Battle of Bull Run
‐Battle of Gettysburg
‐Fredericksburg
Leaders from the South:
‐General Lee
Leaders from the North:
-Abraham Lincoln
‐General Grant
Civil War Groups:
-white slave holders
‐confederacy
deserters
‐soldiers
‐Federals
‐Army of Potomac
‐Union
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Armistice
Definition: An
agreement made by
opposing sides in a war
to stop fighting for a
certain time; truce
The Northern and
Southern armies only
stopped fighting after
their two generals
signed an armistice,
agreeing on certain
terms.
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Vocabulary Strategy Reflection
This List‐Group‐Label‐Define strategy will help students to comprehend
Across Five Aprils better, as it introduces them to Civil War terminology and events
prior to reading the novel. In addition, students learn the definition of at least two
words they don’t know relating to the Civil War, and collectively create a word wall
they can reference throughout the novel. Because this book references many Civil
War events but does not explain many of them, this wall will become crucial to
students’ comprehension of the book. Students will be asked to keep a running list
of unfamiliar war terms/events in the novel and regularly add to the word wall
under the categories they came up with as a class. This will not only teach them
new vocabulary, but will help them file it into a certain context and associate it with
other words in the same category. This is important for long‐term memory and
application of the vocabulary.
This strategy will help students to get excited about learning new words
because it is a bit more active and involved than just giving them a list of vocabulary
words to learn. It also gives students the tools they need to comprehend additional
words they come across in the novel and get in the habit of learning vocabulary
while they read instead of just skipping over unfamiliar words. This is important
especially for struggling readers. The Four Square strategy for the word wall also
helps students learn and remember the words better because they are defining,
drawing, and using the word, giving them three ways to remember the word. It is
important when teaching this strategy to make sure students pick words for the
word wall that are truly unfamiliar to them and most others, or the strategy will not
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be as affective. As a teacher, I may need to have an additional list of words to
supplement the class list.
Anderson, BYU, 2010