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    • Annual Voices Journal Submission Guidelines
  • Annual Voices Journal 2025
    • Journal 2025 Picture Word Indicative Model (PWIM)
    • Journal 2025 Creating ESL Bilingual Units
    • Journal 2025 Creating Lessons for All through Picture Books
    • Journal 2025 Faculty Resources for ML Student Success
    • Journal 2025 Fostering Inclusive Environments
  • 2025 Spring Weekly Voices
    • Teaching Newcomers? Effective Writing Strategies for ELL Newcomers
    • Proposed Changes of HS Requirements for Districts and Students
    • Congratulations to April’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Daryl Perkins
    • Preserving Family Culture and Language: A Parent Workshop in Irvington’s Early Childhood Department
    • Trauma Informed Considerations and Strategies for Multilingual Learners
    • Addressing Student Trauma, Anxiety, and Depression
    • Free Resources to Explore and Use ChatGPT and AI
  • 2025 Winter Weekly Voices
    • Professional Development Opportunities in 2025
    • NJTESOL/NJBE Scholarships and Awards for your students and you!
    • Congratulations to January’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Brittany Fuentes
    • English Learners With Disabilities: The Rules Schools Have to Follow
    • 2024 Higher Ed Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • 2024 Higher Ed Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • Resources for Educators Pertaining to Immigrant Students, Families, and Preparation for Response
    • How to Identify and Serve English Learners with Disabilities
    • 2024 Raquel Sinai Newcomer Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • How to Connect With English-Language Newcomers: Teachers Share Their Favorite Lessons
    • Congratulations to March’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Juliana Neno
    • 2024 Pedro J. Rodriguez High School Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • NJTESOL/NJBE Spring Conference Invited Speakers
  • About Us
    • Mission Statement
    • Executive Board
    • Membership Information
    • The Hotlist
    • W25 January 21

Contact Us by Email

webmaster@njtesol-njbe.org
njtesol-njbe-voicesnjtesol-njbe-voices
  • Home
    • Annual Voices Journal Submission Guidelines
  • Annual Voices Journal 2025
    • Journal 2025 Picture Word Indicative Model (PWIM)
    • Journal 2025 Creating ESL Bilingual Units
    • Journal 2025 Creating Lessons for All through Picture Books
    • Journal 2025 Faculty Resources for ML Student Success
    • Journal 2025 Fostering Inclusive Environments
  • 2025 Spring Weekly Voices
    • Teaching Newcomers? Effective Writing Strategies for ELL Newcomers
    • Proposed Changes of HS Requirements for Districts and Students
    • Congratulations to April’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Daryl Perkins
    • Preserving Family Culture and Language: A Parent Workshop in Irvington’s Early Childhood Department
    • Trauma Informed Considerations and Strategies for Multilingual Learners
    • Addressing Student Trauma, Anxiety, and Depression
    • Free Resources to Explore and Use ChatGPT and AI
  • 2025 Winter Weekly Voices
    • Professional Development Opportunities in 2025
    • NJTESOL/NJBE Scholarships and Awards for your students and you!
    • Congratulations to January’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Brittany Fuentes
    • English Learners With Disabilities: The Rules Schools Have to Follow
    • 2024 Higher Ed Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • 2024 Higher Ed Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • Resources for Educators Pertaining to Immigrant Students, Families, and Preparation for Response
    • How to Identify and Serve English Learners with Disabilities
    • 2024 Raquel Sinai Newcomer Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • How to Connect With English-Language Newcomers: Teachers Share Their Favorite Lessons
    • Congratulations to March’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month: Juliana Neno
    • 2024 Pedro J. Rodriguez High School Scholarship Winner’s Essay
    • NJTESOL/NJBE Spring Conference Invited Speakers
  • About Us
    • Mission Statement
    • Executive Board
    • Membership Information
    • The Hotlist
    • W25 January 21

Word Analyzer Vocabulary Tool

In the 4th podcast of the Science of Reading, highlighted in Weekly Voices October 1st, Diane August mentioned the Word Analyzer Vocabulary Tool which can help determine which words in a text need to be taught. The tool’s content is based on the Seward First 4000 Word List and all of the commonly used parts of speech for each word. When a text is pasted into the tool, it divides the vocabulary into five parts depending on frequency of use. The first group are words that occur most often. In each of the next three groups, or quartiles, are those used progressively less frequently. The final group are the most frequently used words such as the, of, or have. The Q count shows how much of the text contains the words in each of five frequency lists. Cognates refers to similar words in Spanish. The image-ability score shows how easy or difficult it is to create an image or use gestures to explain the word.

Apart from uncommon words, which are not included, the tool generates frequency lists and color codes the words in original text according to which list they are in. Clicking on any color-coded word will show its definition, but the vocabulary in the definitions is sometimes more difficult than the words themselves. However, the Word Analyzer can be a useful tool and save time in lesson preparation. The site contains a guide, and registration to use it is free.

Announcements

2024 Silver Sponsor

We are so excited to inform you that our next Morris/Sussex Chapter meeting will be on Tuesday, November 12th at 4:15 online. Our fabulous WIDA rep, Maggie Churchill, will be presenting. Register here.

