Well, I am still out this week, but the doctor says I should be able to go back to work on Monday. Meanwhile, I missed our wonderful Farm Fun Day at school, and also our Halloween Fun Day- two special events that I greatly enjoy and was very sorry to have missed. But I am going to tell you this week about some fun things we did that led up to our unit on the Farm. By the way, on our Farm Fun Day, we had a “Party Pony and Farm Animal” company come to our school and bring their farm animals! All of the children got to ride a pony and have their picture taken on it, and also pet the farm animals. Then we had a class photo taken with the animals. Each Kindergarten class (there are five classes at my school!) gets a half an hour to spend with the animals, and parents are invited to come and take pictures, too. Our PTA pays for this wonderful event, and we are very grateful to them for it! We used to take a field trip to a local farm, but it was much more expensive to pay for the buses, and the children actually got less quality time with the animals because the farm group that allowed schools to visit used to put us into groups of about one hundred children at a time! (Try to imagine 100 children all trying to reach down to pick up 15 chicks... it just didn’t work, and was very disappointing!) So we no longer visit Green Meadows Farm, but we really enjoy having Bea’s Party Ponies come to our school for a few hours. What do we do for our farm unit?
1. We make an “Our School Farm” singable book, and learn the song.
The children spend one or two days on each animal, depending on how complicated it is. For example, we usually do the pig’s head on one day, and the body on the next. We do the cow the same way, etc. That way, no one has to be stressed about finishing up on time.
2. We use the animals to decorate our bulletin boards before gluing them into the books.
We have parent volunteers colate the books together and glue in the projects for the kids after we are done displaying them on the bulletin boards. That way, we get double duty out of the kids’ artwork! I type up the words to the books in large print and post them on the bulletin boards with the artwork so that the kids can see it. I also print out name labels on for the artwork on return address stickers so that the children’s names are all clearly printed on the front of each piece- and I don’t have to be the one to do the writing! Parent volunteers can put the labels on for me.
3. We graph our favorite farm animal and write about the farm after it comes.
Ive included two graphs for downloading this week, one for the Farm Animals, and one for the month of November. We also read non-fiction books about the animals and try to write about what we have learned about them, on a VERY basic level.
4. We count, pattern, and sort the farm animals at the math center. (See last week’s Pumpkin Patch counting page; we put the farm animals in the pumpkin patch and counted them.)
1. Duplicate three sets of the picture cards, and five sets of the question cards. Cut apart and mix up. Put one Barnyard Bang card on the bottom of the deck. There are blank cards at the end if you need to change the word cards. There is an alternate set of picture cards near the end of this set if you don’t want to use the duck to practice the “duck and cover” position that is often taught to children in earthquake or emergency drills. The alternate set just has a duck on that card. Copy the set that meets your needs best. The question cards included cover sight words, alphabet, numbers 0-30, sorting, and ordinal numbers. I usually choose either the math or the language arts cards. There would be way too many question cards if you use them all, in my opinion.
2. The dealer gives each child a card in turn. The child attempts to read the word. If he does not know it, there is no penalty.
3. If the child gets a “special” picture card, he does the following: * “Duck and Cover” (Or just the duck): the child says, “Quack, quack, duck and cover!” and curls up into the duck and cover position on the floor, as is illustrated on the card. The hands should be covering the neck. If you are using the duck only card, have your kids quack like a duck or do the action of your choice. * Milk the cow and get a treat: the child pretends to milk a cow, and then wins a treat. You may wish to blow up a rubber glove with air, close it with a rubber band, and let the children pretend to milk the cow that way! * Giddy-up: All of the children move down one seat clockwise, leaving their cards behind. * Duck, duck, goose: The child points to three other children in succession, saying, “Duck, duck, goose!” The child that he is pointing to on the word, “goose,” must change places with that child, leaving his or her cards behind. * Barnyard Bang: The child says, “Bang!” and gets all of the cards at the table, except for the dealer’s cards. * Dinner Time: Run for it! The child says, “Gobble, gobble!” and runs around the table like a Thanksgiving turkey running for his life! The child next to him that just had a turn becomes the farmer and grabs a fork, and chases him around the table. (Remind children that they may not tackle and actually capture the turkey! This rarely happens, anyway, since the child that just finished his turn is usually not paying close attention to the next child’s turn. By the time he realizes it’s his turn to be the farmer and finds the fork, the turkey has already gotten too far away! :)
7. We do guided drawing of the farm animals.
I LOVE to do guided drawing with my students, and we do it with each unit! When we do guided drawing, I do it whole group. I pass out clip boards or large pieces of very stiff cardboard and have everyone sit on the floor where they can see me. I draw on the white board, and they draw on their papers with a black fine tip marker. (Do NOT give them anything that erases or any kind of eraser, or they will never let any mistakes go!) They are not supposed to talk at all, and no one can say, “I can’t!” We just try our best, knowing that we are just practicing, and if we don’t like a certain section, we just ignore it and keep going. We can always try it again. The last rule for guided drawing is that the children cannot “draw ahead” of me; that is, they cannot guess at what I am going to say or do and then draw it before I do. They have to wait until I draw it, while watching and listening. Then they may draw.
