WEEK 2
Goal:
The goal of week 2 is to determine the students’ level of phonological awareness, introduce the “th” phoneme and grapheme and developing fluency through sight words.
Focus:
- Phoneme/ Grapheme "th"
- Sight words (misses, usually, sister, love)
Conferencing - Formative Assessment
Blending & Segmenting
Reasons behind our choices for this video:
Since our main goal as teachers is to support students in their phonological awareness, we figured that it is important to determine their current stage in this process
Conferencing appeared to be a very effective strategy for that because it gives the teacher a precise overview of what learners already know and what they still have to work on.
Moreover, it suits perfectly with our own teaching philosophy of a child-centred classroom because through conferencing, a child is put into the position of the lead learner.
We chose the strategy of blending and segmenting because through applying these strategies, it is easy to determine how far students are in their reading process. They need to understand that words consist of a succession of different sounds in order to solve the task.
Additionally, by observing how students blend and segment the words, a teacher can determine their ability of cognitively working with these different parts of a word.
As this is an essential skill, it is beneficial for the teacher, the student, and the parents to have and documentation of their development in this area.
After having done conferencing, a teacher can evaluate the outcomes and can create further activities and learning experiences based on the result. In other words, it helps him or her to operatively support children in moving forward in their reading process.
Furthermore, conferencing creates the possibility of developing very specific learning goals which can be used to shape the reading journey in a positive, helpful way
All in all, using phonics related conferencing is not only beneficial for the teacher, but also for the student and other members of the learning environment because it makes clear what needs to be improved or refined.
PHONEME /GRAPHEME "TH" ACTIVITIES
PRE-ACTIVITY "TH" PHONEME
Purpose:
The purpose of this activity is to introduce the “th” voiceless phoneme and let children experiment with practicing, listening to, reading, and writing the “th” sound. During this activity the teacher can identify which student already feels confident with the “th” sounds and which children need further support. The students also practice onset-rime activities to learn about word families which will help them with their reading and spelling.
Material:
Th card, picture of thumb, grapheme cards, paper, pen, wizard/witch cape, wand, wizard pot, list of th words
Activity:
Place a “th” card on the white board with a picture of a thumb. Explain children how they can make the soundless “th” sound: putting your tongue between your teeth, while blowing air at the same time.
Practice some words with the soundless “th” reading them with the children.
Let children sound out different phonemes on separate cards that were put on the white board to spell out easy “th” words like (p-a-th, b-a-th, m-a-th). The children sound out each phoneme and then combine the sound sequences to read the word, they then have to draw the word they just read together, they are given 5 min per word. During this activity, the teacher can see observe the level of the student’s phonological awareness. (“Onset/Rime Games: Classroom Strategy,“ 2019)
Differentiation:
Students who had shown difficulties with the onset-rime activity and sounding out the phonemes could receive individual support from the teacher through blending and segmenting activities. The teacher could give the child a scarve/blanket that it can put on to make a cape because the child is now a wizard. The teacher could read different words and the student should try to sound out each phoneme of the word and draw tap with their wand on the table/ in the air for every sound they can count in the word. The students could then be asked to blend together phoneme sounds made by the teacher to create words. Doing so the student swirls their wand in a bucket/witch pot blending the sounds (creating a potion. This can give teachers the opportunity to provide one-on-one support to students.
Children who are already comfortable with the different “th” sounds could read different “th” words, sound out the phonemes separately and then say the whole word to their partner while their partner spells out the different “th” words. They can take turns sounding out and spelling the words from the word list
VOICELESS & VOICED - TH
Purpose:
The children practice recognising the difference between voiced and voiceless th.
Material: th cards, picture of thumb and father, th sentences, hats / or hat pictures
Activity:
Make children recognise that the “th” in the word “father” looks the same as the “th” in the word “thumb” but sounds differently. Place two “th” cards on the white board with a picture of a man with children and an arrow to the man and a picture of a thumb next to it.
Read short sentences with different “th” words to the children and they have to listen out for the “th” sounds in these words.
Brainstorm some words with “th” with the children and write them on the whiteboard into two different columns based on their sound.(Scratch Garden, 2018)
Differentiation:
Students who need to practice making the different “th” sounds could play a little game where there are pictures of three hats one student chooses a hat without telling his partner. The partner has to ask the question “Do you want this hat?” and point at a hat. The partner has to say either say “No, thank you.” or “Yes, thank you.” This will help them practice the voiced and unvoiced “th” sound. (“Speech Therapy Activities for Voiced TH Sound,”2020)
“TH” PICTURE/ OBJECT SEARCH
Purpose:
This activity will allow them to recognise “th” sounds in words all around them and make a real life connection.
