Ultimate Word Work Pack

Click here to check out the Ultimate Word Work Pack!

If you're like me, you are always looking for ways to embed high frequency word practice into everything you do.  The more ways you provide for your students to practice reading, writing, singing, and playing with the words the more opportunities you provide for them to memorize them effectively and efficiently.  

I prefer to use the Fry word lists because they are the 1,000 most commonly used words listed in order of frequency in text.  In 1996, Dr. Edward B. Fry expanded on the Dolch word lists and research.

The first 25 words make up approximately 1/3 of all published items.  The first 100 words make up 1/4 and the first 300 words make up 65% of all written material.  

In kindergarten and first grade children pick up words like little garbage collectors.  My goal is to immerse them in words that will make them the most successful and competent readers possible and in my opinion, the Fry words are the most efficient way to accomplish this.

High frequency words, sometimes referred to as "sight words," are words that do not always sound the way they are spelled so students need to memorize them to become fluent readers.  These words should be recognized instantly by readers.  

We all remember the pain of memorization, my goal is to make memorization fun and engaging by providing a variety of ways for students to practice these words.

The Ultimate Word Work Pack provides teachers and students with the opportunity to teach and practice high frequency words each week in many exciting ways!

The monthly sight word cards can be used on your word wall or to play a several games such as Memory, Swat-a-Word, and Fishing.  Directions for each month are located at the beginning of the pack.  You will also find 3 partner games: Bingo, Battleship, and Snakes & Ladders.  

The sight word song can be sung to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.  There is also a word search for each month!

Here is an example of one of my students singing an old sight word song!

Finally, there are weekly word work pages where students will practice 4-6 words.  Spin*Write*Graph, Read*Stamp*Write, Roll-a-Sight Word, and Graph-a-Sight Word.  

I like to use all of these activities in my literacy centers each month, they provide students will multiple, meaningful ways to practice using the words as they work on memorizing them.  

These words are paced out to match my Kindergarten Homework Menus.  These menus utilize the first 150 Fry words.  I also offer First Grade Homework Menus which cover the first 300+ Fry words so The Ultimate Word Work Pack would help you provide practice for about half of the first grade words as well!

To learn more about high frequency word practice and find some helpful and creative ways to support your child at home please check out this article on Childhood101!

Sight Word Baseball

Do you ever get a little carried away transforming your classroom into a camp ground, cave, beach, or train for special thematic day?

I like to turn mine into a baseball diamond once a week and play ball!  Sight Word Baseball to be specific!  I have always used index cards to play but decided I needed to "jazz" it up this summer.

We play a few different versions of baseball to keep it fresh and separating these words into 5 games will definitely help me differentiate a little more.  I use this game as a whole group and small group activity. You will find several resources in this pack that will help you facilitate both whole group and small group versions.  There are instructions for each, a color-coded poster for students to reference, a baseball diamond game-board, and a score sheet as well as 500 color-coded words printed on baseballs.

For the first quarter we will play ball with the 1st 100 Fry words as a whole class during Skills Block.  Usually I keep the class together and I rotate through all students once or twice.  Sometimes I mix it up and we play on teams or I change up how students move around the bases.  Obviously this is a walking game (unless you like to get a little crazy and let 6 year olds run laps around your classroom, I'm not judging...yes I am).  My top 3 favorite movement variations (in order of most to least) are: 1) dancing, also known as shaking your tail-feather  2) any animal inspired movement, particularly slithering like a snake or doing the worm and 3) dancing, did I mention dancing.  Seriously, what's better than kids dancing?  I wish I had that much fun doing...well, anything :)

Freebie available in Preview

During the second quarter I will transition to the 2nd 100 Fry words as a whole group game and put the 1st 100 words into literacy centers for students to continue practicing words with their partners.  There is a score sheet for students to keep track of the score (for those competitive kids).  When I play as a whole group I don't worry with the score.

I plan on using the 4th and 5th hundred as a small group enrichment activity for my students performing above grade-level.  As the year goes on you'll be able to use the words you've already played as a whole class in remediation activities with students who may not have memorized the words yet.

Earlier I mentioned that I like to keep students in a whole group and rotate through them once or twice during a Skills Block lesson.  The words are color coded to indicate the number of bases the student can move to if they read the word correctly.  Green words are worth 1 base.  Blue words are worth 2 bases.  Yellow words are worth 3 bases.  Red words are a home run!  So if a student reads a blue word correctly they move to 2nd base.  If the next person reads a green word correctly they move to first base and the previous player moves to 3rd base.  If the 3rd player reads a red word correctly they get a home run and everyone scores!

What happens when they read a word incorrectly?  I always "pitch" them 2 more words (3 strikes, you know).  Most of the time a student can get on base with 3 chances.  Occasionally it doesn't happen and you're left with a choice:  walk them or strike them out?  Totally your decision, some kids can deal with a strike out and some can't.  This is supposed to be fun and you don't want them to disengage so keep that in mind as you decide how you will play with your class!