Well, to say that ANY thing is working this week would be strange, since I wasn’t there! I have been out with a terrible case of viral conjunctivitis all week and have been forbidden to return to work until it disappears, since it is highly contagious. Let me assure you that it is so miserable that I would have much rather been at work this week, even though it has been raining steadily all week long here in southern California, and that means that the children can go nowhere for recess because we don’t have gymnasiums for that purpose here. As hard as that is, let’s just say that I would MUCH rather have been at work!
That being said, I am going to share with you some ideas that have been working well during the last couple of weeks instead of this week. I would also like to give a “shout out” to all of the wonderful people that I met at the Kindergarten Teachers of Texas conference last weekend as well! I didn’t get to attend any sessions, since I was presenting the entire time. But on Friday night, I got to browse around the exhibit hall, which was a well stocked, fun place to shop, and I certainly had a great time meeting people at my booth. I am especially grateful to my friend Vanessa Levin of Pre-K Pages who graciously gave me TWO WHOLE DAYS of her precious time to help out at my booth! Her expertise with early childhood needs and issues really came in handy when people had questions at my booth. If you haven’t seen her blog or website yet, I highly recommend it! Her great ideas on Pre-K Pages.com really saved me a couple of years ago when I had a large group of children that needed remediation in Kindergarten. I LOVE her ideas, and tweak them all the time for use in my room! The thing I love about her website is her very creative use of common (and mostly FREE) objects in the classroom! She has a way of teaching with themes that is extremely appealing to young children, and her ideas are usually very simple to implement. They always spark my imagination to create something related, and I’m usually able to take her ideas a little farther to use with my students at the Kindergarten level as well.
1. “Pumpkin Patch Counting” and “Spider Counting” I always try to combine fine motor skills with academics if I can, and this seems easiest to do when the children need to practice counting objects. I also like to stick to the themes that we are studying for social studies or science. So I decided that I would make a couple of counting worksheets that are along the lines of the “Number Tree” activity that is a free download on my website. (The Number Tree idea originally came from Pre-K Pages.com, but I created the paper to go with it.) In this activity, the children count out a given number of plastic farm animals (or whatever you want) and put them in the pumpkin patch. They then raise their hand and tell the teacher, aide, or volunteer that they are ready, and how many farm animals they counted. If the adult agrees that it is correct, then the child may color in that numbered pumpkin on his or her pumpkin patch. There are three different versions so that the children can progress from smaller to larger numbers. The first one goes from one to ten, the second from eleven to twenty, and the last goes from twenty-one to thirty. When the children get to the pages with the numbers past ten, we give them Cuisenaire “Count-Ten Cartons,” which are just like egg cartons that have been cut down to have just ten spaces. (Ice cube trays with just ten spaces work great too, if you can find them! Sometimes they have them in the dollar store.) This helps them count the larger numbers more easily. For example, for number twelve, they put one animal in each space, and then put two extra farm animals in the pumpkin patch. Then once the adult checks that they really do have twelve animals, and have identified which pumpkin on their worksheet has a number twelve, they may color in that pumpkin.
I made a spider web page that is exactly the same thing, but with spiders! I bought a box of plastic spiders at a party store, and saved them so that the kids could count them for Halloween fun. I was going to ask parents to donate some black nylons (knee highs would have been perfect) and then stretch them over the tops of some pie tins. That would have made some excellent spider webs! But alas, I was not around to take care of this, so I think that we are just going to count the spiders into bowls or paper plates and call it a day. :) There’s always next year!
Just for fun, I purchased some plastic spider rings, and I thought that next week we will put one ring on each finger and count them to ten. Then we’ll add a few more plastic spiders in the dish, and count them up to twelve or thirteen, etc. Anyway, the good news is that these two counting sheets (Pumpkin Numbers and Spider Numbers, all three versions of each one) have been included as your free download this week. I hope that they are useful to you. Enjoy!
2. Great Gadgets for Fine Motor Skill Development
At the KTot Conference in Texas, I enjoyed purchasing a few new items at a booth called, “Write Out Of The Box,” where they stock a lot of fun little items that help children improve their fine motor skills in fun and clever ways, such as wind up toys, squeezy balls, stretchy toys, pincher grasp items such as kid friendly tweezers and things like that. I chose to add to my collection of wind up toys that I use as rewards when the children participate and try their best during my guided reading groups, much the same as I use the balls. (See last week’s entry on using a balls to motivate a reading group for more information.) I like that the rewards that I give them can also improve their fine motor skills as well!
