We are doing first grade phonics now. Get ready to learn and do all of the activities I think everyone will enjoy!

Learn about some of the differences between teaching phonics to ELLs and native English speakers. Also discover some new resources.

Here are six ideas for teaching phonics virtually with tips for how to teach sounds and model skills during a Zoom meeting.

This blog post includes ideas, activities, and free printables for using dice in the classroom. There’s a whole WORLD of possibilities for using dice with literacy!

In today's post, I'll share ideas and free materials for teaching beginning Spanish phonics. I'll cover letter sounds, open syllables (sílabas abiertas), syllables with blends (sílabas trabadas), and closed syllables (sílabas cerradas).

Are you looking for some FREE Phonics Activities? Well, you’ve come to the right place!! Today in our Struggling Reader Series, I’m sharing TONS of links to free phonics activities. Don’t get stressed out looking at the entire list. We’ll talk really quick about how to narrow down what phonics skills your learner needs to work ... Read More about The ULTIMATE List of FREE Phonics Activities

Students will love these fun hands-on phonics activities that teach letter sounds, digraphs, letter blends, vowel sounds, and more!

Need some fun, active learning activities for teaching prepositions in Kindergarten, first grade, or second grade? This post has 5 ideas to get you started!

Discover and use the science of reading to teach phonics scope and sequence by grade level with my printable phonics sequence chart.

Teaching phonics doesn't have to be scary. I created this FREE 70-page guide, including 5 lesson plans, 4 resources and many tips just for you!

We are headed quickly for Back to School! Summer seems to go by faster every year, don't you think? This year for one of my goals in reading as we start back to school, I

A range of free printable SEN teaching resources used with Autistic pupils aged 4-18, literacy, numeracy, topic and themed resources.

Teaching Beginner Level FSL Students to Read with Phonics Bonjour, chers professeurs de français! As educators, one of our primary goals is to empower our students to become confident readers. For beginner-level students of French as a Second Language (FSL), phonics can be a powerful tool to unlock the world of reading. Phonics involves teaching the relationship between sounds and letters, enabling learners to decode and read words with accuracy and fluency. In this blog post, we will explore effective strategies and activities to incorporate phonics instruction into your FSL classrooms, ensuring that your students develop a strong foundation in reading from the very beginning. 1. Start with the Basics: Begin by introducing the French alphabet and its unique sounds. Emphasize the differences between the French and English alphabets, as well as any special characters (e.g., é, è, ê) that represent distinct sounds. Utilize visuals, flashcards, and interactive activities to make the learning process engaging and memorable. Check out these FREE alphabet cards by Ashley Ramos with pronunciation guide to get you started. 2. Teach Letter-Sound Correspondence: To introduce phonics, associate each letter with its corresponding sound. Focus on the most common sounds first, such as 'a,' 'e,' 'i,' 'o,' and 'u.' Use clear pronunciation examples and repetitive exercises to help students master these foundational sounds. Gradually introduce consonants and less common vowels as they progress. 3. Introduce Phonemic Awareness: Before diving into phonics, build phonemic awareness skills, which involve recognizing and manipulating individual sounds in spoken words. Conduct activities that require students to identify initial, medial, and final sounds in words. This step lays the groundwork for phonics as students understand how sounds come together to form words. 4. Syllables and Blending: Break down French words into syllables, and teach students how to blend these syllables together to read the whole word. Encourage students to clap out the syllables and then blend them to enhance their phonemic abilities. Gradually increase the complexity of words as their confidence grows. French Immersion avec Mme Sophie has generously offered up this free deck of BOOM cards for practicing syllables in French. 5. Cognates and High-Frequency Words: Leverage the power of cognates, which are words in French that share a similar spelling and meaning with English words. Introduce high-frequency words, like "je," "le," "la," "et," etc., that frequently appear in texts. These familiar words create a sense of accomplishment and motivation for beginner learners. Use this full powerpoint lesson plan, word wall and activities to teach your students about French-English cognates. 6. Engage with Phonics Activities: Make learning enjoyable through various phonics activities. Use interactive games, puzzles, and online resources that target specific phonics skills. Create word-building exercises using letter cards or magnetic letters, where students can manipulate letters to form words. Check out this comprehensive set of 26 French phonics brochures filled with activities for the whole year. French phonics activities 7. Read Aloud and Shared Reading: Regularly read aloud to your students, exposing them to the rhythms and intonations of the French language. Incorporate shared reading activities where students follow along with you, highlighting the words as you read. This helps students understand the connection between spoken and written language. If you’re having trouble accessing French books in your area, or would like a digital version, please check out The French Experiment’s website for access to FREE read-alouds that even come with audio! French phonics activity brochures for the whole year 8. Decodable Books: Use decodable books specifically designed for beginner learners. These books contain words with phonetically regular patterns, allowing students to practice their phonics skills in context. Gradually increase the complexity of the texts as students gain proficiency. Check out the Science of Reading in French’s TPT shop for decodable reading in French activities. As French teachers, teaching beginner-level FSL students to read using phonics lays a strong foundation for their language learning journey. By systematically introducing letter-sound correspondences, blending, and phonemic awareness, students can decode words with confidence and embark on a fulfilling reading experience. Remember to make learning engaging and enjoyable through interactive activities, read-aloud sessions, and the use of decodable books. With your guidance and support, your FSL students will soon become proficient readers, opening up a world of possibilities through language! Bon courage!