Here's one of the best parts of Sight Word Baseball....the bases!  I found this sweet treasure at the Dollar Tree!  After 4 years of use my old bases were pretty worn so I picked up a brand new set.  I can't wait to tape them down!

Students playing in a small group will need the baseball diamond game-board, plastic bears or place markers, a set of 100 baseballs.  The score sheet and poster for referencing are optional.  Each student will take a turn flipping over 1 baseball and reading it.  If they read it correctly they move the number of spaces indicated by the color of the word and keep the baseball.  If they read it incorrectly they place it in a discard pile.  The next student then takes their turn.  It is up to the students playing the game to keep each other accountable.  I encourage this by telling them that if they catch their partner reading a word wrong they should help correct them and make sure they discard because the objective is to have the most baseballs by the end of the game.  Keeping their partner accountable could help them win the game.

Sight Word Baseball is available in my TPT store and this Score Sheet (pictured above) is a little freebie that you can get in the preview!

Pick up your copy today and play ball all year long!

Beginning, Middle, and Ending Sound Activities

Have you ever started 3 or 4 units around the same time and then lost all motivation to finish any of them?

Yep, that's what I've been up to.

I finally knocked out a beginning, middle, and ending sound activity pack mostly because I need to use the activities for remediation during MTSS (formerly RTI).

It's just too much fun to focus on all the fun and adorable holiday activities everyone else is churning out right now!

So the BME Sound Activity Pack provides opportunities for students to isolate, produce, find, sort, and match beginning, middle, and end sounds.  The whole pack is black line masters (of course) and linked to common core standards.  It is broken up into 3 sections (beginning, middle, and end).  Each section has:

*Hole punch activities

*Stamp or fill in the sound

*Sound sort

*Sound research and record

*Sound memory

The BME Sound Pack is available in my TpT store and there is a FREEBIE up for grabs in the preview!  Stop by and check it out!

Blog-slacking and Room on the Broom

I'm sorry I've been blog-slacking for the last couple of weeks!   Thankfully I was able to knock out my Room on the Broom, Nocturnal Night, the Farm field trip, and my formal observation.  Check back for pictures from all of these events this week!

Today I want to share pictures from our Room on the Broom activities with you!  I originally posted my Room on the Broom Companion Activities here a few weeks ago.

The 46 page literacy and math companion pack was originally $8.00 in my TpT store but for this week only I'm putting it on sale for $5.00.  Check it out if you are still interested in teaching this unit this year or want to save it for next year!

After wake-up work and MTSS we read the story Room on the Broom.  Students completed one of the worksheets from the companion where they found words from the story and put the same words in alphabetical order.

When students finished the worksheet we met on the rug and discussed the 9 centers we were going to work through during the day.

Students worked in 2 math centers where they matched numbers to number words and recorded their matches on a recording sheet.

They also got their first taste of place value with a place value matching game.  Students matched the number card to the base ten block pictures then recorded their matches on the recording sheet pictured below!  I love exposing them to these things early and letting them practice with a concept before I officially introduce it to them.

Students also participated in a variety of literacy activities!

BA and his partner matched rhyming words from the story and recorded their matches below!

I never make time for my students to do crafts in class because we truly don't have a free moment to partake most of the time.  Since this was kind of a fun break from the learning schedule (SHHHHH!!!!) I decided to sneak one in!  Students made a broom and glued it to paper with a short excerpt from the first page of the story.  Very basic but they had a blast (which is really all that matters :).

I picked up a second book from Chamblin Bookmine (this fantastic book store we have in the Ville) for only $3.00!  I let students use the second book to help them complete the story map FREEBIE available in my TpT store!

Finally students got to do a Readers Theatre.....

...word building...

...and finally, a picture sequencing activity...

Overall it turned out really well!  On the way to lunch Noah said "Hey Miss Fun Time, this is the best day ever!"  Be still my heart!

Room on the Broom

So last weekend I was wandering through the children's books in Target looking for book for my friend Rachel's baby shower when I came across Room on the Broom (click here to check it out on Amazon).  As I stood in the aisle reading, idea's came steadily flowing into my head about ways I could use this book in my class.

If you know anything about my digital products you know I stick to games and activities that can easily be incorporated into centers.  I've never tried a book companion before.  I've also never purchased clipart.  I use whatever I can draw out myself.  So this is a whole new venture for me and I'm SO pleased with the way it turned out!

This companion is 46 pages with both literacy and math activities.  Common core standards are included in each section.

The literacy activities include:
-rhyming word game with a recording sheet
-readers theatre with puppets
-2 writing prompts about monsters and friendship
-2 worksheets that include word searches, ABC ordering, and a maze
-2 word building activities

The math activities include:
-place value matching game with recording sheet
-number puzzles students can practice counting by 1's, 2's, 5's, & 10's
-number word matching game with recording sheet

There are 9 separate activities in this packet with multiple versions of several activities to help provide differentiation.  If I were to price out each activity individually they would cost at least $14.00 but you can get them all in this packet for ONLY $8.00!  Please check it out and let me know what you think!