I also purchased some “Mini Grabbers” there that we used with the kids to pick up their farm animals in the Pumpkin Patch counting activity above. That made it super fun for them! We did a similar activity the week before using the “Bug Catchers” that they also sell to pick up pom-poms at their math center. Their job was to read the directions and then pick up five reds, two pinks, one black, and so on. If the adult agreed that they did this correctly, then they got to color in that square. (Yes, this is very similar to the activity above, but uses color words as well! I have included the paper as another free download this week.) We did this once with tweezers and another time with the bug catchers. I got my bug catchers at a local US Toy Company store, though, not from WriteOutOfTheBox.com where they are much more expensive. My friend Vanessa pointed out that many of the things they sell there can be found more cheaply in places such as the Oriental Trading Company, so it is certainly worth looking other places before making a purchase! I should note that I bought a dozen of the bug catchers, and two of them are already broken. So beware! I have really not had much trouble with wind up toys breaking, though- thank goodness! But you can get cheaper ones in the dollar section at Michaels, especially during the springtime when people are looking for Easter basket stuffers. They just don’t do any of the special “tricks” that the ones from WriteOutOfTheBox.com do. THOSE are much pricier- but pretty neat!
3. A Movie for Using Balls to Motivate Young Readers- and Zoo-Phonics, too!
Last week I explained this motivation technique and decided to take a movie of a reading lesson in which I used balls to motivate my students, so I am including it here. In it, my students are doing the Zoo-Phonics motions to practice their letter sounds. But they are not looking at the Zoo-Phonics cards anymore! They have transitioned away from them and are now practicing the sounds with just plain lower case letter cards. As you will see in this video clip, they really, really REALLY like Zoo-Phonics! And, they were SUPER excited to earn a ball to play with for just a minute- you can totally see the joy and excitement in their little faces! I am SO proud of these children, because they did not know a single letter or sound when school started on August 23rd- and now they just about know them ALL! And what a fun way to practice! I highly recommend Zoo-Phonics for the active learner- it just can’t be beat!
4. Calendar Book- Updated Files for Write the Date
For those of you that are doing the calendar books, I am posting a few more of the “Write the Date” papers. I previously posted them for September and October, but did not have anymore after that. I have had a chance to finish up the rest of the months this week while I was trying to let my eyes heal, so I am including them in this blog posting. I hope you like them! I had to create artwork for the November one, and that was the primary delay. There are still no papers for July and August, though!
There is another game that I came up with years ago, but never could give away nor sell, since I didn’t own the artwork on it. But, this summer I tried to catch up on the missing pieces of artwork on some of these “old reliable” games that I have been using year after year to make drill and practice a little bit more fun, and I actually did manage to get it all completed! I also just added some cards to this game that are like the whole group comparing sets cards, but with a Halloween theme, so this will also provide further reinforcement on comparing sets. Basically, you can play this game with either the sight word cards, the alphabet cards, or the numbers and comparing sets cards, so there is a lot of flexibility built into it. There is also a set of blank cards so that you can put your own words or concepts into it and make it suit your own needs as well. I have the whole game posted to my website for purchase HERE, if you're interested.
This is how you play “Boo!” It’s a lot like “Ring the Bell,” but with a Halloween theme.
1. The dealer holds all the cards, shuffling them before beginning. Put one “Boo!” card on the bottom of the stack.
2. The dealer gives the first child a card. He tries to identify the card. There is no penalty for getting it wrong.
3. If the child receives a special picture card, then he must do the following things.
Bat: The child gets to pretend to fly around the table one time. Spider: The child gets to stand and spin around several times (a reference to a spider spinning a web.) Ghost: The child says “Boo!” and he gets all the cards at the table, except for the dealer’s cards. Pumpkin: The child gets to get up and do a log roll on the ground (the child lays down and rolls on the ground with his arms at his sides, like a pumpkin rolling down a hill.) Monster: The child gets to get up and scares everyone at the table with a big monster “Roar!” Then all of the children at the table have to give him one of their cards. Trick or Treat!: The child get either gets a small treat (like one piece of cereal)
The game continues until all of the cards are dealt. The child with the most cards is the winner.
Variations on the game:
1. Keep the special picture cards in one stack and the question cards in another stack. Start pulling the special cards when the kids are getting restless, and do them all at once so that everyone gets one.
2. When a child gets a special card, have him or her choose a friend or two to do the activity with him. Or, you choose some kids that were being really good to do it with him or her instead. That keeps everyone active.
