One example of these strategies is the word wall; I attempted using the word wall for the past two years and still had not determined a successful implementation. Although I had read about word walls before, Herrell and Jordan's article reminded me that the word wall is really supposed to be there to benefit the students; it should be something they are aware of, that they help create, and that they can refer to. Teachers become so involved with proving to principals that their classroom contains the correct standards-based displays that we often forget that the purpose of having displays and bulletin boards is to help our students. An effective word wall is a great way for students, especially students with special needs and emergent bilinguals, to become familiar with the content vocabulary; creating games and activities based around the word wall is a good way to keep students engaged and make them aware of the vocabulary words.
I'm convinced - a word wall, with jargon terms, will be going up in my class this year.
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