We’ve picked up the pace over at This Reading Mama’s house as our official school year has begun (we started the week of Labor Day). I just wish I could keep up with posting! We are now focusing on one word sort a week versus spreading the one sort out over a couple of weeks or more. ALuv was ready for a faster pace and has handled it quite nicely. (For those of you that are new to This Reading Mama, I use Words Their Way & the supplemental book sorts to teach phonics. I wouldn’t do it any other way. You can click here to see why I like Word Study so much.) Below was our week with short i.
Monday: I introduced the sort by modeling how to do it. (10 minutes)
I first laid out all the pictures by word family (IG, IP, & ILL) and we talk about how they rhyme.
I modeled how to match the words with the pictures, saying each word. After they were all matched, I took the words, shuffled them, and supported him as he said each word and matched them to the correct picture. (On the first day, I am quick to step in if he needs help or makes a mistake because I want him to learn it correctly.)
Tuesday: With support, I asked him to lay out all the pictures by word family like I modeled for him on Monday. I stepped in only if he matched words and pictures incorrectly and did not self-correct. (5 minutes)
We extended his play with short i words by getting on www.starfall.com. He made words with IP and IG and then interacted with the short i book. I love this site! (10 minutes-or sometimes more if he wants to keeping “working”)
Wednesday: I asked him to match words and pictures independently. I added a little spice and said, “See how fast you can match your words and pictures,” and I timed him. We reshuffled the cards and I asked him to do it a second time, “I bet you can beat your own time! How much faster can you do it?” After he was done matching, he read me the words as I checked his work. (3-5 minutes)
We extended the sort as he spelled short i words on our Leap Frog word maker (on setting 2). I love this little contraption because it is self-correcting. With each short i word he made, it read the word to him so he knew right away if he had spelled the correct word or not. (5-7 minutes)
Thursday:
He rematched words and pictures independently and I checked behind him as he read me the words. (3 minutes) On this day, he was out of sorts (no pun intended) and he didn’t want to sort the pictures by word family. And I have bigger battles to fight than whether or not my child sorts his pictures and words by their word families.
Again, we extended the phonics skill by playing a short i file folder game I had in my teacher file called Short i Relay. (5-10 minutes, depending on if he wanted to play again) It’s an extremely simple game, but it was a hit and got him out of his funk. I’d love to make you a copy that you can download and may get around to it soon. I did attempt make a copy, but didn’t like the quality, so I’m going to keep playing with it.
Friday: He rematched words and pictures, read them, then glued them into his Word Study notebook. (10 minutes-the gluing part takes the longest!)
I assessed him to check his understanding. I found this assessment in my short i file from teaching and used it. He had to circle the correct word in each box without my help. (3-5 minutes)
We had some extra time one afternoon while both NJoy and MBug were napping (which hardly EVER happens these days!), and I pulled out the Spin and Write activity we’d done back with short a and we played around with making short i words. (10-15 minutes)
I included how long the activity lasted…mostly just 10-15 minutes each day so you can see that Word Study isn’t designed to BE your reading program. It’s the simple side dish that adds to the authentic reading and writing you’re already doing each day.
Thank you for joining This Reading Mama on a literacy journey!
~Becky
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