Semantic Organization PDF

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VOCABULARY DEVELOPMENT &SEMANTIC ORGANISATION What is semantic organisation ? As children learn about their world, they need to learn how to organise the incoming information in order to make sense of it, and the new knowledge they acquire. Children learn vocabulary, concepts and how to understand and use complex language. These skills start at the very basic level of recognising features, patterns, attributes, characteristics, consistencies and irregularities in objects, events and experiences. At first, this recognition may be non-verbal, but children soon start to acquire words the vocabulary and descriptive language which both consolidate and promote this learning. These verbal and nonverbal skills then allow the child to develop the ability to compare, contrast, classify and categorise. These are essential for making sense of the world. Children who have difficulty organising and processing information will also have difficulty retrieving and organising what they want to say. They may have problems with knowing the meaning of words and concepts and understanding how these can be categorised. In addition, they will have difficulties understanding the relationships between words in sentences (such as temporal, causal, spatial), and fail to interpret these correctly. It is possible to hypothesise a hierarchy of simple to complex semantic organisation skills to guide the selection of therapy goals in this area. J Labelling J Functions J Attributes + simple description J Associations J Similarities J Differences J Categorisation J Describing J Synonyms/Antonyms J Definitions/ word meanings J Multiple Meanings J Word relationships J Semantic absurdities and semantic metalinguistic awareness J Figurative language/ implied meaning In addition, children may have specific difficulty with word retrieval. Cueing techniques are known to help and intervention should focus on the goals of:  Wordfinding  Fluency  Flexibility  Cueing techniques  Processing and producing discourse

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource

SEMANTIC ORGANISATION HANDOUT BUILDING UP VOCABULARY KNOWLEDGE The goal of this programme is to build up knowledge of words and labels for actions/objects. Vocabulary development should occur while we also learn about the world and events. Our knowledge is linked to contexts (such as the farm, hospitals, shopping). Schema is the name given to specific contexts that we experience such as riding on a bus, going to the supermarket, cooking dinner. Vocabulary development is learnt within this developing knowledge of contexts and schema. SPECIFIC GOALS: J Build up knowledge of particular contexts and schema J Teach labels/names for words/actions/events J Learn about functions of objects J Learn about how things happen ACTIVITIES should incorporate a 'theme' which will build up schema knowledge. Themes should involve contexts a child is likely to experience as this will give them the vocabulary they need when they are in such a situation - in other words, involve 'real-life' contexts. Use symbolic play, role play and joint action routines. Read stories and act them out. Make up collages of pictures based around a theme to stick on the wall or cover the pages of a scrapbook. Examples of 'contexts': school shopping farm garden cooking bath time bedtime mealtimes beach zoo going on a bus/train visit to doctor/dentist parties LANGUAGE TO USE: QUESTIONS TO ASK What is this ?What's this called ? What's he/she doing ? What do you do with this ? What do you use it for ? Where do you find this ? What is it made out of ? What colour/shape/size is it ? What is happening ? What will happen next ? Can you think of something else you might see at the ......?

LANGUAGE TO MODEL This is a ...... He/she is ......... This is used for ....... We use this to ........ We find it in/at ..... It's made out of ...... It is ......... Talk about what is happening. When I was at the ...... I saw a........ There could also be ........

SUGGESTED RESOURCES First 1000 word picture books Large picture books/dictionaries with pages built around themes Books - fact or fiction about a theme (with lots of pictures) and picture cards Old magazines and catalogues to cut up (junk mail can be very useful!) Suze Leitão Speech Pathologist

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource

SEMANTIC ORGANISATION HANDOUT COMPARING AND CONTRASTING The goal of this programme is to build up knowledge of words. It is important that we learn how objects and events are associated and linked. Our vocabulary development is learnt within this developing knowledge of contexts and schema. SPECIFIC GOALS: J Developing an understanding of how objects/events are associated (go together) J Comparing - discussing similarities J Contrasting - discussing differences ACTIVITIES should incorporate a 'theme' which will build up schema knowledge. Fun games include 'Go Together' Snap, Lotto or Memory where pairs of cards can be linked in some way. Children only 'win' a pair if they can explain the association. Remember, there can be many different reasons why things might 'go together'! Semantic grids can be used to compare objects along the same dimensions, eg OBJECT size colour location etc Bird Cow LANGUAGE TO USE: QUESTIONS TO ASK Can you find two that go together ? Show me some that go together. Why did you put those together ? Can you find one that's the same in some way ? Can you tell me one way they are a bit the same ? How did you know these were the same? Can you find one that's different in some way ? Can you tell me one way they are a bit different ? How did you know these were different?

LANGUAGE TO MODEL I think these go together. Here is a ---- and a -----. They go together because ........ Here is a -------. This one is a bit the same. These are the same because ...... These go together because ...... Here is a -------, and this one is a bit the different. These are different because ......

