Voice of Literacy
Comprehension: Homonyms, riddles, and word play
About Dr. Marcy Zipke
- Assistant Professor of Elementary and Special Education at Providence College in Providence, Rhode Island.
- Research on metalinguistics in comprehension
- Gained interest through her own struggle as a 1st grader to make a joke
Metalinguistic Research
- Metalinguistic Awareness: Ability to manipulate language or sounds in words
- Example: The man’s nails were sharp. (nail-homonym)
- Example: The girl tickled the baby with the stuffed bear (structural ambiguity-who has the bear)
- Conducted 2 hour study (4 30 min sessions) with 3rd graders focusing on homonyms, riddles, and jokes.
- Saw a significant increase in standardized test scores
For Teachers
- give explicit teaching of homonyms (example: watch)
- read riddles:
- Example: Why did the witch go to night school? She wanted to learn how to spell better.(lexical riddles-homonyms)
- Example: How do you stop a skunk from smelling? You hold his nose. (structural riddle)
- wrote own riddles:
- started with topic (baseball)
- brainstorm list of terms related
- look for homonyms
- Example: Where is the largest diamond in NYC? Yankee Stadium.
For Parents
- Reading Amelia Bedelia books
- Writing riddles
- Picture books with homonyms and riddles
- Arlene Alda-Did You Say Pears?
For Principals
- When writing curriculum it doesn’t need to be a huge part of reading instruction
- Finding ways to insert play with language into the day-fun and instructional
Policy-Makers
- More emphasis on different parts of metalinguistic language
- Phonological awareness is great but aspects of metalinguistic language could be beneficial as well