Vocabulary · Tier 3: subject words
Bilingual subject glossaries
A glossary of key subject terms with the English word, a simple definition, a diagram where useful, and the home language term. Students can check meanings quickly and link new terms to what they already know.
- Bands
- 1 to 4
- Stages
- Upper elementary, Middle school and High school
- Settings
- Mainstream class, Push-in support, Pull-out support and At home
- Prep
- High prep
How to do it
- List the key terms for the unit.
- Add a simple English definition and a picture or diagram.
- Add the home language term, checked by a speaker where possible, such as a parent, a colleague or an older student.
- Give students the glossary at the start of the unit.
- Encourage students to add terms as the unit goes on.
In a lesson
Maths (high school)
In a trigonometry unit, a Korean-speaking student uses a glossary where hypotenuse has a labelled triangle, the definition “the longest side of a right-angled triangle, opposite the right angle” and the Korean term 빗변. She checks it during a problem and labels her own diagram correctly.
What commonly goes wrong
- Machine translations give the everyday meaning instead of the subject meaning.
- The glossary is handed out and never used.
- Staff assume students know the term in their home language, when they may have learnt the subject in English.
Adapting it
For a lower band
Keep definitions very short and rely on diagrams.
For a higher band
Ask students to write their own definitions and compare them with the glossary.