3. Add some question cards that are harder for those children that are more advanced, so that the game remains at a good instructional level for all. You can even have two or more completely separate decks of cards at different levels that you play with different ability groups if you choose. The great thing about differentiating this way is that the children don’t know that they are being given different lessons, and no one has to feel bad about anything. From the outside looking in, it looks exactly the same, so it can just be your little secret. :)
2. Practicing Sound Blending with CVC Bingo
I discovered a fun way to practice blending sounds a couple of years ago, probably sometime in the middle of the night! (I love the good ideas, I just wish they would come at a more convenient time of day!) It makes use of the CVC bingo games that are included in the CVC Resource CD and downloads, (and I'm including the Short A family Bingo game as a free download this week!) I figured that if I just changed the way the caller called out the word and segment it rather than say the whole word, then the kids could practice blending the sounds that they hear and look for that picture. For example, instead of calling out “cat,” the caller would say each sound individually: “/c/ /a/ /t/.” Then, the children would look for the picture of the cat and cover it up, etc. My kids learned to blend these sounds together really quickly this way! In fact, for the first few units of CVC words that we did, I had my parent volunteer segment the sounds of the pictures the first time they played the game, because this helped them learn to sound out the words in print the following week. It also is a more reasonable way for my struggling students to play the CVC bingo game, because it kind of brings it down to a more appropriate instructional level, and was definitely a more meaningful activity for those groups. If you don’t have the CVC bingo games, you could use any bingo game that you have with pictures, and simply segment the sounds, or separate the beginning sound from the rest of the picture and have them blend the word together and say the word. For example, instead of “desk,” it would be “/d/ /esk/” and then the kids would say, “desk.” Essentially, what you are doing here is taking a reading or vocabulary activity and turning it into a phonemic awareness activity. The phonemic awareness activity acts as a springboard to help the kids learn how to blend the sounds that they will eventually see in print, especially when you practice with words that they will be learning to read anyway! This is my “secret weapon” when I am trying to get my class to learn how to sound out CVC words, and I try to explain to parents how to help with this to at parent conferences and Back to School night. Then I include it as homework, and have their book buddies practice with them, too! Last year, nearly every single child in my class passed our CVC word reading test with 100%!
3. Getting Kindergartners Started Writing Sentences When it Seems IMPOSSIBLE!
Years ago, when I first started making up sight word songs, I developed this method of using the songs with the word wall to get kids started writing sentences. This method is more about teaching kids to write a specific sentence, rather than one of their own choosing as they would if they were journalling, but at least it’s a start! Later in the year when they have more skills, we move into journalling, and teaching kids to write the words that they hear. It seems to be particularly difficult for English language learners to try to write words phonetically right from the beginning, and this method gives these children especially a different way to go about it.
To prepare for the lesson, I make sure that my word wall has all of the words on it that the kids will need. (I always add the words to the wall gradually as the children learn them, rather than fill it up with all of them at the beginning of the year, which is overwhelming to the young eye when they are trying to find a new word.) This is what I do:
A. Tell the children what sentence we are going to try to write. In my class I let them personalize their sentence by choosing what animal or object they would like to put at the end of it. For example, I tell them that we are going to write, ““I see the cow,” but they might like to write, “I see the pig,” instead. In this case, they could choose any farm animal. Actually, if a child takes the initiative to put something else on their paper rather than a farm animal, I’m fine with that, too!
B. Ask the children to repeat the sentence, and maybe count the words that you are going to write. Sometimes, I may write a line on my white board easel for each word that we are going to write. Then I choose a child to find that word on my word wall. The rest of the class “helps” that child by singing that sight word song while the child tries to find it and point at it with my teacher pointer. They do this acappella, meaning that we are not using a CD; we just do it from memory. Once that child has found it, I have the children tell me how to spell the word. I show them how I can copy that word from the wall, or even write it from memory by using the song, if I can. I write the word on my white board easel.
C. I discuss the fact that I must have a space between my words, and I sing the “Spaces” song from Sing and Spell Vol. 2 with the kids acappella. I put a magnet up on my white board easel to hold that space.
D. I ask the children what the next word should be, and pick another child to find that word with my pointer while the class again sings that sight word song. Then I write the word as the class spells it for me. Then we add the space with the Spaces song. Basically, I model this process from beginning to end, showing the children how I know what to write. I keep doing this until I get to the end of the sentence.
E. The child that gets picked to point to the last word in the sentence gets to choose the farm animal that I will put in my sentence. I have my farm animal pictures and the names of the animals to copy on a separate pocket chart from my word wall. I prefer to put them on a pocket chart rather than “clutter” up my word wall, which makes it hard for some of the little ones to find those sight words. Plus, there isn’t room to leave them up all year long on my word wall, so they will have to come down when we are done with the farm unit anyway.
F. When we get to the end of the sentence, I ask the children what we have to put at the end of the sentence, and then prompt them to sing me the I’m Done song from Sing and Spell Vol. 1. Then I put a period at the end. Later in the year, I explain that an exclamation point is a “happy period” that you can put there instead, and we practice reading the sentences that we wrote in two different ways: once with a period, and once with a “happy period.” It’s fun!