T-Shirt Design Contest – All NJTESOL/NJBE members and their students are invited to participate in this first-ever competition. The winning design will be featured on the 2025 Spring Conference t-shirts sold to raise funds for the NJTESOL/NJBE Scholarship Fund. Submissions are due by Nov. 15, 2024. See more information here.

Spring Conference Call For Proposals
Presenters play a key role in our Spring Conference. We invite proposals that will strengthen systems of support for students, their families, educators, support staff, and the communities in which we work and live. Proposals may focus on any educational level, from Pre-Kindergarten to university, as well as on adult school and workplace literacy settings. Proposals can be submitted for an in-person presentation, a pre-recorded presentation for the Video Library, or a combination of both. You can submit your proposal here. The deadline is Nov. 17, 2024.

Come join the NJTESOL/NJBE’s Bergen County Chapter on November 19th, 2024, on Zoom from 4:30-5:30 PM. The guest speaker will be Emma Rosenblum, and she will share some great resources that ML teachers K-12 can use in the classroom. We invite others to bring a resource to share if you would like and if there is time. Please invite your content area colleagues and administrators as well. Everyone is welcome. Please register here on Eventbrite.

All members of NJTESOL/NJBE are invited to attend our Countering Anti-Black Racism (CABR) Committee Meeting on Wednesday, November 20, from 7:00-8:30 pm. We will meet on the 3rd Wednesday of every month through June. Please sign up at Eventbrite for a free ticket so that a Zoom link can be sent to you on the event day. You must be a member of NJTESOL/NJBE to attend.

Advocacy Committee: Thursday, November 21, at 5:00. Join us for discussions on issues that impact Multilingual Learners and their families in New Jersey. Register on the Google form to get a Zoom link.

Nominate the member of the month!
NJTESOL/NJBE has so many amazing teachers throughout our state that it would be fitting to highlight some of them. Nominees could be colleagues who are available to answer questions about ELLs or the Bilingual Education code; educators who support students and their families beyond the classroom with projects, college applications, and extracurricular activities; someone who joins committees in support of ELLS or to implement positive change for the community. The nominee must be a member of NJTESOL/NJBE. Nomination Link

Online Dictionaries

Diane August also mentioned using an online dictionary. Below are four free online learner’s dictionaries.

The Oxford Learners Dictionary provides understandable definitions and goes further with word lists such as important words, academic vocabulary, phrases, topics, and collocations (words that are usually used together). Although the site is British, students can hear words pronounced in both British and American English.

The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online also has both British and American pronunciations along with simple definitions and examples. The additional examples of word use are from the corpus, so those sentences have a high level of vocabulary, but the words in those sentences are linked to definitions. Overused words have a thesaurus with definitions and simple examples. The site also contains translation dictionaries for Spanish, Japanese, and Korean with definitions and explanations for use of the words.

The Cambridge Dictionary defines vocabulary using common words, and the examples are also simple. Pronunciation is in both British and American English. Like a paper dictionary, it lists words that would precede and follow the word that was looked up. In addition, it has translations of single words in many languages and audio pronunciation for Chinese, Spanish, and Portuguese.

The definitions in the Britannica Dictionary contain a slightly higher level of vocabulary used to define words, but the exhaustive list of definitions includes examples of almost every possible use of any word. The examples provide common collocations for each use. “Ask the Editor” answers common causes of confusion in vocabulary and grammar. The pronunciation is American.

November’s NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month Mrs. Singh

and

4 Ways to Support Long-Term English Learners

ARTICLES:

Meet Our New Executive Board Members

Science of Reading Podcast 3:
Diagnosing Dyslexia in Multilingual Learners
– with Francisco Usero-González
and
Science of Reading Podcast 4:
Practical Strategies for Multilingual Learning
– with Diane August, Ph.D.

Communication is KEY!
and
Anti-Immigrant Rhetoric Has Consequences. What Schools Can Do to Help

Congratulations to October’s
NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month Kellie Cuccaro

and
Every Teacher Is a Language Teacher: Strategies for Supporting Multilingual Learners of English in the Mainstream Classroom– Naashia Mohamed

3 Ways to Ensure English Learners Benefit from the Science of Reading
-Leslie Villegas
and
Supporting Multilingual Learners in Developing Reading Fluency across the School Day– Kate Kinsella

Announcing the 2025 Spring Conference Keynote Speakers!

Congratulations to November’s
NJTESOL/NJBE Member of the Month Mrs. Singh

and
4 Ways to Support Long-Term English Learners – Sarah Said

Word Analyzer Vocabulary Tool
and
Online Dictionaries

Notebook LM
-Jessica Duran
and
5 Ways to Use AI-Generated Images in Your Classroom -Brent Warner

Inspirational Quotations
and
A Chorus of Reasons Why We Teach

Invitation to Write an Article for the Yearly Voices Journal
and
Padres con Poder/Parent Power Parent Expo

5 Ways to Bring Cultural Diversity into Your Classroom -Carol Higho
and
Defying Labels at Tables -Joyce Farr

Season’s Greetings from the NJTESOL/NJBE Executive Board

NJTESOL/NJBE Voices Editorial Board

Executive Director
Kathleen Fernandez

President
LeighAnn Matthews, Bridgewater-Raritan Public Schools

Past-President
Michelle Land, Randolph Township Schools

Layout
Dale Egan, Bergen Community College

Technology
Marilyn Pongracz, Bergen Community College

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