In today's post, I'll share ideas and free materials for teaching beginning Spanish phonics. I'll cover letter sounds, open syllables (sílabas abiertas), syllables with blends (sílabas trabadas), and closed syllables (sílabas cerradas).

Give your students a meaningful tool with this FREE personal sound wall for students. See how to store them and use them!

Should you introduce letters to your preschooler in their order in the alphabet? Surprisingly, no. There are actually better ways to introduce letters.

Discover 10 fun activities to build pre-reading skills in preschoolers. Develop print awareness, motivation, listening comprehension, letter knowledge, and phonological awareness for early literacy success.

When you have students who are in upper elementary classrooms reading several years below grade level, your phonics instruction needs to b...

In today's post, I'll share ideas and free materials for teaching beginning Spanish phonics. I'll cover letter sounds, open syllables (sílabas abiertas), syllables with blends (sílabas trabadas), and closed syllables (sílabas cerradas).

English may sound daunting to English learners but it does not have to be. Use these 5 tips to teach phonemic awareness and phonics to older ESL students.

These ideas give active reading a whole new meaning.

It's so important to have students practice solving unknown word meanings every day. Grab some ideas to implement word analysis strategies instruction in your upper elementary classroom right away!

Help 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students practice decoding multisyllabic words with these 9 engaging activity ideas.

