Questões de Concurso

It’s no surprise that research shows a very strong relationship between reading comprehension and vocabulary knowledge. After all, we need to be able to understand the words that we encounter when reading in order to understand what we’re reading. As Grabe and Stoller so succinctly stated back in 1997, “reading improves vocabulary knowledge and vocabulary knowledge supports reading development” (p.119). It’s a reciprocal relationship: the larger your vocabulary, the easier it is to read, and the more you read, the more your vocabulary increases.

So how do we get learners to increase their vocabulary to make reading easier (and more pleasurable!)? Research tells us that to read with adequate comprehension,95 – 98% of the words in the text need to be known (Nation 2001: 147). But what does it mean to know a word when a single word can have many diff erent senses/meanings? Take a simple word like green. Now put yourself in your student’s shoes. Imagine first encountering this word in a story about someone who lost their green jacket. Then in a diff erent context you read about someone who was green – instead of a color this could mean that the person was feeling sick, or envious, or a novice, or eco-conscious. Not so simple, is it?

We also know that reading texts on diff erent topics increases the chances that our students will encounter diff erent words and come across new meanings of known words. But how can we get them to do this consistently? One eff ective way is to combine “intensive” and “extensive” reading practice. This approach can both fine tune reading skills and increase vocabulary knowledge, all while making reading more pleasurable.

Intensive reading activities typically take place in class and involve diff erent ways of interacting with a text. Examples include timed readings, scanning for information, or skimming to get the gist of the text before diving in to read.

Newspaper articles off er great resources for scanning activities since they often include dates and names. If your school has a campus paper (print or online), use it as a resource for scanning activities. Rather than focusing on just one article, have your students scan the entire school paper for when or where certain events are taking place. This has the added benefit of being directly relevant to their daily lives.

I’m also a fan of timed readings using short texts (200 – 400 words) that cover a wide range of topics. These increase the opportunity for students to encounter more diff erent words and to see words they already “know” in diff erent contexts and with diff erent meanings (as our example above of the word green).

Extensive reading usually happens outside the classroom, but there are benefits to including a dedicated time for this type of reading in class. When I teach reading, I always have 10 – 15 minutes of silent sustained reading as part of class. During that time everyone, including me, reads something of their choice. I set a timer so that we don’t lose track of time while reading.

With extensive reading, students choose texts of high interest to read every day for a predetermined amount of time. It’s important that students are reading for pleasure during this time and NOT reading textbooks. Graded readers or young adult literature are great resources for extensive reading.

You can help motivate your students by keeping track of their reading. Here are two suggestions:

1. Reading logs – Have your students keep reading logs of how much time they spend reading each day. They should also write a sentence or two about what they read.

2. Reading progress tracker – Have a place in your classroom to show their reading progress. For example, if students commit to reading 15 minutes a day, create a board showing student progress in 15-minute increments. As students accumulate reading time, you can have benchmarks (e.g., an hour, five hours) for when students receive diff erent rewards, such as a certificate, time for an in-class game, or even a free book.

Combining intensive and extensive reading activities has long been a recipe for success in my classrooms. I have no doubt that it will help you help your students become more successful, and happier, readers, too.

Adapted from https://www.cambridge.org/elt/blog/2025/03/13/readingand-vocabulary-a-recipe-for-success/ Acesso em 23/07/2025

Extreme weather events are deeply intertwined with global patterns of inequality. The poorest and most vulnerable people bear the brunt of climate change impacts yet contribute the least to the crisis. As the impacts of climate change mount, millions of vulnerable people face disproportionate challenges in terms of loss of jobs; physical harm; disease; mental health effects; food insecurity; access to water; migration and forced displacement; loss of shelter, assets, and community ties, and other related risks.

Some people are more vulnerable to climate change than others. For example, workers in sectors such as agriculture, fishing, and tourism rely on natural resources that are particularly sensitive to increasingly unpredictable weather and seasonal patterns. Female-headed households, children,  persons with disabilities,  Indigenous Peoples and ethnic minorities, landless tenants, migrant workers, displaced persons, older people, and other socially marginalized groups often have fewer financial and other resources to cope with and recover from shocks which might threaten their wellbeing and the wellbeing of their families. The root causes of their vulnerability lie in a combination of their geographical locations; their financial, socio-economic, cultural, and social status; and their access to resources, services, and decision-making power.

