Showing posts with label spelling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label spelling. Show all posts
Thursday, January 19, 2017
Melting Snowman
Wednesday, January 11, 2017
Spelling
As we continue to work on spelling more words correctly, I wanted to
share a few ideas with you that you can do at home to help your child
work on spelling.
First, I wanted to share this article about spelling:
Why is My Kid Allowed to Make Spelling Mistakes
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
A while back, I created a home page for our crew on SpellingCity.com. This site allows teachers (and parents and students) to create and save spelling lists. Once lists are saved, students can do various activities to learn to spell (and read) these words. I added lists of sight words that our crew needs to master by the end of first grade. The lists labeled 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D and 1E are the lists to master by the end of first grade. I also added some lists for second grade for students who need an extra challenge - these begin with the number 2. After doing some of the teaching activities and games for each list, your child may take a spelling test to see if he or she has learned these words. If not, they can practice some more and if so, they can move on to the next list. We have been using these lists at school and I wanted you to know that your child can use these lists at home on a computer or a tablet. If you use a tablet, you will need to download the app, click on "more lists" and then search for my lists using my name, our school name or school zip code. If you have your child go to the Resources page of our crew blog, they can access it from there on a computer.
First, I wanted to share this article about spelling:
Why is My Kid Allowed to Make Spelling Mistakes
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
Spelling City
A while back, I created a home page for our crew on SpellingCity.com. This site allows teachers (and parents and students) to create and save spelling lists. Once lists are saved, students can do various activities to learn to spell (and read) these words. I added lists of sight words that our crew needs to master by the end of first grade. The lists labeled 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D and 1E are the lists to master by the end of first grade. I also added some lists for second grade for students who need an extra challenge - these begin with the number 2. After doing some of the teaching activities and games for each list, your child may take a spelling test to see if he or she has learned these words. If not, they can practice some more and if so, they can move on to the next list. We have been using these lists at school and I wanted you to know that your child can use these lists at home on a computer or a tablet. If you use a tablet, you will need to download the app, click on "more lists" and then search for my lists using my name, our school name or school zip code. If you have your child go to the Resources page of our crew blog, they can access it from there on a computer.
Monday, May 23, 2016
Spelling
One of the ways that we have been working on our spelling is by simply trying out different ways to spell a word and then seeing which one looks right to us. Even if the word still is spelled correctly, it will be much closer than our first attempt. The best ways to learn to spell are to read and write a lot and to really look at words to notice patterns within them and how words look when they are spelled correctly. Check out some of our work below.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
Spelling
As we continue to work on spelling more words correctly, I wanted to
share a few ideas with you that you can do at home to help your child
work on spelling.
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
A while back, I created a home page for our crew on SpellingCity.com. This site allows teachers (and parents and students) to create and save spelling lists. Once lists are saved, students can do various activities to learn to spell (and read) these words. I added lists of sight words that our crew needs to master by the end of first grade. The lists labeled 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D and 1E are the lists to master by the end of first grade. I also added some lists for second grade for students who need an extra challenge - these begin with the number 2. After doing some of the teaching activities and games for each list, your child may take a spelling test to see if he or she has learned these words. If not, they can practice some more and if so, they can move on to the next list. We have been using these lists at school and I wanted you to know that your child can use these lists at home on a computer or a tablet. If you use a tablet, you will need to download the app, click on "more lists" and then search for my lists using my name, our school name or school zip code. If you have your child go to the Resources page of our crew blog, they can access it from there on a computer.
Homework ~ Read a good book or two. Check out a Bedtime Math story. Try a spelling activity.
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
Spelling City
A while back, I created a home page for our crew on SpellingCity.com. This site allows teachers (and parents and students) to create and save spelling lists. Once lists are saved, students can do various activities to learn to spell (and read) these words. I added lists of sight words that our crew needs to master by the end of first grade. The lists labeled 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D and 1E are the lists to master by the end of first grade. I also added some lists for second grade for students who need an extra challenge - these begin with the number 2. After doing some of the teaching activities and games for each list, your child may take a spelling test to see if he or she has learned these words. If not, they can practice some more and if so, they can move on to the next list. We have been using these lists at school and I wanted you to know that your child can use these lists at home on a computer or a tablet. If you use a tablet, you will need to download the app, click on "more lists" and then search for my lists using my name, our school name or school zip code. If you have your child go to the Resources page of our crew blog, they can access it from there on a computer.
Homework ~ Read a good book or two. Check out a Bedtime Math story. Try a spelling activity.
Friday, January 8, 2016
Melting Snowman
As we continue to work on spelling more words correctly, we are
playing a game that will help us with that. It is called Melting
Snowman. It is basically just the game Hangman but I didn't want to have
to explain "hanging" to first graders so I changed the hanging man to a
melting snowman (photo below). Play is just the same, you guess letters
to complete the phrase and if you guess incorrectly, a part of the
snowman "melts" (is erased). You have to guess the word or phrase before
the snowman melts. This would be a great game to play at home with your
child. It really makes them think about letters, words and how words
work. You can play this on paper but it would work better with a small
whiteboard or chalkboard since you are erasing parts of the snowman.
MinM
Our MinM next week is Music/Performing Arts.
Volunteer
Today's volunteer is Ms. Carin. Ms. Carin comes in on Thursdays and reads with us and helps us out during stations. I can tell that Ms. Carin is a science teacher because of some of the fun lessons she teaches the crew at the build and create station. Thanks, Ms. Carin.
MinM
Our MinM next week is Music/Performing Arts.