I love sharing what I've learned (and am still learning) about homeschooling, especially homeschooling a special needs child. I am a huge advocate for homeschooling children with special needs. I truly believe that a parent's love for their child will guide them to find the best possible curriculum to meet their child's needs. I'll do anything to help Joe succeed. Research reading programs - ✔ Find musical DVDs to help him learn math facts, states, etc. - ✔ Sit with him for endless hours in the bathroom while working on potty training. - ✔ Teach him how to butter his own bread. - ✔ You'd do these for any of your kids right? The difference when dealing with a special needs child is that often times the first thing tried doesn't work. Or the second. Or the third. Usually around the 4th or 5th try is when I finally find something that works. I hope my trial and error process provides you with more insight to help you know where to start. For any homeschooling parent, especially if you are starting from the beginning, teaching your child to read is the skill that requires the most of your time. Over the years I've used many different reading programs. I've purchased ready to go curriculum. I've printed and printed and printed phonics worksheets and mini books. I've spent my Dollar Tree budget on workbooks worth exactly what I paid. I've bought my share of early readers. Oh, how I despise most early readers. Some have worked, others not so much. I'll share two of my favorite series later in this post. Here's what I'm using to teach Joseph (with Down syndrome) to read today. I say today, because I do change things up a bit through the school year depending on what's working and whether I find something new I'd like to try. However, I have no plans on changing because the following two reading tactics are working quite well for us. #1 All About Reading Level 1 This is the phonics component to Joe's reading program. It's really the spine, the meat, the backbone to how I'm teaching Joe to read. Phonics play an important part in reading, even for kiddos with special needs. I've read in numerous places how kids with Down syndrome can only learn to read through sight reading. That's false and short sighted because really, are you going to make flashcards for every word in the dictionary? Because that's what sight reading means - memorizing and learning to recognize words immediately. Phonics is a tool for readers. A tool to help them sound out a word using very specific rules relating to letter combinations. And I love All About Reading! It takes you through step by step using a sequence that makes sense. Each step is scripted, which at first (if you haven't used a scripted curriculum) feels fake and slow. But once you pick up on the flow and script style, it's really easy to be natural and still follow the script. Now that I'm very comfortable with All About Reading Level 1, I put my own spin on it. Here's how: Letter sounds come easy to Joe, but the blending of letters together to read a word is a slow process. He definitely gets the process. It's just his lips don't always want to move into the letter sound shapes quickly. Say the word fun. Look at yourself in the mirror as you say it slowly. Your lips have to make 3 different shapes. Then in order to say the word fast you have to be able to move your lips and tongue quickly. That's where people with Down syndrome often struggle. The brain power is there! The necessary facial control is sometimes difficult. All About Reading lessons include a section called Fluency Practice. It's usually 1-3 pages of words, phrases, and sentences for your child to read to increase their reading speed. Speed is important for reading comprehension. As we've progressed through the lessons the Fluency pages are our least favorite part because they take a long, loooong, looooooooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnng time to get through. Like Lesson 10 took over a month. Looking at a whole page of sentences was overwhelming even if I covered up everything except what he was reading. He just knew it was never ending. So I grabbed a yellow legal pad, turned it sideways and started writing out the sentences word by word for Joe to read, and we haven't turned back. It's working just as I had hoped. The key to this style of fluency practice is to write one word at a time. The 2nd key is to adjust the sentences so there's lots of repetition. See my samples below. In the first example the sentences are the same length; I just changed up a word or two in each sentence. Reading the same words over and over again helps with instant recognition. Lesson 10 Sentences Lesson 12 Sentences - definitely harder than lesson 10. Once the full sentence is written I let Joe read it again pointing on his own. Then a smiley face and I start writing the next sentence having him read each word as I write it. Once the page is full, we're done for the day. ----------------------------------Edited 4-13-18------------------------------------ Since this blog post I started a YouTube channel. For a look at All About Reading Level 1 and how I customize it to make it work best for Joseph check out the video. #2 Like I said earlier, I've bought my fair share of early readers. We've stuffed our library bag, too. I'm hard to please when it comes to those early readers. Some readers have advanced words. We checked out one Level Pre-Primer from the library with the words tornado and lightning. Clearly, those are not pre-primer words. Some are simply stupid. Thankfully, I ran across Margaret Hillert's "Beginning to Read" books. Most of the books are familiar stories, simplified to only include words off the Dolch word list. The Dolch word list includes 220 of the most often used words in books, textbooks, newspapers, etc. Hillert's books are repetitive throughout and list the words used in the back of the book. Her simplest books use just over 30 different words. Original copyright hardcovers New updated versions. These include excellent additional literacy activities. The rhyming activity is really helping Joe with his rhyming. Books we've read according to number of words 34 - The Three Little Pigs 36 - The Three Goats 43 - The Yellow Boat 44 - Cinderella at the Ball 45 - The Three Bears 49 - A House For Little Red 58 - The Purple Pussycat 61 - Four Good Friends 61 - Dear Dragon Goes to the Library 67 - It's St. Patrick's Day, Dear Dragon 69 - Little Red Riding Hood 72 - Pinocchio This is just a handful of her books. Amazon has many, many more, but they are pricey. Buying used is probably a good option. Here's another option for purchasing used copies. Here's how we use the Beginning to Read books. Day 1. I read aloud the story a couple of times during Morning Time or whenever time permits. Day 2. I read the title, then have Joe read the title from the title page. I read the first few pages, then have him read a sentence or two. I read a few more pages, then have him read a sentence or two. This continues till the end. Day 3. I point, he reads. If he gets stuck on a non-phonetic word (true sight word) I simply tell him the word and he keeps reading. If he gets stuck on a phonetic word, I have him sound it out and go on. Day 4. Repeat of Day 3. Day 5. I quiz him on the words using homemade flashcards. I write each word on a card, then set out 12 in front of him. I say a word, he finds it and holds it. Each time he finds a word, I replace it with another card so there are always 12 cards in front of him. Once all cards have been picked up he gets a reward, usually a hug, high 5 or animal cracker. Day 6. Same as Day 5, except I put out 16-20 cards at a time. Day 7. Joe holds the pile, reads a card, then hands it to me. Once I have all the cards (which I've done nothing to earn them) he congratulates me. He's so funny. Writing out the flashcards doesn't take much time because the words are used in multiple stories so I just reuse them over and over. He also reads the book to himself during afternoon quiet time. At this time, I don't correct him if I hear a wrong word. I let him read it any way he chooses as long as he's reading quietly. I want him to simply enjoy books. Thanks for reading; that was a lot of information. Do you have other questions about teaching reading to beginners? I'd love to help. Please leave a comment here at the blog or at the Camp Homeschool Facebook page. Linking up with

