The Origin of ClueWise Vocabulary
"It's time to check your vocabulary homework," I announced to my third period seventh grade English class. This was a group I genuinely enjoyed teaching, even though they weren’t exactly known for doing their homework. "Please open your workbook to page 32. As you work on the warm-up, I'll stop by your desk to give you a homework completion stamp. After we review the warm-up, I'll go over the three most challenging vocabulary exercises from last night and answer any questions you might have."
A few students shuffled through their backpacks for their workbooks. Others looked at their feet, taking great pains to avoid making eye contact with me—a clear signal they hadn’t done the assignment. A couple let out muffled groans.
By the time I finished my sweep through the room, the results were obvious. Only about a third of the class had completed the work. Some had scribbled in random words just to collect partial credit and avoid showing me a blank page. A few didn’t have their book at all. I can't really say that surprised me, since three tattered, coverless copies had been sitting abandoned on the air conditioner for weeks.
Although I took responsibility for failing to motivate my students, I couldn’t ignore the book itself. It was small and cramped, nearly impossible to write in, and the word lists felt random. The exercises were rote and uninspiring. My students weren’t at fault for finding it boring. That day, I decided to turn a corner.
"We're putting away the vocabulary books," I declared. "Leave them home. Learning is supposed to be fun, not a chore. Instead, we're going to try something that might actually help you for the rest of your life. We're not just going to learn lists of words. We're going to learn how to learn words. We'll study word parts, and when you can recognize them, you'll be able to make educated guesses about meanings. We'll also use context clues (the details in a passage that surround a word) to zero in even more."
The room went silent. Then came a few cheers.
Before that day, I had wondered why my students seemed more excited about Spanish class than English. During homeroom, I’d see them enthusiastically reviewing for Spanish tests. I’d overhear them say things like, "That’s the same as the English word!" whenever they discovered cognates. Those moments lit them up, I presumed, because they gave the students a sense of instant success.
Eventually I asked a student, "Why are you so much more interested in studying for Spanish vocabulary quizzes than English ones?"
The answer was a revelation: "Well, Mr. Thorne, it’s fun in Spanish. We use pictures and flashcards, and besides, if we don’t learn the words, we won’t know what’s going on in class."
There it was. They had a real need to learn the words, and their Spanish teacher made them engaging. At first I thought, Sure, that’s easy when you’re teaching basic sight words. Harder with more challenging vocabulary. But then I remembered how much joy my students felt with cognates: hospital, animal, doctor, capital. They loved finding those connections. Why? Partly because they didn’t have to memorize an entirely new word. But more than that, cognates made them feel successful.
Kids like patterns, and cognates gave them a low-frustration way to see them. Realizing that most Spanish -ción words match English -tion words turned learning into a puzzle. Could I replicate that with English? Not exactly, but I could come close. What if I taught them patterns in English, using roots, prefixes, and suffixes through puzzles, riddles, and mysteries?
So I did. And something changed. The very students who had once refused to touch the workbook began joining in. They looked for patterns, used word parts as clues, and started treating words like mysteries to be solved. That was the beginning of ClueWise Vocabulary.
Soon I saw another shift: the students who were formerly my least engaged were suddenly taking pride in making connections, and the most reluctant learners were starting to play with language.
It was a long road that brought me here, but I hope you’ll benefit from what I learned. If your students aren’t engaged in your current program, it may be because you’re using a book so dull it could put the school mascot to sleep in the middle of a pep rally. Or maybe it’s because students don’t see any relevance between the word lists and their lives.
Stop preparing them to memorize words for a quiz, only to forget them the next day. Vocabulary should be fun, enduring, and empowering, and not just for the students. Teachers should enjoy it, too. That’s ClueWise Vocabulary.
Epilogue:
On the last day of that school year, a student quietly approached me.
"Thank you," he said. "This is the first time English class has ever been fun. You taught me it’s okay to make mistakes and that we often learn more from failing than from being right."
A lump formed in my throat. This was one of the students who regularly stared at his feet during homework checks earlier in the school year. He still didn't do his homework every night, but his habits improved noticeably once he embraced being a word detective. The real change happened in the classroom; his participation and test scores soared.
"No, thank you," I told him. "Figuring out how to help you learn made me a better teacher."
"I have a confession," he said. "I used to hate your class. That vocabulary book without a cover in the lost and found? It’s mine. I tore the cover off because I didn’t want it returned. When you saw that I didn't have a book anymore and gave me copies of the assignments, I ripped those up, too. Most teachers would have been mad or given up on me. Thank you for listening to what I was really trying to say."
Students aren't always able to tell their teachers exactly what they need. What do you think your students are really trying to say?