I have a little video clip of this method that I took of my class several years ago when I was trying to make an instructional DVD. The instructional DVD never happened, since the quality of the video tape didn’t come out as it should have, but I have used the video clip in my workshops ever since! I am including it here so that you can get an idea of what teaching kids to write this way looks like. If a picture tells a thousand words, than a video tells a million!
This year, I did this lesson once with the kids just watching, and then the second and third time I passed out white boards and had the kids write along with me on them. The fourth time I did it, I had them write their sentences in small groups as part of our rotation. (For more information on how I do my rotation, see my blog entry on how to pull small groups in Kindergarten.) I use lined writing paper that I made myself rather than that awful thin newsprint that the school provides, because the children just can’t erase it without making giant holes in the paper. So I xerox a bunch of copies of it each month and just use it as needed. I have three different versions of this paper, some with more lines and some with fewer, and I have included them as a free download this week. I know that many of you might not need them, and there’s not much to them, but I find them absolutely essential and use them every week, so maybe they will be useful to some of you as well.
To differentiate this lesson, I have my faster learners/workers write more than one sentence as time permits, and/or possibly include the word “and” and include more than one farm animal. They could also write an adjective before the animal, such as “I see the soft sheep,” and sound out the adjective that they want to include. For my struggling students, at the beginning of the year, they usually need me to guide their group through the process again from beginning to end. So I choose a student from just that group to find the first word, and then I make sure that everyone in the group was able to copy it. Then we go on from there, just as in the whole group lesson, but I stop each time and make sure that each child is keeping up with each word.
4. Using a BALL to Motivate a Reading Group
I found a rather unusual way to motivate a difficult group of children a couple of years ago, and I have used it ever since! I had been on little trip with my husband and had spotted an interesting looking squishy ball that interested me in a candy shop (don’t ask me why we were in the candy shop!) and on a whim I decided to buy it. It wound up on my desk at school when we came back. Well, the next day back at work, I was trying to give a required and very dry scripted guided reading lesson off of a chart to a group of very wiggly little boys that clearly couldn’t see the point of learning to read. I just COULDN’T get their attention! I had given lots of these lessons previously with puppets, but they were already tired of “Mr. Beaver” and “Mr. Pirate” asking them to sit up and read. One of them reached over to my desk and grabbed the ball. That’s when it hit me: offer them a chance to play with the ball in exchange for paying attention to the reading lesson! So I tried it. I had one little boy who was trying his best, so I took the ball from the little guy that had helped himself to it without permission and said, “I’m going to throw this nice new ball to A____ because he is doing SUCH a wonderful job of reading and trying his BEST!” I took the ball and tossed it to him, and let him play with it in his chair for 10 or 15 seconds. Then I invited him to throw it back to me. Guess what? I instantly had ALL of those boys’ attention, and they were ALL trying to read from the chart, in nice big voices as they sat up straight and tall. WOW! I couldn’t believe my luck! After we finished reading the chart, I passed the ball to each of them and let them each play with it for a few seconds, and then grabbed an empty tub, and asked each child to see if they could make a basket. They loved it, and worked for it every single day! So I decided that I could save some time by having more than one ball. I bought them when I found them on sale here and there, and at the Dollar store. Now I have a box full of them, and the box sits next to my reading table. The kids know that the balls are there, and if they are REALLY good and try their best, they might get to play with them for a little bit!
Since I have added more than one ball, I have learned to:
A. Model the acceptable behavior with a ball. It can’t be thrown high in the air, or at anyone. They also can’t get up and walk around with it.
B. Sometimes I use a sand timer to make sure that I don’t waste more than 60 seconds on it. But this is 60 seconds well spent, if they are all paying attention to the entire reading lesson, rather than picking at the glue on their fingers or staring at the wall for entertainment.
C. When I count to three, the ball must be thrown back into the box immediately. If they do not, then next time I pass around the balls, the child who did not follow directions doesn’t get one.
D. ONLY the children who are doing their best and paying attention get thrown a ball, and consistency is a must, or the balls will cease to work their magic. You can’t just decide that you feel sorry for a child that didn’t earn it and give it to him or her anyway, or you might as just well put them away. I tell the kids that I need to see their eyes on the chart or book, their lips moving, and I need to hear their voices, or they don’t get a ball. I do remind that the balls are coming and they might not get one if needed during the lesson. I have had some pretty “tough” boys in tears because they didn’t get a ball, which is hard to watch, but the next time around they usually do pay attention and try.
And since we are thinking outside of the box here, it may be good to mention that balls are not the only thing that will work! I have other “gadgets” that I keep near my reading table as well, and I use them in the same way. Usually, when I get to the end of a section in that scripted reading guide that we use, I give them the gadgets to play with while I look at the next section coming and figure out what it is that I am supposed to do and say next. It’s motivating and fun for the kids, and necessary for me. So far, my collection includes stretchy animals such as snakes and caterpillars, wind up toys, and a box full of magnets. And then there is also Mr. Ball. Mr. Ball is just a tennis ball that is sliced open halfway and that has wiggly eyes glued on. The children love to feed “Mr. Ball” a penny, and if they are good, I might give them a penny to do just that! When I squeeze him in just the right way, you can put a chip or a penny in his mouth. Sometimes Mr. Ball bites when you feed him though, so watch out! Then he gets too full and spits them up into the penny container. That’s always good for a laugh! And I think that there should always be a little bit of laughter in any school day. Don’t you?
