Vocabulary and the new GCSE - a second attempt

 In a previous post, I tried to think through what I wanted from a Scheme of Work for the new GCSE in terms of Vocabulary and the Vocabulary List. I ended up going round in circles. It's been going round and round in my head ever since, so I'm going to try again to get it straight, and at least work out what the issues are I want to solve.

Here's a list of Vocabulary headlines:

• I don't want to give the pupils the entire exam board vocabulary list and say "Learn this" - whether that be at the start of the course or in panic revision mode at the end!
• I don't want to chop up the exam board vocabulary list and give them a chunk a week, that has nothing to do with the words they are seeing in lessons.
• I do want weekly vocabulary homework lists to relate to the words we see week-by-week in class. Whether that be for seeing vocabulary in advance of the lesson, or for revising vocabulary after the lesson.
• I don't want words to be met as a one-off because they appear in a text or because they are on the list or because they relate to a topic.
• I want to make sure the vocabulary homework lists cover all the words on the exam board list, and that they are met and re-encountered in class in different contexts across the course.

What I can see now but which I failed to pin down explicitly enough in the previous post, is that this isn't about the vocabulary homework lists at all. The vocabulary lists we put on Quizlet are extracted from the course. So what matters is that the course itself - the way it is planned and resourced - makes sure the whole vocabulary list is built into the texts and content of the course.

In the first instance, we could look to the textbooks. Have the publishers constructed such a course, starting from the vocabulary list? Or have they started from a topic approach, using such words as are appropriate to the topic? They may have identified in the unit vocabulary pages which words are on the exam list. Have they shown us the other way round? Where are all the words on the vocabulary list met and re-met?

I also think there is not going to be a perfect solution. And maybe we are not going to see the change of approach the new GCSE was supposed to bring in. The exams may look pretty familiar. And the language pupils need for Speaking and Writing is not going to be limited to the Vocabulary list.

So I think I need to stop hankering after a perfect solution, and think clearly what I can realistically do:

• Vocabulary homework lists which combine the core repertoire of opinions, reasons, descriptions, tenses with the vocabulary for each topic.
• Vocabulary homework lists which combine the high frequency non-topic words (often, a bit, some, nobody) with the vocabulary for each topic.
• Deliberately re-writing texts from the textbook to mirror them in other topics, to re-encounter and emphasise some of the words that could belong in any topic. Especially verbs (manage, succeed, follow).
• Monitoring which words slip through the net (puissance, souci or gérer), including giving pupils this responsibility.
• Assessments which do not have a topic based focus.

What I have just done is recreate the previous post. With less ranting and less going round in circles. But coming to the same conclusions! I suppose that's progress. And it means I think I have the Vocabulary question in a state where it can fit in with the other elements that need putting together, without it being the piece of the jigsaw that just didn't fit. It's going to have to fit!

How close am I to concluding that if the Vocabulary List doesn't mean we have to change everything, do we actually need to change anything much at all? Try this post where I finally shoot the Vocabulary List fairy.