I wrote an article in March about best practices for explicitly teaching vocabulary. Robert Marzano's six-step approach to supporting students with vocabulary acquisition and retention is still one of my favorite approaches to teaching vocabulary.

From Step 1 (introducing the new term by providing a description, explanation or example of the new term) to Step 6 (involving students periodically in games that allow them to play with terms), the six-step approach ensures students understand and retain key academic vocabulary.

After teachers have sorted vocabulary terms into the three tiers and determined which words merit more attention in upcoming text, I encourage teachers to think about how they will differentiate instruction for learners who will need explicit and specialized vocabulary instruction.

In the former article, I provided a few instructional strategies such as digital comic strip makers like storyboardthat.com, makebeliefscomix.com and pixton.com. I'd also like to share a tactile instructional strategy — foldables — that supports students who have organizational and processing needs.

Foldables are fun, motivating, three-dimensional interactive graphic organizers that students create to support organization of key material, such as vocabulary terms. Foldables support students with note-taking and retention of information. Students draw pictures to help remember the concept, as well as annotations to meaning in their first language (for ELLs).

For examples of vocabulary foldables and templates to print out, click here.

Teachers should start to collect and match instructional resources and tools to support targeted vocabulary acquisition during planning. I always urge co-teachers to consider using the alternative co-teaching model to frontload and preteach targeted vocabulary for students who have significant gaps in background knowledge and memory learning barriers.

Universal Design for Learning Principle I: "Provide Multiple Means of Representation" provides a few digital resources for multiple options and support for vocabulary and symbols.

Visuwords and Shahi are online graphic dictionaries and thesaurusi that help develop word knowledge around targeted vocabulary. Specifically, in visuwords, word relationships are illustrated by the color and pattern of the link between words.

Vocab Ahead offers videos that give an active demonstration of vocabulary with audio repeating the pronunciation, definition, various uses and synonyms. Students can also practice with flash cards that give a written definition and visual representation of the word.

After students have internalized the targeted vocabulary introduced, a great way for students to practice the academic vocabulary is to have them create digital flashcards on the key terms. Quizlet allows students to make simple learning tools for free — flashcards, games, etc. Students can add images, sentences, etc., to match their vocabulary terms.

Quizlet also has precreated flashcards for thousands of concepts that you and students can use for class. Students can download the app on their phone and manipulate the virtual cards in any setting.

Vocabulary time should be a fun learning experience, so try one of these digital tools and resources to engage students and build a lifelong love of words.