Primary Chalkboard

Phonemic Awareness and Phonics Intervention Activities

Hi Friends,

Nicole, from Mrs. Rios Teaches, here! I am teaching a 1st and 2nd grade combo class this year, and had 5 of my first graders come in considerably behind in reading readiness. I immediately set aside a 20 minute block of time to work with these students, and I am so happy to say that all of them have made wonderful progress!

Here is how I structured this powerful learning time.

Learning objectives keep the kids and me accountable for our time together.

I schedule this 20 minute block of time for first thing in the morning. We say the Pledge of Allegiance, and then it's work time! The rest of the class does Read to Self at this time. We meet everyday, except Wednesdays, because we have our PE teacher that day.

I keep notes on all of our meetings for RTI purposes, and to keep track of student needs and progress. I also keep track of students who miss our group due to absences or tardies.

I just got a new 2nd grade student on Monday, who has had to join our group. So, I have had to color code my notes because I am essentially running two groups within one now. EEK!

Download the form above, and a Comprehension Strategies monitoring form, for FREE below!

Here is our daily routine!

What is that? I bet you are asking yourself.

We use these little treasures to practice segmenting and blending words containing our focus pattern. I made these by cutting legal-size envelopes down to 6 1/4 inches long. I put a little tape on the back to keep the envelope closed. Then, I cut sentence strips to about 6 1/2 inches long so they stick out a bit, and oila!

This is a great opening activity for us because it is independent. So, if kids come in late, it doesn't hold back the rest of the group. Also, students can be working on different words. Right now, I have my 5 first grade students working on -dge, and my new student working on short a words. But, everyone is doing the same activity, which makes it easy for me!

Now before you run out and start cutting envelopes and sentence strips, I am going to be honest and tell you that prepping these is a bit of a pain in the neck. I have been using mine for several years now, and have most of my sets made. Come to find out that my bloggy friend, and new Primary Chalkboard contributor, Karen Jones from Mrs. Jones' Kindergarten, has an adorable set of these available in her TPT store! One of the things I love about her set, is the little picture at the end of each card so that kids can self check. Brilliant! Next time one of my sets looks like it's been through the ringer, I'm buying these! Click on the image below to find out more.

Next, my students use whisper phones to read decodable books containing our phonics focus. These books are from Reading A-Z. LOVE!

Next, my students practice spelling words with our pattern focus, and writing simple sentences. We use these fantastic Interactive Phonics Booklets from Laura Martin's TPT store. Click on image below to find out more.

I love these booklets because they are so versatile. I can have kids cut and paste with the provided letter sheets. I can have students just write in their letters, or I can use letter tiles! I like to mix it up!

As for the sentences we write, I keep them focused on our mastered and current spelling patterns, and try to incorporate some High Frequency Writing words from this list. Click on the pic above to download!

I also have some alternative activities. For example, my new student will be working with my Phonemic Awareness Task Cards on Thursday. We will start by just having the him place his finger in each box as he segments each phoneme. When he is successful with that, we will place letter tiles in the boxes to solidify the letter-sound connection.

You can find these cards in my store. Click on the pic below to learn more.

This is our 4th and final activity! The lists I use are the ones from our district. I listen to all of the students read their lists everyday. Each time a student reads a word correctly, they are able to star their paper! My 1st grade kids started with the Kindergarten list at the beginning of the year. This little one above has mastered almost all of the first grade list now!

Well, that is how I do it! Still looking for more ideas? Check out this great assessment for early readers, by Read Like a Rock Star.

And here is a great Freebie for CVC words, from Victoria Moore!

I would love to hear how you structure your intervention or small group time. Please share by leaving a comment below.

See you next time.

Nicole

Friday- Read Across America Activities in My Classroom

Hi, friends! It's Laura from Peace, Love, and First Grade!
I apologize for the lateness of today's post! One. Crazy. Day!

This week, we've been celebrating Read Across America and all things Dr. Seuss!

Here are my favorites from our class!

The cute hat/cake craft below came from Cupcake.

I just added a writing page.
She doesn't sell this craft because selling Seuss products on TpT is a little bit illegal...
Most sellers (including me) won't take that chance!
Cupcake sells some other great crafts, though!

We read A TON of Seuss books this week!

Today we wrote about our favorites.

We had a birthday party, too!

