Sight words when we line up!

The more my kids see sight words, the more they will practice reading those sight words. I try and put them in different places around the room so that they are always available for my kids to see. I have a file called "Sight words" on my desktop that we review every day so that my kids can practice reading them. As we learn more words I add them to new slides to practice. We sing the sight word song on YouTube EVERY DAY to practice spelling and reading their sight words. Just search for "Sight word rap" and you will see two different versions.

The more they see them the more they will practice and read them! So, one thing I have done is put down dry erase tape where my kids line up. I put one strip in each block all the way up to fifteen blocks. When my kids line up they see the sight words while they stand in line. I hear them saying "I'm standing on 'with'" or "You're standing on the color word 'orange'" as we line up to go somewhere. It's just another way to give them a little more exposure to their sight words. I can change them to words we are working on that week or words they are having trouble with.

SUPER SIMPLE Themed ABC Practice

Alphabetic Principal. That is the term used to describe kids understanding of letter shapes, the names of letters and the sounds each letter makes. I used the die cut machine at our school to make fun shaped flashcards with the letters of the alphabet on them. They were super simple to make and a lot cuter than plain index cards. I can pick whichever shape I want and make them correlate with a holiday that month or a unit we are working on.

This month is October and we celebrate halloween at the end of the month so I cut out ghosts and wrote all of the lower case letters on them. I only did the lower case letters on the ghosts as these are the form they will see these letters most of the time (lowercase). I am going to make pumpkins with CAPITAL letters on them and my kids who know most of the letters will match the upper and lower case... Match the capital A on the pumpkin to the lower case a on the ghost.

It is super simple and easy to make. The kids catch on quickly and if they finish something early they can do it independently by putting the letters in order or they can do it with a partner. Kids that already know all of the letters in the alphabet will use the SAME CARDS to practice letter sounds. These cards really are versatile and so easy to make and use.

Here is a picture of the ghost letters I made earlier today.

Name Practice for Kindergarteners

One of the first things I do with my kindergartener's is help them recognize, write and spell their names. Some of my kids come into kindergarten knowing how to do this very well, whereas some may come to me and cannot even recognize their name when it is written down.

For the first two weeks I will use their names in the place of sight words in their word work center. Whatever they would normally do with their sight words, they will practice with their names. This is a good way for my kids to learn how that particular center works and what to do with a low amount of stress in learning the words. So later when we are practicing words there, they can focus on the word more than logistics of that center.

One of the first things I did was put all of their names on a small sentence strip. I got a pack of 30 at the Dollar Tree and they are perfect for this. I then cut the names apart. Make sure you put enough space in between the letters for cutting. Then I put them into a sandwich bag. I stuck a label on the front with their name so we can see what the finished product would look like/spell. This is really easy to do and simple. I made 14 last night in about 45 minutes.

The next thing I did with my kids' names was dot them out on the sentence strip. Again, I used the small ones from Dollar Tree. I dotted their names and then next week when they return with their photgraph/internet agreement I will take their pictures and attach them to the ends. I will laminate them and cut them out. They will use a dry erase marker to practice tracing their names. 

Finally, I have a box of beads with letters on them that I will let them use to practice making their name with. They will string the beads and this also helps develop their fine motor skills as they thread the bead. I got this image from Google, but these are the kind of beads I will use. You can get them at Wal-mart, KMart, or Hobby Lobby.

The first week we staggered in our Kundera and they got a chance to play with and make their names with the name bags I made (above). Here are some pictures of the name bags in action!