Volunteer
Today's volunteer is Ms. Carin. Ms. Carin comes in on Thursdays and reads with us and helps us out during stations. I can tell that Ms. Carin is a science teacher because of some of the fun lessons she teaches the crew at the build and create station. Thanks, Ms. Carin.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Spelling City
A couple of weeks ago, I created a home page for our crew on SpellingCity.com. This site allows teachers (and parents and students) to create and save spelling lists. Once lists are saved, students can do various activities to learn to spell (and read) these words. I added lists of sight words that our crew needs to master by the end of first grade. The lists labeled 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D and 1E are the lists to master by the end of first grade. I also added some lists for second grade for students who need an extra challenge. After doing some of the teaching activities and games for each list, your child may take a spelling test to see if he or she has learned these words. If not, they can practice some more and if so, they can move on to the next list. We have been using these lists at school and I wanted you to know that your child can use these lists at home on a computer or a tablet. If you use a tablet, you will need to download the app and then search for my lists using my name, our school name or school zip code. If you have your child go to the Resources page of our crew blog, they can access it from there, too.
Homework ~ Read a good book or two. Check out a Bedtime Math story.
MinM ~ Mind in Motion
Our MinM class next week is PE.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Spelling
As we continue to work on spelling more words correctly, I wanted to share a few ideas with you that you can do at home to help your child work on spelling.
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
Homework
Reading ~ Read a good book or two.
Math ~ Practice basic addition and subtraction facts by playing a game either online or offline. Try clicking here, here or here for ideas or suggestions.
Commercial Board Games
Have a family game night and play a board game with word play like Scrabble, Scrabble Jr., Boggle, Boggle Jr, Upwords, Bananagrams, Zingo, Word Yahtzee, and many more.
Other Word Play Games
You can also do word searches, crossword puzzles, hangman (or our version called, Melting Snowman ) or other games that just need a paper and pencil. You can buy books of this type of puzzle or you can go online and print some off. Also, many of these games have online versions that are fun to try, too.
You can also just write a long word on a piece of paper and see how many shorter words you can make using just the letters in that word.
Games to Play in the Car
You can have a spelling bee in the car and give each person a word to spell that is at their level.
You can say a word like "hat" and say what would that word be if I changed the "h" to a "c", to an "f" and so on. Experiment with changing beginning sounds, ending sounds and middle sounds.
Play a game based on word families. Name a word family like the "ate" family. Go around the car and have each person say another word in that family: late, skate, fate, date, gate, and so on.
Online Games
Search for word games on your computer, iPad or smart phone for your child to play. There are many, many variations out there.
Be Creative
Make up your own games. Anything that makes kids think about words and how they are spelled will help.
Homework
Reading ~ Read a good book or two.
Math ~ Practice basic addition and subtraction facts by playing a game either online or offline. Try clicking here, here or here for ideas or suggestions.
Monday, December 9, 2013
Learning Can Be Mind Boggling
Sometimes learning can be mind boggling. I have been gathering a few stories of how the minds of our crew members have been boggled lately. Enjoy!
Homework
Reading ~ Read a good book or two.
Math ~ Home Link 4.10 Number Grids
- During a recent Word Work lesson, we were learning about the "ed" ending, what it means and how it works. Learning about past tense can be a bit challenging for a first grader who is just beginning to grapple with the concept of time. We explained past tense as "things that happened earlier or before now". Once we got past that, we began to talk about how the "ed" ending has 3 different sounds it makes depending on the word it is used in. For example "ed" can sound like /t/ in the words "liked" and "walked". It can sound like /d/ in words like "played" and "mailed". It can also sound like /ed/ in words like "wanted" and "planted". I truly wish that I had my iPad handy when we were doing this lesson. The looks on the faces of the crew showed complete shock. First they were surprised that there was a "past tense" to begin with and then that the suffix "ed" made so many different sounds. When the shock finally began to wear off, they enjoyed thinking of words that ended with the "ed" suffix that made the 3 different sounds. While they are beginning to understand all of these concepts, we will still have to revisit this lesson a few more times.
- On another day during math, we were working on basic addition story problems. We were doing them orally and using mental math strategies to figure them out. At one point I noticed that most of the kids were using their fingers and a partner's fingers to count up the answers. While doing this they would say "5 plus 6, okay I will put up 5 fingers and you put up 6 fingers" then they would recount all of the fingers together. I thought that this would be a good time to review counting up as a strategy. I explained that since we knew how to "see" numbers using dots and we knew how to count by 2s, 5s and 10s, that we could use those strategies to figure out our addition problems. I showed them that they could hold up one hand and say 5 and then count up: 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. Just like in the Word Work lesson, they looked at me with shocked expressions. There were even a few gasps. I finally got them to tell me what they were thinking. They thought that because we were not just counting but doing addition problems that they had to recount every number. Even after I assured them that this was not the case I still had a few skeptics. Now many of them will use their counting and visualizing strategies to help them add but there are still a few who are reluctant. They think that they are breaking the rules if they don't recount everything.
- While learning the names of the coins, the crew complained that the pictures on some of the coins were not always the same. While it is fascinating for adults to see all of the new pictures on the coins, it is frustrating for young children trying to learn the names of the different coins.
- One of our new "red dot words" or sight words is "because". One crew member asked why words had to be spelled in such hard ways. Why couldn't "because" just be spelled "becuz" like it sounds? It is a good question.
- Another thing that is hard for students to remember is whether the subtraction symbol is one line or two lines and whether the equals symbol is one line or two lines.
Homework
Reading ~ Read a good book or two.
Math ~ Home Link 4.10 Number Grids
Important Dates
12/20 Fieldwork to Pacific Ocean Market and Kings Land Restaurant
12/20 Winter Holiday Party
12/20 Last Day of School Before Winter Break
1/6 No School ~ Work Day for Teachers
1/7 First day back for students after Winter Break
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