Click here to check out Room on the Broom Companion Activities!

I know I like to test before I invest sometimes so I'm providing you with this story map FOR FREE! Say what?!

Click here to download this story map for FREE!

Finally, I recently set up a Facebook fan page for The Curious Catfish, click here to follow me on Facebook!

B-I-N-G-O!

Happy Friday my friends!  Whew, 5 straight days of blog updates and 1 Open House in the books.  I earned this weekend :)

A couple days ago I mentioned a literacy workshop that I attended and it got me thinking about reading development and how crucial first grade is to it.  I looked at our reading series and noticed that there are 3 times as many sight words in the first grade series than there are in either the K or 2 series.  I know, regardless of what grade you teach, we all go above and beyond what is prescribed in what ever curriculum that our collective districts adopt.  You  might use Dolch or Fry words to supplement but K-2 is the foundation upon which a child's vocabulary is built.

I took a long hard look at my literacy centers to find ways to embed these words so that students were reading and working with them as much as possible.  Whether they were written on the back of puzzle pieces or candy land cards, students would read the card to make the move or add that piece to the puzzle.  They read words they "catch" after fishing for them with magnetic fishing poles or as they play bingo.  I feel like the more I can engage them in the activity, the more meaningful the practice is.  Check out my Sight Word Bingo game below!

There are 4 bingo games, one for each quarter of the school year, which is how we roll here in the FL.  The 1st game contains words from the 1st 3 HM themes for first grade.  The second games uses words from themes 4-5, the third games uses words from themes 6-7, and the fourth uses words from themes 8-10.  They can be used during the quarter that you are currently on or as differentiation for students who are working either above or below grade level.

There are 2 bingo sheets for each game and a page with just the word cards.  I printed mine on colored card stock, laminated them and cut out the word cards.  Students take turns turning over a word card, reading it, and covering it up on their bingo sheet.  There is a thumbs up free spot in the middle and the first to get 5 in a row wins.  This is a pretty basic bingo game that students can use during literacy centers.

Sight Word Bingo is available in my TpT store.  I will email the first person to follow my blog and comment on this post a free copy of sight word bingo!  Don't forget to leave your email address!

Alphabetical Order

It's Friday Eve, the day/night before the best day of the week.  Anyone else feel that way?

I'm going to dedicate the next 2 days to a couple of literacy centers I love!  Today is all about ABC ordering.  A few years ago I was giving my students a list of 3-5 words and asking them to put them in ABC order.  I had modeled it, we had practiced it together and surely they wouldn't have any problem but a handful did.  They erased holes in their papers and I could see the frustration in their eyes.

I knew they needed something a little more kinesthetic.  An activity they could manipulate easily to ease the frustration and anxiety.  I made these ABC animal cards, one for each letter of the alphabet, laminated, and cut them out.  Finally those students "got it".  I wasn't sure if it was because the cards were revolutionary (which is what I'd like to believe :) or if it was because we had just finally done enough practice.

Last year I modeled how to put words in ABC order and started their practice with these cards during literacy centers.  After a couple weeks of manipulating the cards I gave out a list of 5 words and ALL students were able to correctly write them in alphabetical order!

 

This year I started out the same way and I'm hoping for the same results as last year!  Here is a picture of MB and DN.  They put them in ABC order then had extra time so they regrouped them.  Animals that live in water, animals that walk, and animals that fly.

I've seen cards like these on Pinterest lately and I'm sure they came from the blogs so I'm not trying to step on anyone's feet, I just wanted to share something that has been really effective for me for the past few years.  You can grab a free copy of ABC Ordering Animals from my TpT store!

Camp Ehlinger

Camp Ehlinger is now in session!  Each year I LOVE to end the year with a couple days of Camping with Books, a thematic unit developed and shared with me by Cheryl Saoud!  It's great because I can tear down my classroom, throw up a tent and put out some camping themed centers and call it a day!  On day 1 we learn about bee's and their impact on our daily life including the pollination of some of our favorite crops.  Day 2 focuses on ladybugs, their life cycle and comparing it to other life cycles we learned about earlier this year.  While my students are working in centers I have a chance to clean my classroom for the summer.  Our centers this year include:

-Book Assembly (a camp journal on day 1 and a lady bug life cycle book on day 2)
-Crossword and coloring
-Reading tent
-Computers (http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/kids/games/all/)
-Math fishing games *day 1-Domino Fishing http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Domino-Fishing
                    *day 2-Fact Family Fishing http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Fact-Family-Fishing
-Craft (day 1-binoculars, using toilet paper rolls and day 2-popsicle stick framed pictures)

Reading in the tent!

Inspecting sticks, pine cones, and leaves with a hand lens!

Sporting some insect masks :)