The Menu
Lorax Nutter Butters

Green Eggs and Ham

Horton's Peanuts

Red Fish in Blue Jello

Whew! Thank goodness for Pinterest!
Most of these are on my Seuss Pinterest board.
You can find it here!

A few more pics from my school-

Here is our precious librarian with a little cat!

A Heart-shaped Zoo in 2nd Grade-Seuss would be proud!

Kid created art from our Kinder friends!

By the way, Kohls offers fun books and stuffed characters for $5 each.

We have a lot of reading buddies in my class because of Kohls!

Sam-I-Am and Pop (from Hop on Pop)

Right now, you can find Go, Dog, Go and Put me in the Zoo.
Not Dr. Seuss, but P.D. Eastman and Robert Lopshire are pretty cool, too!

Thanks for stopping by The Chalkboard!

Have some great ideas to share??

We'd love to see them!

Link up below!

An InLinkz Link-up

Thursday- Dress Like a Book Character

Hi Everyone its Latoya from Flying into First Grade.

We are on Day 4 of the linky.

Today is all about looking like your favorite book character. My school will be having book character day on Friday.

I have decided to go as Chester the raccoon from The Kissing Hand book. I chose this character because I read The Kissing Hand every year with my students.

I am making felt ears that I will attach to a headband. I am going to make a felt black eye mask to wear. I am wearing a black and great shirt. I will wear a red heart on my shirt and in my hand. I will also carry the book with me.

Last year my entire whole team went as Pete the Cat.

The year before that we were the grouchy ladybug. This costume was really easy to do. We made ladybug shells from red and black butcher paper. We made pipe cleaner antenna as well. Here is a picture below.

Lastly, I want to leave you with some other good ideas I saw while I scanned Pinterest for different looks.

Amelia Bedelia

Olivia

Rainbow Fish

Chicka Tree

Fly Guy

Now its your turn!!! Link up your Book Character costumes below!!!

Link up below!

An InLinkz Link-up

Wednesday- Favorite Reading Strategies and Tips

Day 3 of Seuss Week here at Primary Chalkboard!

Jessica here from Second Grade Nest....

I'm here to talk about Reading Strategies and Tips today!

So, I am going to list five tips that I love using in my classroom.

Tip #1:

Utilize your school's book room and any sort of Guided Reading class sets!

If your school doesn't offer this, look into the library for this. You could even take a book from the Guided Reading list, rent it from the library, copy it and staple it as a book (if you can't find enough sets). But if your school has a book room, do use it!!

Tip #2:

Make sure to differentiate!

I know you hear this all the time and I know that it is something that you know to do as a teacher, but within your first or second grade class, you definitely have pre-K readers or fourth grade readers. It isn't fair to give your children the same learning. Make sure to give your different levels different activities. This is where small group and centers comes in handy!

Books to show the differences between reading levels.

Sight word readers and chapter books. I have a very big range in my classroom!

Tip #3:

Are they getting it?

Make sure they are comprehending what they are reading. First grade is all about word attack skills and fluency, but once they hit second grade, we are expecting them to read fluently and understand what they are reading. Grab this freebie from my store to keep your kiddos understanding during their Read to Self or Read to Buddy time.

Cut these apart and put them on a binder ring to keep in their book bins or book bags.

Tip #4:

Keep it fun!

My kids love to do other things than just read during our reading lessons. We love using our witch fingers to track. They love using pointers and craft sticks to find different words. And they love using index cards as bookmarks, but little do they know... these are used as exit slips when they write one event that happened from the story! And their absolute favorite is getting a Post-It!

Tip #5:

Keep them accountable.

Make sure you are doing partner talk! Making them turn and talk to a partner about what they are reading is one way to make sure they are getting it. And being independent and responsible at the same time.

Another way to keep them accountable is to keep a learning log. In our learning log, we write about our listen to reading, we write about our word work, we do interactive notebook pieces with our reading book for the day.

Link up below!

An InLinkz Link-up

Tuesday- Everything Dr. Seuss

Welcome to our second day of our Read Across America Week Linky!

Is your class prepared and ready to celebrate an amazing and fun author!? Here are some fun ideas to get you started.

We have our reading buckets ready and labeled. These buckets are usually jam packed full of Dr. Seuss books, but my class has already grabbed their favorites!!

Red and white construction paper is all you need. One piece of 12x18 red paper and 2 strips of 18 x 3 white paper. Attach with a small 2x4 red strip in the back.