Someone emailed me this week and asked me if I thought her class of exceptional three year olds might respond well to the Singable Songs for Letters and Sounds DVD. I had to answer that I thought that it would! I recently received a few little video clips of a twenty month old little girl named Amelia who has been “obsessing” over the Alphabet Action song on this very DVD, insisting on watching it and dancing along several times a day. Her mother wanted me to see how cute she was as she was enjoying performing the song in her little diapered bottom! You can view some of these video clips on my Facebook page. The most amazing thing, though, is the video that the mother took of this little girl identifying all of the letters out of order, before she even turned two years old! Her mom didn’t even realize that she was learning them, and then began to suspect that Amelia knew the letters out of order and sat down with flashcards to find out. This video is on my Facebook page as well!
2. Singable Books and the “Top Down” Learner
Little Amelia is a good example of a child that is a natural learner, and is the kind of child we probably would all like to have in our future classes when she is old enough! She is obviously responding to her very enriching, stimulating environment and has began to learn just for the joy of it! I would say that Amelia is learning lanugage arts in the order that most kids learn (from the bottom up): first the letter names and sounds, and then after that, she will learn some words and then go on to learn to read from there. But I always seem to have a few kids in my class that don’t seem to learn in this same way. I like to call them “Top Down” learners, but another name for this type of child is a “global learner.” This type of learner seems to need to see the big picture first, and then will learn the details last. In other words, they may learn to recognize words first, and learn to “read” (memorize or recite) some books, and then after that, they start to realize that the individual letters are important enough to notice and learn. So for the global learner, some sight words come first, and a love of books. After that, they start to learn the letters. And for this reason, I go ahead and teach the sight word songs even though I may have quite a few children in my class that still do not know the whole alphabet. And even though progress may be slow with learning the letters, they do begin to learn the letters in the sight word songs more quickly than the rest of the letters. They also learn the sight words that they find often in our “Singable Books” more quickly than the ones that they don’t see as much. Interestingly enough, there are two children in my class who read 10-13 sight words each yesterday, but just last week, neither one of these boys knew more than half of the alphabet! Some kids just learn better from the “top down,” I guess! They were able to read the most of the given sight words without hesitation, and I am confident that the rest of the letter names will come along nicely very soon as well.
The current Singable Book that we are working on is the “Our School Farm” book. We have been singing the song each day, and learning about the different farm animals. We’ve also been counting with our plastic toy farm animals and playing games with them, too. A local “party pony and farm animal” company is coming in a couple of weeks to visit our Kindergarten for the morning, and each child will get a chance to ride a pony and pet the farm animals. We are counting down the days as working on our book, and the kids are really excited! As soon as we finish this book, we will begin our “Halloween Song” book. The kids always love this song, because it sounds spooky and it is very active, with lots of jumping motions and things like that. There are few holidays that get children as excited as Halloween, that’s for sure!
This is how we use our Singable Books: every day, we read/sing the book together before I send them to work on their page. We usually do one page a day, although sometimes an art project takes two days, such as the cow and the sheep. When they are done with the book, we read the book together in small groups and practice turning the pages, finding letters and words that we know on the pages, identify the spine and the front and back covers, find the title, and then try to track the words as we read (speaking, not singing) the book together. Then we sing the book together again up to regular speed. Then the kids get to take the book home. When it gets closer to the end of the year, I start saving the books to keep out for Open House, though. But I do like the fact that everyone gets to have lots of books at home that they can definitely "read." If they can sing it, they can read it, because it is then easily memorized. This also gives that global learner a purpose for learning those letters and words, since this is a meaningless activity to many children at first; they don't see the need because it is so abstract. A little motivation goes a long way!
3. Whole Group Comparing Sets Practice
We really needed more practice comparing sets than we could get in small groups, so I decided to make some larger comparing sets cards that we could use to practice whole group, and this is a free download this week! All we do with them is hold them up and read the question: Are example, “Are there more cats, or dogs?“ Then the children look at the pictures and answer together as best they can. Sometimes we just look and take a guess, and sometimes we have to count the objects together. But this practice, together with the More, Less, and Equal songs on the Musical Math CD and DVD, have really helped the children understand the concepts, and I think that most of the children will pass this concept.
