Oral Story Blending - Lesson Idea # 33

This activity helps your child work on his/her phonemic awareness (oral blending skill) and their listening comprehension all at once! You can use a sample of any story you like to play this game. The example shared below uses an excerpt from Frog and Toad.

1. Have your story and questions ready.
2. Put on your “dunce cap”.
3. Tell your child that you are going to tell him/her a story and that you might need their help blending some words because you can’t figure them out.
4. Read a line from the story and sound out the last word very slowly. Then ask the question to your child and wait for them to help you by figuring out the word before you continue reading.

Example:

The old brown Frog sat in the /s/ /u/ /n/.  Where did the Frog sit? (in the sun)

His pal Toad hid under a /r/ /o/ /k/. Where did Toad hide? (under a rock)

Toad told Frog that the sun would turn him into /m/ /u/ /sh/. What would Frog turn into? (into mush)

Frog told Toad that he looked like the gopher;s next /m/ /ea/ /l/. What did Toad look like? (a gopher’s next meal)

Suddenly it began to /r/ /ai/ /n/. What did it begin to do? (rain)

Frog and Toad played together in the /m/ /u/ /d/. Where did they play? (in the mud)

Kids have a lot of fun figuring the words out to complete the story. You can do this with songs, poems, and other stories anytime you want!

What’s That Sound? - Lesson Idea #32

This is a phonemic awareness activity that focuses on having your child identify and isolate the initial sounds of words. Playing this word game with a puppet can make it a whole lot of fun!

1. Have a list of random words that begin with different sounds ready for this game.
2. Tell your child that you’ll be saying some words and that the puppet wants them to repeat only the first sound of each word. Show your child some examples with the puppet’s help before you have them give you the sounds.
3. Examples:

Parent says: snail … Puppet says: /s/

Parent says: mushroom … Puppet says: /m/

Parent says: shade … Puppet says: /sh/

• Phoneme isolation is one of the more difficult skills of phonemic awareness, so your child may need some practice with this one. Remember that the words you chose don’t have to be small words because your child is not expected to read them - they just have to be able to say them and repeat the first sound. This is a good chance to expose your child to some new words!

Change That Sound - Lesson Idea #31

This is a phonemic awareness activity that focuses on kids’ ability to segment (separate) and substitute initial sounds. Play it as a riddle game and they’ll have plenty of fun with it!

1. Ask your child these riddle type questions to see if they can replace the first sound in the given word with a new sound. Here are some examples to get you started:

• What word starts with the sound /b/ and rhymes with cat? You can keep going by asking for the new words that rhyme with cat but start with the sounds /h/, /r/,/s/,/f/.
• What word starts with the sound /t/ and rhymes with the word new? More sounds: /y/,/z/,/g/,/sh/.
• What word starts with the sound /s/ and rhymes with the word night? More sounds: /r/,/l/,/m/,/b/.

Phoneme substitution is one of the hardest of the phonemic awareness skills, so don’t be surprised if this is tough for your child to do. Help them out by giving them the new word when they can’t think of it. If they get frustrated, then move on to something else and try this game another time. Remember that you want to keep these games fun and engaging, so just keep it light!

Stamp A Word - Lesson Idea #30

This is a fun and engaging way to have your kids practice building and blending words! You’ll need plenty of paper, and letter stamps - you can use letter stamps with ink pads, foam letters and finger paint ( you can find foam letters at the dollar store!), or you can even use letter stickers.

1. Have a list of words ready - high frequency words and/or words pulled from a book or selection you are reading with your child that have letters and sounds you have already introduced.
2. Tell your child that you will write a word or show them a word card for them to make their own by stamping/painting/sticking it onto the paper. To make it more challenging, simply tell your child that you will be calling out the word for them to make - then if they need help, you can write it or show them the word card.
3. Once your child makes the word, have them blend each sound together from left to right slowly before going back to quickly read the whole word.
4. Have your child go back and quickly read all of the words they made when finished for some extra fluency practice.

• Here’s another way you can change this up once they got the hang of it: Call out the letters that make a word for your child to stamp/paint/stick, then have them try to blend the word together and see if they can read and tell you what word you spelled out for them. They love this part!
• Note: You can use irregular words (words that are exception to the rules: ex: the, was, one) with this activity, but tell your child to read them without trying to blend the sounds together.

Play Dough Letters - Lesson Idea #29

This is a great activity to reinforce letter recognition and/or letter sound correspondence while strengthening fine motor skills. You’ll need some play dough, an alphabet chart or cards, and plenty of imagination.

1. Tell your child that you’ll be calling out a letter and that you want them to try to mold and form the letter using the play dough. You can work on one target letter or have them review several letters at once.
2. If your child can’t remember what the letter looks like, then show him/her the way it looks on the chart or alphabet card. Encourage them to try again. If they still need help, get your hands dirty and show them how it’s done. Remember this is not a test, so keep it light and fun!

• You can make this a letter-sound corresponding game by asking your child to then make an animal or object out of the play dough that starts with that letter’s sound. Or you can reverse it by using picture cards or pictures out of a magazine and asking your child to make the letter that matches the picture you’ve shown them.
• For extra fine motor skill development let your child use scissors on the play dough to help them make letters and objects. This is great for kids who need a little extra practice using scissors.

Who Let The Letters Out (song)

Ok, so clear your pipes and get ready to sing. Don’t worry if your voice isn’t that of a songbird, I promise you your kids won’t care. This is a fun song to sing that will reinforce the letter sounds and possibly get your kids (and you) dancing and moving around. It’s sung to the tune of ” Who Let The Dogs Out”. Now before you roll your eyes and say “no way”, give it a try. Kids love this!