SUGGESTED RESOURCES Real objects or pictures of items linked to a theme or category Large picture dictionaries and old magazines and catalogues Vocabulary workbooks eg SPARC picture book, Vocabulary to Go! First Steps (WA) - Oral Language Module 'Classification' Suze Leitão, Speech Pathologist

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource

SEMANTIC ORGANISATION HANDOUT LEARNING ABOUT CATEGORIES The goal of this programme is to build up knowledge of words and organisation of concepts. Our vocabulary development is learnt within our developing knowledge of contexts and schema. This knowledge is organised within a system of categories. Learning about categories and subcategories is an important step in developing a well organised system of vocabulary. SPECIFIC GOALS: J Build up knowledge of particular contexts J Learn about how objects and events can be organised into categories and subcategories J Learn that categories can be flexible and objects can often belong to more than one category or 'group' ACTIVITIES should incorporate a 'theme' which will build up schema knowledge. Fun games include asking children to sort objects/pictures into 'groups'. Children should have practise with large groups (categories eg animals, food) and smaller groups (subcategories eg breakfast foods, food I like/hate). They should be allowed to sort by themselves and also according to criteria given to them (eg sort these clothes into three groups - things men, ladies or children can wear). You can use posting boxes to sort out cards or stick pictures onto big 'category' collages. Children also need to experience that categories are flexible by sorting the same material in different ways. Another activity involves making a number of cards with category names on them. The child must turn over a card, roll a dice and then name that number of objects from within the category. An alternative is to have 'teams' of children competing to see who can list the most examples from a given category. LANGUAGE TO USE: QUESTIONS TO ASK Can you find some that go together? Why did you put those together ? Can you sort these into two groups ? Can you sort these out into ...... & .......? Now can you think of another way to sort them out ? Can you tell me some ways that these are the same ? Do these belong in the same group ? What group of things does this go with? What is the name of this group ?

LANGUAGE TO MODEL These go together because ....

I can sort these out and make three groups - ........& ...... & ...... Another way I can sort them out is ... These are the same because .... These all belong together in a group. This is a kind of ...... This group is called .......

SUGGESTED RESOURCES Old magazines and catalogues to cut up (junk mail can be very useful!) Vocabulary workbooks eg SPARC picture book, Vocabulary to Go!, LPR handbook First Steps (WA) - Oral Language Module 'Classification' Suze Leitão, Speech Pathologist

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource

SEMANTIC ORGANISATION HANDOUT DESCRIBING The goal of this programme is to build up knowledge of words and organisation of concepts. Vocabulary development is learnt within our developing knowledge of contexts and schema. School-aged children need to learn to express themselves competently, both orally and in their written work. They need to learn to use descriptive language, in particular in certain types of texts. SPECIFIC GOALS: J Producing oral and written 'descriptions' (describe specific objects) J Producing oral and written 'reports' (describe groups of objects) ACTIVITIES should incorporate a 'theme' which will build up schema knowledge. Themes should involve contexts a child is likely to experience as this will give them the vocabulary they need when they are in such a context - in other words, involve 'real-life' contexts as well as fantasy. Games such as "What am I?" riddles, 20 Questions and describing a hidden picture/object for someone else to guess, all work on descriptive language skills. In addition, children can be asked to produce verbal or written descriptions of objects focusing on the attributes listed below. They may illustrate these with a picture. It can be fun to produce a series of pictures with descriptions from within one category and make them up into a book with a theme (eg 'bush animals' 'transport'). Reports are factual texts usually written at school. They classify and describe groups of objects with a summary comment eg 'dinosaurs' 'transformers'. Children may need to practise producing these texts - orally and written. LANGUAGE TO USE: QUESTIONS TO ASK What does it do ? What parts does it have ? What colour is it ? What shape is it ? What size is it ? What could we use with it ? What does it go with ? How does it feel/taste/smell/sound ? What is it made of ? Where would you find/buy/keep it ? What group of things does it go with ?

LANGUAGE TO MODEL TALK ABOUT: Function Components/parts Colour Shape Size Association Attributes Composition Location Category

SUGGESTED RESOURCES Clear coloured pictures Vocabulary resources eg SPARC picture book, Vocabulary to Go! First Steps (WA) - Oral Language Module 'Classification' Suze Leitão, Speech Pathologist

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource

SEMANTIC ORGANISATION HANDOUT VOCABULARY SKILLS The goal of this programme is to build up knowledge of words and organisation of concepts. Vocabulary development is learnt within our developing knowledge of contexts and schema. School-aged children need to learn to express themselves competently, both orally and in their written work. They need to learn skills in manipulating and organising their knowledge of words and language. SPECIFIC GOALS: J Synonyms (words that mean the same) J Antonyms (opposites) J Compound words J Definitions/word meanings J Multiple meanings J Semantic absurdities (jokes, silly sentences) J Figurative language (metaphors, similes) J Implied meaning J Text comprehension - monitoring meaning ACTIVITIES should incorporate a 'theme' which will build up schema knowledge. Themes should involve contexts a child is likely to experience as this will give them the vocabulary they need when they are in such a context - in other words, involve 'real-life' contexts as well as fantasy. Vocabulary activities at this linguistic level can be both oral and written. There are many worksheets that can be used for this level of programme. It is important, though, to spend time talking about words, their meanings and organisation. It is a good idea to get children to work in pairs or small groups. Semantic mapping is a very useful technique to link vocabulary development with oral and reading comprehension. Select a topic or stimulus word. Children then brainstorm associations to this word onto paper in small groups or work directly with the teacher. Words are categorised into groups as they are written/drawn. The categories on the map are then labelled and discussion follows which enables the children to learn the meaning and use of new words/concepts, see relationships among them and relate new knowledge and words to previous knowledge. It is also important to make links to discourse, for children to enrich their vocabulary knowledge and use in a variety of contexts.

Suze Leitão, Speech Pathologist

Suze Leitão, Semantic organisation, Therapy ideas resource...