The poor are often not just among the most vulnerable to climate change, but also disproportionately impacted by measures to address it. These impacts can include increased costs of living, loss of livelihoods, and limited access to resources and support systems, which exacerbate existing inequalities and poverty trends. In the absence of well-designed and citizen-centered policies, efforts to tackle climate change can have unintended consequences for the livelihoods of certain groups, including placing a higher financial burden on poor households […].

While much progress has been made on the science and the types of policies needed to support a transition to low carbon, climateresilient development, a challenge facing many countries is engaging citizens who are concerned that they will be unfairly impacted by climate policies. Citizen-centered programs play a vital role in ensuring that resources are used efficiently. Engaging people in shaping climate action is equally critical for achieving lasting impact. This means ensuring transparency, access to information, and active citizen engagement on climate risks and green growth. Such involvement can help build public support to reduce climate impacts, overcome behavioral and political barriers to decarbonization, as well as foster both new ideas and a sense of ownership over solutions.

Moreover, communities bring unique perspectives, skills, and a wealth of knowledge to the challenge of strengthening resilience and addressing climate change. They should be engaged as partners in resilience-building rather than being regarded merely as beneficiaries. Research and experience show that community leaders can successfully set priorities, influence ownership, as well as design and implement investment programs that are responsive to their community’s own needs. A 2022 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recognizes the value of diverse forms of knowledge — such as scientific, Indigenous, and local knowledge — in building climate resilience. Innovations in the architecture of climate finance can connect communities and marginalized groups to the policy, technical, and financial assistance that they need for locally relevant and effective development outcomes.

From: https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/social-dimensions-of-climate-change

The public school district in Seattle has filed a novel lawsuit against the tech giants behind TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and Snapchat, seeking to hold them accountable for the mental health crisis among youth.

Seattle Public Schools filed the lawsuit Friday in U.S. District Court. The 91-page complaint says the social media companies have created a public nuisance by targeting their products to children.

It blames them for worsening mental health and behavioral disorders including anxiety, depression, disordered eating and cyberbullying; making it more difficult to educate students; and forcing schools to take steps such as hiring additional mental health professionals, developing lesson plans about the effects of social media, and providing additional training to teachers.

"Defendants have successfully exploited the vulnerable brains of youth, hooking tens of millions of students across the country into positive feedback loops of excessive use and abuse of Defendants' social media platforms, " the complaint said. "Worse, the content Defendants curate and direct to youth is too often harmful and exploitive ...."

Meta, Google, Snap and TikTok did not immediately respond to requests for comment Saturday.

While federal law — Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act — helps protect online companies from liability arising from what third-party users post on their platforms, the lawsuit argues that provision does not protect the tech giants' behavior in this case.

"Plaintiff is not alleging Defendants are liable for what third-parties have said on Defendants' platforms but, rather, for Defendants' own conduct, " the lawsuit said. "Defendants affirmatively recommend and promote harmful content to youth, such as pro-anorexia and eating disorder content."

The lawsuit says that from 2009 to 2019, there was on average a 30% increase in the number of Seattle Public Schools students who reported feeling "so sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more in a row" that they stopped doing some typical activities.

The school district is asking the court to order the companies to stop creating the public nuisance, to award damages, and to pay for prevention education and treatment for excessive and problematic use of social media.

While hundreds of families are pursuing lawsuits against the companies over harms they allege their children have suffered from social media, it's not clear if any other school districts have filed a complaint like Seattle's.

Internal studies revealed by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen in 2021 showed that the company knew that Instagram negatively affected teenagers by harming their body image and making eating disorders and thoughts of suicide worse. She alleged that the platform prioritized profits over safety and hid its own research from investors and the public.

Available at: ttps://www.npr.org/2023/01/08/1147735477/seattlesschools-are-suing-tech-giants-for-harming-young-peoplesmental-health