Because of your knowledge about vocabulary development, you're asked to visit a classroom during a PTA meeting and help PreK-4 teachers explain their standards-based vocabulary programs that are congruent with the Developmental Continuum: Vocabulary presented in the chapter 7. Read the sketches about classroom discussions and the questions that parents ask, refer to the Developmental Continuum for Vocabulary (Handout 7.1), and decide what you would say to the parents. Choose one question to respond, elaborating on your answers as if you were talking to parents. I picked 5. if you want you can choose different one.

1. Parents in Ms. Alverez' prekindergarten class ask how they can help to develop their children's vocabularies at home. What do you suggest? Identify three things that parents can do.
2. Second grade teacher, Mr. Robinson, explains to parents that he teaches base words and endings, such as swim + ing = swimming, to expand children's vocabularies. What else might he do?
3. Ms. Nesbit explains to her first grade students' parents about academic vocabulary and says that she teaches it every day. Parents wonder how she does it and what words she's teaching. How would you explain what Ms. Nesbit does?
4. Ms. Ortega explains to her third-grade students' parents that her goal is to develop her students' word consciousness. The parents ask Ms. Ortega for more information because they want to learn more about word conscious. How do you explain the term word consciousness?
5. Mrs. Kim tells parents that kindergartners should know 5,000 words by the end of the school year. Is that correct? Also, the parents ask why vocabulary knowledge is important. How do you respond?