1. Here is the basic line of the original song: “Who let the dogs out…woof, woof, woof, woof, woof!”.
2. Replace this with “Who let the A out… short /a/,/a/,/a/,/a/,/a/!”; “Who let the B out…/b/,/b/,/b/,/b/,/b/!”, and so on and so on with each letter of the alphabet.
3. You can add clapping and stomping to this to work on rhythm and movement at the same time.

• Take this opportunity to really emphasize the correct pronunciation of each letter sound. Try not to add the schwa sound (uh) after certain letters like b, g, k, m, etc. I know it’s easier to say /buh, /guh/, and /kuh/ - but it’s important that you keep the sounds as true as possible so that your child can learn the sounds correctly.
• You can easily turn this into a phonics activity that reinforces letter-sound correspondence  by singing along with letter cards or by using an alphabet chart to point to the letters as you sing their sound.
• Or if you want to take this activity outside and get your child really moving, you can draw the letters on the ground using sidewalk chalk and have your child jump from letter to letter as they sing each sound. It’s really funny when they make up little dances while they sing about the letter before jumping onto the next one!

Around The Table We Went

It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to do a workshop or presentation about reading instruction, so I was happy to finally get the opportunity to do one last night.  I truly love the process involved in sharing valuable information with people for the sake of helping kids read. We had our first Reading Roundtable Workshop for homeschooling parents in our local community of Knoxville, TN.

I’ve done plenty of workshops and presentations about reading in my career, but this one was different. I think my natural tendencies as a presenter to include and interact with my audience, combined with my own desire to learn from others led me to offer a different type of workshop. I’ve dubbed it a Reading “Roundtable” because I had the desire to do more than just the typical dissemination of information to a group of people. Instead I wanted to present the information to the group (with questions and answers inserted as they came up, of course), but then opening up “the floor” to the participants in the hopes that they would share their knowledge, experiences, and/or concerns as they related to reading, curriculum, and homeschooling. Well, the results were awesome!

Although there were few in attendance for our first Reading Roundtable Workshop, the amount of information that flowed freely between everyone in the room was amazing! Connections were made, suggestions were taken, experiences were shared, concerns were aired, light bulbs were turned on, and ideas were born. I’m really excited about how it all went down and the possibilities that are possible!

I’ve had plenty of responses and requests for future sessions, so I’m happy to report that there will be many more of these in the future!

Build-a-Word - Lesson Idea #28

This hands-on activity helps to reinforce the use of affixes (suffixes and prefixes) to help build and add to your child’s vocabulary. You’ll need some index cards or sentence strips, markers, some baggies, and a list of root words and affixes.

1. Use a list of root words and affixes to help you make word cards - you can also pull words from the books or selections you have worked on or plan to work on with your child.
2. Choose a different color marker to write the prefixes, roots, and suffixes onto the cards. For example prefixes can be green, roots purple, and suffixes orange. Place all of the word parts in labeled baggies.
3. Have your child try to build as many words as they can with the word parts given. You can even have them practice their writing by making a list of all of the words they come up with. Kids love to compete with each other to see who can make the most words - so involve a sibling or friend that can also work with these words for even more fun!
4. Sample words using prefix: out-, root: stand, suffix: -ing

standing
outstanding
outing

Those are three words from just from one set of word parts. Imagine how many words your child can create with baggies full of word parts!

• It’s important that your child comes up with real words that make sense! You can let them use a dictionary and/or thesaurus to check their words to make sure they’re real.
• This is an excellent time to discuss the meanings of these word parts and how affixes can instantly change the meaning of a word. It’s a fun way to make your kids see the power of words!

Readers and Golfers

I love to play golf, but I’m not a golfer…yet. That raises the obvious question–what are the differences between a golfer and someone who plays golf? Well, they’re basically the same differences between someone who can read and a reader.

Golfers have spent countless hours practicing chip shots and bunker shots. They’ve hit thousands of buckets of balls with their drivers and irons. They’ve spent time and effort tweaking small nuances in their swings in their basements. They are prepared for every situation the course, which they’ve played dozens of times and know intimately, can throw at them. As a result, they score well on the weekends when they play.

Guys who play golf (like me) usually go out once a week or less to play 18 holes. Maybe we hit a bucket of balls before we play to warm up. We get a little stressed when put in the situation of having to chip downhill onto green because we don’t really have that shot. We lay up instead of going for greens because we can’t hit our 2 iron well every time and can’t rely on it. We basically play every hole shot to shot, reacting to the latest situation we’ve created for ourselves instead of setting ourselves up and executing a strategy.

So what does this have to do with reading? Maybe you can see where I’m headed with this…
Read the rest of this entry »

Twist a Word - Lesson Idea #27

This take on the classic game of Twister is a really fun way to get your kids moving while learning to read and spell words! You’ll need some sidewalk chalk and a large writable surface that’s outside (sidewalk, driveway, patio, etc.).

1. Make some word cards of 2-4 letter words that you want your child to practice reading and spelling. These can be high frequency words and/or words from a story you are working on.
2. Then draw a large grid of random letters (found in the words you chose) on the ground. A good size grid would be a square with 4 rows and 4 columns. You can make this bigger or smaller if you like depending on the size of your letters and how far your child’s limbs can reach! Your child will be using these letters to spell out the words with their hands and feet.
3. Show your child a card, have them read it aloud (have them blend if needed or read it to them if it’s an irregular word) and then find the letters to spell it with their hands and feet. It helps if you have them read the word, spell it, say the letters as they find them on the grid, and finally call out the word when finished.
4. Once they complete a word, they can then practice writing the word with chalk on the ground to make a list of all the words they were able to twist. They’ll be amazed at what they’ve accomplished!

You can also play different variations of the game depending on your child’s level of ability: