I mean...why WOULDN'T you use cootie catchers in your reading block? It makes perfect sense. Ok - remember last week how I was talking about doing a little spring cleaning with some of my TpT resources? Well, I did a little spring cleaning in my file folders on my computer as well. Yikes. Now THAT'S a bit of a rabbit hole. I got in a little deeper than I wanted to, but I figured I might as well finish the job. I got rid of a lot (a LOT) of cringe worthy products that just didn't make the cut anymore, and I got some major organizing done as well. BUT - you know what I found? THIS >>> It's a reading comprehension cootie catcher that I TOTALLY forgot I made! And since it resurfaced for me - I thought I'd resurface it for you! I'm sure I made it for you guys in the first place, but I can't for the life of me find it anywhere on the blog. There's actually 3 different versions. They have different comprehension questions that can be used with any fictional book. They work great as a quick partner review game. You can download them here! Find any long-lost things in your spring cleaning, lately? Pin and Share this freebie:
These four no-prep reading games give great practice reading i-e words! And they're free!
Creative ideas to get kids excited about reading deeper.
Speaking of reading , I made this spinner as a quick fun way to check comprehension after reading. Instant mini lesson too. Click below to d...
Happy Saturday Friends! Today is officially my first day of Spring Break! I wanted to share something I did with my students to motiv...
Use station activities to improve reading comprehension! Get your students moving, working collaboratively, and interested in learning.
Anatomia de um Leitor Olhos , para ver pistas nas imagens e palavras. Boca , para ler com expressividade de um contador. Mãos , par...
I have several free resources available at my TpT store. Click on the images below to download your FREE copy! If you do not have access to a printer right away, you can also pin the images to your favorite boards and download them at a later date!! FREE
How do you work on fluency in your classroom? We make sure to READ READ READ simple sentences to practice our fluency!
Okay, let’s talk guided reading for emergent readers. Reading comprehension and fluency are vital reading competencies for any reader, especially our beginning readers. These leveled reading pointers provide a FUN, hands-on system for your students to grow their fluency. These reading sticks will help children follow and understand the text that they are reading. When I taught kindergarten […]
Add some coloring to reading with this set of animals read and color reading comprehension worksheets. These are great for both reading comprehension and listening comprehension. Animals Read and Color Reading Comprehension Worksheets for Grade 1
Once I figured out the template for the All About Me Flip Up Book, I knew I HAD to create some resources for reading response and writer’s workshop. I am...
Hi all! I can't believe that it is already OCTOBER. There is so much going on but I'm still loving every second of it. I forgot to post about this previously, but for all the non-ELA related things (including my most recent hall pass invention), you can visit my second blog at MyClassyRoom.wordpress.com I like to try out different formats and settings, so I used to have a blogger "for life", then I created that one on wordpress, and now I'm back on blogger. Besides, there are so many teacher pages on blogger that I wanted to access. Enough rambling. Week 3 centers went the best yet. The frantic business has subsided. Also, they were very "active" centers, which could have gone either way. Then I remember back to my 9th period 7th graders last year who were off-the-wall. If we did a play or a game or something where they moved (even sometimes just taking their notes from standing up around the room), they were 7million times more well behaved. There's got to be some science to that. Anyway, here are the pictures for the board; this week's topic was "Main Idea" Read to Self: Still in the library, logging their minutes in their center folders. Students read their "Book Club" choice book. I used bins from the $1 store and labeled them with index cards. There are 2 more baskets as well, I don't just teach 12 students! There are 5 more in each of the other bins. The stories are all under the Realistic Fiction genre. They had a choice of reading Granny Torelli Makes Soup, Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Book 1, Who Ran my Underwear up the Flagpole, School Story, and There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom. These books are easier so that they can be worked on independently for all of my students. We will be working more with non-fiction and more challenging texts after our Book Clubs. Read to Someone: Around the classroom, still working with their "Book Club" books. We added "Checking for understanding" with a blue checkmark. Students asked each other the 5W's at the end of each chapter. I cannot wait to show you what I am adding to the "Read to Someone" station in the coming weeks! Listening: Students listened to an audiotape of 3 short Aesop fables. In their center folders they recorded the main idea for each. Teacher/Group: I had to add the "/" in there. I just finished all but one administration of the BRI (Basic Reading Inventory) for my own record keeping. Next week, I need to pull my students for at least 30-40 minutes each day to administer 5 different students benchmarking with F&P. So, while I wanted a strictly "teacher" group, that isn't going to happen. So, therefore, over the next few weeks, I am going to have that bunch of students play a game as reinforcement of what we are learning. This week they used cards with a "secret decoder" that shows the answer to work on Main Idea. They kept a score tally on the whiteboard. Also, which I forgot to photograph, I made "A B and C" answer cards using paint chips from WalMart. The free ones. I wrote a letter on each of the colored sections and students slide a butterfly clip to the answer. Yay! (I was in Troy by my alma matter, Sage, this weekend for "Chowderfest." I had Tom stop the truck so I could go and pick up some of the game sets they have!) Writing: Students finished publishing (final copy, cover page) their Pro/Con of 6th grade essays. Word Work: By far, the biggest hit of the week. I had 3 of my students stay after just to play it again! This week was a review week for spelling. So, I created Spelling BAM! What is that, you ask? Well, I took a container from the iced tea mix I finished up (*goodbye, summer*), and decorated it. I was in a rush, but it looked pretty good. I can always cover it in the future. Next, I filled it with cut up index cards that had all of the spelling words (1 time each), two cards that said "swipe" and two cards that said "BAM!" The final step was to secure the rules on the back with packing tape. Basically, kids sit in a circle and take turns pulling out a card. They give it to someone who reads the word. The first student needs to spell it correctly. They do, they keep the card. They don't, it goes back. A "swipe" card allows students to take a card from another player's pile, if they can spell it correctly. A "Bam!" card means all of that player's cards goes back into the jar. At the end of the centers, the student with the most cards wins! (This could me modified for vocabulary practice too) On to planning Week 4! Have a wonderful weekend!
With so many of my BIG KIDS struggling with fluency, I worked to make it a part of my daily work with students, a Tier 1 intervention that the majority of the class could benefit from. Reading fluency incorporates three main components: speed, accuracy, and prosody, which directly impact comprehension. While I have shared a great deal about incorporating 6-Minute Solutions, here are a few other ways I worked to make fluency fun for my 6th graders.
Create your own listening center in your classroom with these easy instructions from this kindergarten teacher!
If you are looking for free online read-aloud websites, I have just the list for you!
Reading Response activities will likely form a major part of your reading programme, whether you are running guided reading groups, a daily 5 system,
Close reading, broken down with a FREE planning page that works for any text
Get six hands-on syllable activities with free printables - perfect to get your little one ready to read!
Just click the following link to download this list of homophones: Homophones Word List 2 A homophone is a word that sounds the same as another word or words, but has a different meaning and spelling. Homophones can really trip up our young readers and writers. It’s sometimes difficult for them to know for sure which […]
This week in my summer camp, my class discussed the ocean ( for additional ocean resources click HERE ). Camp Google was a very valuable...
As teachers we spend countless hours searching for the perfect activities to go along with our lessons. Having a list of go-to resources that can be used the
Looking for fluency activities? I just updated my fluency freebie. I added some short passages. If you need longer passages, I recommend visiting Reading A to Z. This is a great site with leveled passages. There are even some free books that you can download. Click HERE to get your freebie.
As we all know, fluency is a key component to reading success! Students need a LOT of opportunities to practice sight word recognition and newly learned
Activities and resources to help teach a child to read, from pre-readers to school-age, in phonemic awareness, phonics, and comprehension.
A fun way to build reading comprehension with these rainbow retelling bracelets. Includes a free printable.
Help your students work on fluency at home with Zoom Cards! I sequence my phonics program carefully. It is structured, and students build 'brick by brick' on what they already know (free printable on sequence HERE). If you are looking for a phonics system that is: comprehensive; fast to prep ; easy to implement and maintain; engaging and independent; and sequenced and challenging - well, you've just found it! These zoom cards, numbered from 1 to 34 will step learners through a sequenced set of letter sound patterns and words. They include cards for single sounds word families cvc words consonant blends ccvc words cvcc words consonant digraphs nasals The cards are backline so you can copy them onto brightly coloured paper to add some interest. Give each student a small plastic pouch to keep their cards in. You can assess the students quickly on a Friday to determine if they are ready to move onto the next card. It is personal choice, but I would recommend aiming for 100% accuracy. Students have a card for the whole week and time themselves reading the sounds/words each night. They can record their best times and try to get faster as the week progresses. With 34 cards, there is enough to cover the whole year. My printable Zoom Cards file can be found on our TpT store! Thank you so much for stopping by my blog, be sure to follow our ELA Pinterest board for ongoing ideas and activities.
If you're looking for a fun way to introduce common digraphs, you'll love these free dice and beginning and ending digraph posters.
Do your students struggle to show that they are able to comprehend what they have read? Being able to demonstrate comprehension is a vital life skill. Here is how we target reading comprehension in my self-contained special education classroom. Many of my students have language based disabilities. The more words (spoken or written), the more ... Read More about Functional Reading Comprehension Instruction In Special Ed.
We must explicity teach reading strartegies. Reading strategies do not function in isolation; they work synergistically to help students fully access text.
I took this idea from a handout provided by WE are TEACHERS and ReadyGen of PearsonSchool.com I loved the detective and the them...
Comprehension difficulties happen to everyone… good readers, and struggling readers alike. They happen to adults too! Every time I read directions for a complicated IKEA assembly or a technical-scientific article, I find my comprehension skills being challenged! The important thing we need to teach our students, especially the struggling readers, is that those moments of […]
Welcome back to Preschool and Kindergarten Writing Lessons, a 10 week writing series between The Measured Mom and me. If you are just joining us, feel free to visit the post that includes all the links to our series so far. Today, I’d like to talk a little about teaching kids how to write a ... Read More about Teaching Kids How to Write a Sentence
Download this FREE Help Your Child Learn to Read reading tips brochure for your students' parents to support their child in learning to read.
I wanted to make some charts for Author's Purpose that would appeal to my first graders. I went with the P.I.E acronym (Persuade, Inform, Entertain) but took it to the next level by actually using Pie as the text examples. I then added some Other Examples so the students would get additional visual examples of the different purposes. I have these up on my Teachers Pay Teachers site for only $2.00! ***UPDATE - I had a few requests to add an additional, optional 4th poster for "Explain". I have now included this in the download too. This is also available in a money saving bundle with my Reader's Tool Box: Click on the picture to see it! Save With A Bundle: Author's Purpose Anchor Charts and Reader's Toolbox of Reading Strategies Click here to go to Teacher's Pay Teachers to get them :) While you are at my store, check out some of my new and best selling products including: My Original Writing Center - My best selling product! CVC Clip The Sounds Print Your Own Teacher Subway ArtPerfect for Gifts! Don't Get "Frozen" - A Sight Words Card Game Read It, Build It, Write ItAll 220 Dolch Sight Words Included The "Blue Cat" Daily Five Posters Reader's Toolbox of Reading Strategies Marzano (Kid-Friendly) Rating Scales Polka Dot Behavior Clip Chart with Daily/Weekly Behavior Reports and Punch Cards Chevron Behavior Clip Chart with Daily/WeeklyBehavior Reports and Punch Cards Word Family HousesCVC and CCVC Words Included The Ultimate Writing Center: Chevron Sight Words Superhero: Everything You Need to Motivate and Reward Sight Word Recognition Sight Words Superhero Add-On Pack: 130 Pages of Sight Word Games and Activities! Mighty Minions Sight Words Card Game Mighty Minions Read It, Build It, Write It Author's Purpose Anchor Charts Letter AND Sound Picture Mats Interactive Word Wall Books The Scientific Method Posters and Activities Awesome Adjectives with "The Blue Cat" Check out these MONEY SAVING BUNDLES: And MUCH more - click here to see more great products! And, don't forget to follow my store to get a free kit each month!!! Past "Follower Freebies" include" Click here to see how to get free kits each month: Mrs. Gilchrist's Follower Freebies
My daughter loves when we have storytime at our house. Every day we can easy read for 15-30 minutes. Visits to our local library is always exciting because of the idea of finding new books to enjoy. There has been one book that is not new to most, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Although I've heard great reviews about this book I never made the decision to borrow it. I have found another fun way to find books and that is at yard sales! When I see a bin of books I'm all over it! Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was one I recently found and grabbed it for .25 cents!! After the first read my daughter was hooked! She smiled and laughed and thoroughly enjoyed the story. She loves how it rains and snows food! Each night before bed my daughter chooses a book which is alot more fun and easier now that we have our rain gutter book shelf. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was a favorite for at least a week straight! To help my daughter with reading comprehension I made up this activity, here's what I used and how we played: Giant Post it Notes (these are awesome!) Permanent Marker Brown paper bags Prizes for bag This was such an easy set up. I had a list of questions I asked my daughter about the story and wrote 2 choices to each question onto the Post It Notes. After I read the question my daughter had to choose which was the correct answer by jumping on it. At the end of each path I taped a brown paper bag, if she chose the right path she would receive some goodies I hid in the bag. If she chose the wrong path the bag would be empty. She chose the correct answers so she got the prizes on the first try - had she not we would have just kept playing until she got it right! This was a really fun activity that helped my daughter with her reading comprehension and got her moving at the same time.....and a little prize at the end never hurts!!
Students can use these close reading one pager posters to demonstrate their understanding of and show their thinking through close reading exercises. The one pager poster format is perfect for open ended reading responses, with the questions broken down by the number of "close reads" a student...
In this huge list are 50+ texts {including poetry, picture books, and more} that you can use when modeling comprehension strategies to your readers.
I am so happy to share some brand new, silent e fluency passages I made… and they are FREE! These phonics “read & illustrate” passages are the perfect way to assess students understanding of what they are reading. There are 2 activities for each of the following phonics skills: a_e i_e o_e u_e […]
Strategies, interventions, and techniques that teachers and parents can use to help kids with dyslexia improve their reading skills.