4. Whole Group Sorting Practice?
Last year, I decided that the hardest part of sorting was definitely telling how the child sorted, not the actual sort itself! Some children simply don’t have the vocabulary to identify how they sorted. Was it by color, or shape, or size? So we have been making use of the Sorting Song on the Musical Math CD and that helps quite a lot! The motions that we have the children do when they say, “I can sort by color; I can sort by size. I can sort by shape- any old time!” also help them remember what each catagory label refers to, I think. But my husband also helped me out by creating some sorting charts that I have been using to drill the kids in a whole group situation. (These charts have also been included as a free download this week!) He made some pictures that show some attribute blocks that have been sorted by size, by color, and by shape. I have been holding them up in front of the class and asking them to identify how I sorted. Then I call on the children one at a time and ask them to tell me how I sorted, as I continually mix up the cards. I think that the extra practice is really helping them a lot! Another thing that I found is that a struggling child can be left with the picture of the completed sort, and can keep working. I just told the child to make their blocks look like my picture, and that child can keep going without me. Then when he or she has it, I can go back later and ask him how he sorted, and then have him do it again without the picture. It really seemed to work!
1. Large Rhyming Words Practice Cards and Bingo Game
Producing rhyming words is always something that is not very much fun to practice, but it is something that just has to be done! Since I teach at a Title One school, many of the children come from homes where there are few books to read or literacy activities going on. So we have to fill in the gaps as best we can. One thing that is helping me this year is a new set of rhyming words practice cards and a matching bingo game that I made over the summer.
This is how it works: You take the large cards and put them into a gallon size zip lock bag. Then take a dark piece of 12 x 18” construction paper and fold it in half, and then insert it into the bag so that it is covering up the pictures of the rhyming words. The cards are printed with one picture above the other, so if you pull the paper up halfway, the children will just see the top picture. So when you pull it up, then you ask the children, “What rhymes with ____?” (say the name of the picture you are showing in the blank, of course!) I always do this part of the activity whole group. The children usually call out lots of different answers. I always tell them that there are many correct answers, but though only one of them is printed on the card. Then I pull up the card and they all shout out the picture on it. So we do this activity several times a week.
Then, in small groups, we play the matching rhyming bingo game. I use those same large practice cards as the calling cards, pulling each one only halfway up, and ask the children in the group to tell me as many rhyming words as they can think of as the word on the card. I praise all of the correct answers, and explain why if an answer may be wrong. Then I show the answer on the card, and the children cover up that picture on the bingo card. The first person to cover all six of the pictures on the card gets a bingo and he or she gets a couple of pieces of cereal. Then we keep playing until my cards are all gone and everyone has won! The children love this game, and it is much more fun than just randomly asking them to tell me words that rhyme with another. The artwork on this game was far too much work, so I cannot give this one away free - sorry! So we have posted it on my website as a download for sale.
2. Making Sight Words With Alphabet Pattern Blocks
Last week we made the word “the” with our Alphabet Pattern Blocks by using the black and white masters and having my parent volunteers trim the letters close and glue them down to form the word. I have also just posted some Pattern Block paper masters to copy on colored paper here. The children just had to glue down the paper pattern blocks to form the word “the.” I told my parent volunteer running the center to continually ask the children what word they were making, and how to spell it. I am hoping that the children will take their word home and hang it on the wall, and tell their parents what it says. We are ALMOST past the point where when I ask the children, “What word is this?” they stop either just giving me blank looks, or answering by just spelling the word, “T-H-E!” I’m sure it must be hard for those children who are still learning English, since the word “the” really doesn’t carry any meaning. It’s more of a language “placeholder.” But lots of them are now proudly answering, “The!” Hooray!
3. More, and Less, and Equal: Oh, My!
Comparing Sets is a hard concept, and I think that one of the hardest things about it is remembering the associated vocabulary. The children have to remember what the words “more,” “less,” and “equal” each mean individually. So several years ago I came up with a song for each of these words, and we sing them faithfully every year, and I think they really make a huge difference! They are on the Musical Math CD and DVD. You do have to really explain and demonstrate with manipulatives the full meaning of these words, though, because the lyrics of the songs are meant to be a “hook” that helps the kids quickly remember if they are looking for the group with “a lot” or “a little” or “the same.” The real meaning of more, less, and equal, though, is much more complicated than this, so this cannot be the sum total of the lesson, that’s for sure!
Despite the success of the songs, the children still need to practice comparing sets, of course! So I came up with the More, Less, and Equal game a few years ago. All you need is a large die or a number spinner, some counters, and a more/less/equal spinner or die. Instead of a die, we use a large standing “Really Good Wheel” that I bought from reallygoodstuff.com for about thirty-five dollars. It looks and feels something like a roulette wheel, and the kids really love to play games with it!