Do you have struggling readers you just can't reach? This mega list of reading intervention activities will help you teach all students how to read!

Preschool and Kindergarten Writing Lessons This 10-part series from This Reading Mama and me took place in the spring of 2014. This series will help you understand how to teach writing to young children, from

This Kindergarten Assessments binder has all of the math, ELA, and writing assessments you will need to get you through the ENTIRE YEAR!

Don't have time in your day to reach every student? My 10 Minute Reading Intervention resource can help you squeeze in lessons that are fast & effective!

Grab this FREE phonics assessment so you can find out exactly what phonics skills your students need to learn!

In this post, I'll explain what exactly a diphthong is, how to teach it, when to teach it, and I'll provide some activity ideas!

Despite the joys of our profession (and there are so many!), there are also so many things which can drain our energies and motivations in the classroom. One

Even if all you have is 1 piece of clipart, you can still turn almost any skill into a themed activity. This chapter gives you lots of examples. No more

Repeated practice matters for students with dyslexia, but how much repetition is really needed in your Orton-Gillingham lesson?

Developing strong morphology knowledge and skills can help our readers become stronger and have deeper comprehension. Learn how here!

I am always looking for resources to use in my homeschool. I have found several free printables for the curriculum I am using. One thing I have not found is the phonics charts for special sounds for Abeka. I decided to just make some plain black and white printable phonics charts to help others. Click here (or the pinnable image) for the phonics chart printable. Some other Abeka resources I found are: Blend Ladders Addition Flashcards Alphabet Flashcards Number Concept Cards ABC Bible Memory Verses

Are you wondering how to teach phonics? There are some important do's and don'ts to keep in mind when it comes to powerful phonics instruction.

Last weeks of school can be crazy. Here are 5 meaningful activities you can do with your ESL students at the end of the school year.

Learning to read is such a fun and special time: it's a valuable skill, and sparking an early love of reading can make it become a lifelong passion. In order

I did the research so that you don't have to! Here is a list of 10 free resources that are perfect for distance learning in Kindergarten.

Letter recognition activities that include movement. Activities that allow you to incorporate movement right into your instructional time!