Reading for Intermediate and Advanced Learners, Spring, 2011

Possible Sentences
Possible Sentences is a pre-reading vocabulary strategy that sparks students’ interest in reading, accesses their prior knowledge about a topic or concept, teaches them how words may be used in the text, and helps to improve their reading comprehension. Before reading, students are provided a short list of vocabulary words from their reading. They create sentences based on their prediction of what the reading will be about. After reading, students check to see if their "possible sentences" are correct or if they need correction.
I plan to use this strategy with stories from the second grade basal reading series used in my classroom. Before reading a story, I would give students a list of six to eight vocabulary words and ask them to create sentences with the words that demonstrate their knowledge of the word. I would give them the option of using more than one of the vocabulary words in each sentence. Students would be given an opportunity to share one of their sentences with the class. As students read the story, they listen for the vocabulary words and how they are used in the story. After reading, students check to see if the words were properly used in the sentences and if not they tell how they can change the sentence to reflect the correct meaning.