This is how you play: In a small group, each child spins the wheel and takes the number of counters that came up on the wheel. After everyone in the group has had a chance to spin, then someone in the group rolls the more/less/equal die to see who is the winner of that round. If “more” comes up, then the person that has the most counters at the table is the winner of that round. If “less” comes up, then the person that has the least at the table is the winner of that round. If equal comes up, then if any two people have an equal number, then they are the winners of that round. If none of them have an equal number, then roll the die again until you have a clear winner. The winner of the round can get a piece of cereal, or an extra counter, or whatever you want! You can have the children all give back their counters and start again, or keep them all and add the next round’s counters to their existing number. It doesn’t really matter! The only thing that matters is that the children get some practice identifying numbers that are more, less, or equal to each other. I also sent a version of this game home for homework, complete with a number spinner and a more/less/equal spinner. I am including it in this blog as a free download, along with the parent directions! In addition, I am including the master for the more/less/equal die, so that you can make your own, if you want to do so. (After you print the spinner, of course, you’ll have to insert a paper fastener into the middle of it, and then put a paper clip around it. Loosen the paper fastener a bit so that it will spin.) We wrapped paper die around a foam die so that it would be sturdier than just a hollow paper cube die. It held up very nicely, and we were able to pass it along to another class to use the next day!
In case you were wondering about it, the “Really Good Wheel” came with a variety of different write-on, wipe-off “plates” that you can switch out easily so that there can be twenty different places to land, or just two! I have used it in a ton of different games, and it has traveled from class to class for lots of games, so I have never regretted spending the thirty dollars on it. The only problem I had with it is that the plates always left a dry erase marker shadow when I tried to erase a mark, so I decided to use Post-it Note Tape to mark the sections on the wheel. That has worked out great, because the tape sticks for a long, long time, and comes off easily when you want it to, leaving no residue. If you get a wheel, I would highly recommend getting some of this removable tape to use along with it!
4. The “Secret Signal to Go to the Bathroom”
One thing that always drives me crazy is “potty wanna-bees!” That is, children that think they need to go to the bathroom just because they saw me give someone else permission to go. So many years ago, a very wonderful, experienced teacher taught me a trick: the “Secret Signal to Go to the Bathroom.” This little classroom procedure has been a life saver for me every single year! This is what it is: I teach the children that if they have to go to the bathroom, they should put one finger up in the air quietly. That way I will know that they are not waiting to answer a question or make a comment, but need to go to the bathroom. If I nod at him or her, that means that it is okay to go. (By the way, I have one student this year who keeps raising his middle finger when he needs to go, but I keep telling myself that this couldn’t possibly mean anything!) The great thing about using a secret signal is that most of the time, few or no children realize that someone was just given permission to go to the bathroom because the whole thing happened silently. That means that the need to go to the restroom does not suddenly become contagious in the middle of a lesson! If someone raises their hand to ask to go to the bathroom, I ask them to use the secret signal in a minute or two, and I’ll let them go. I try never to allow the children to get away with not using the signal to get permission during a lesson, because then no one will use it, and then I’ll have lots and lots of “potty wanna-bees” interrupting every lesson every day.
No one may go to the bathroom without permission, and if someone is already there, then I will never give permission for another child to go at the same time unless it is an emergency. (I usually look for signs of true distress, such as “potty dancing, etc.”) I also tell the children that if it is really an emergency and they just can’t wait, they should not be afraid to just speak up and tell me that they really need to go in order to avoid an accident. Children rarely want to tell anyone they are going to have an accident unless it’s really true, so I don’t really have a problem with children fibbing about this just to get permission to go hang out in the bathroom for a bit. I tell the children that in order to go to the bathroom, it has to be your own idea; it can’t be someone else’s idea. If you only tell me that need to go when you see that someone else is going, this tells me that you probably don’t need to go right this minute because it wasn’t your idea, and you can probably wait a bit. The fingers that are raised consistently each time someone comes back from the bathroom belong of course to the ones that really need to go. I also tell parents about this policy at the beginning of the year, and ask them to let me know if their child has trouble “waiting.” That knowledge does also help!
Other secret signals that I have used include:
- two fingers up means that you need a tissue
- three fingers up means that you need to put away or get a sweater
- four fingers up means that you need a drink
The year that the children finally decided that we needed FOUR different fingers worth of signals, I was feeling kind of amused about the whole thing, since usually we get by very well with just one or two! So I added, “Alright! Then FIVE fingers up means that you want to tell us something that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYTHING WE ARE TALKING ABOUT!” Then as I giggled beneath my breath at my own inside joke, one of my students raised his hand (with five fingers up) and announced, “I’m going to Disneyland tomorrow!” I’m still not sure if the child actually knew he was way off topic and did that on purpose, or if it was just one of those “random thoughts” that burst forth from the average kindergartner at any given moment- with five fingers up, four, three, two, or one!
This is a small group game that is along the same lines as Halloween Boo!, but with a farm animal theme. It also ties in well with Thanksgiving, since it includes a turkey that is trying to escape becoming the farmer’s dinner! You could make your own Barnyard Bang game with your own clipart, or purchase mine as a download from my site. 