Materials:
Pictures with “th” sounds (bath, earth, math, mouth, tooth, thumb)
Activity:
The children can find pictures representing “th” words amongst pictures with and without “th” words or look for objects in the classroom that have “th” sound.
Differentiation:
Children can either find “th” word pictures from a sample of pictures or find them in the room including their body and if able to, write them down.
PUDDLE JUMP
Purpose:
Integrating physical activity to facilitate learning increases student interest, motivation, and learning and improves content knowledge and skills.
Material:
Chalk, list of “th” words
M-a-th, p-a-th, b-a-th,
Th-i-n, th-i-n-k, th-i-n-g, th-i-r-d,
C-l-o-th, m-o-th, b-o-th,
Additional words:
month, tenth, mouth, strength, thorn, thumb, thank you
Activity:
Words are spelled out on the ground and students have to jump in each grapheme and sound out each phoneme and at the end the entire word. The students can jump with one leg into the single-letter graphemes and with two in the digraphs (multiple letter graphemes). This can be changed and adjusted by the children. If this activity is too easy for the children, they can also spell out their own words with the “th” sound.
Differentiation:
If this activity is too easy for the children, they can also create puddles with graphemes of their own words with the “th” sound.
If students struggle jumping with one leg the teacher can allow the students to jump into each grapheme however they prefer.
If the students struggle sounding out each phoneme, they can work in pairs to helping each other out.
"TH" WORD SEARCH IN BOOK
Purpose:
The students learn to recognise “th” words within context and practice their reading skills.
Material:
Paragraphs from the story
(Van Huffelen, Karner, Schmidt, Veneman, 2020)
Activity:
Find all the words with “th” in the paragraphs and circle them and read them out loud to a partner.
Differentiation:
Students who have difficulties reading the entire word can sound out only the phonemes they already know, maybe a partner knows more phonemes and together they can build the word.
WORD HUNT
Purpose:
This reinforces the reading and writing of chosen words. Integrating physical activity to facilitate learning increases student interest, motivation and learning and improves content knowledge and skills.
Material:
Map, paper, pen, words with “th”
Path, think, both, something, month, thumb, bathtub
Activity:
Places on a map of the school grounds are marked with numbers. The children have to use the map to locate the places and then go there. Once they get there there will be a word written on a card. The children have to read the word and either copy it down and write a short sentence with this word or just think of a sentence within their group of 3-4.
(“Classroom activities to develop grapheme/phoneme correspondences (GPCs) and decoding,” 2015)
Differentiation:
The children can select members of the group who write down the word, sound out the phonemes, write the word and separate the letters based on the graphemes. This will help children contribute to the task with what they are most comfortable with but still become aware of the other aspects.
- If children struggle with words they can add them to the wonder wall.
SIGHT WORDS ACTIVITIES (USUALLY, SISTER, MISSES, LOVE)
MISSING WORD
This activity can be done individually or in pairs.
Purpose:
This is a great way to develop word recognition and comprehension skills, as the learners have to not only read the sentence but the have to find a suitable word that will make the sentence make sense. Sight words from this week and last week have also been used. This can be an individual activity, so it will give insight on what a learner already understands and where they may need more support.
Material:
Worksheet, pencil
Activity:
Give each learner the worksheet.
Let learners choose if they want to work individually or in pairs.
Model the first question, so that they know the process of finding the correct word.
Learners read the sentences and fill in the word that is most suitable
When they are finished, you can go through the sentences as a class.
Differentiation:
Differentiation by support
Differentiation by resource (see additional material)
Students must write down words they don’t understand, so that it can be added to the “wonder word sheet”
BINGO
This is a class activity but students fill their bingo cards individually.
Purpose:
This game is a fun way to develop vocabulary and word recognition. It is added to reinforce the sight words and graphemes that have been learned in the past 2 weeks. Additionally, it contains words from the Dolch and 100 high-frequency list, as well as vocabulary from Finn’s Feelings.
Material:
Bingo cards (See the list of words you can use in the provided material), stickers
Activity:
A list of words is provided below. You can adjust these according to your students’ needs. Print these words on a grid, and make sure that each learner has a different combination of words.
Each learner gets a different bingo card with a set of words printed on the grid.
Call out words one at a time.
When each learner hears a word that is on their card, they cover it with stickers.
When the stickers line up to make a horizontal, vertical or diagonal row, the student must shout “bingo” and he/she is the winner of that round.
You can play more than one round, depending on your learners’ needs.
Differentiation:
Have the weaker readers read the words (on their cards) to you individually before the game and correct any mistakes.
To boost the confidence of learners, you can make the game easier by reducing the number of squares from the standard 5-by-5 to 4-by-4 or even 3-by-3, and by using a majority of older, more familiar words.
You can also allow each learner to keep their card for a few rounds so they become more familiar with their cards. Ask learners to write down the words they don’t know and these can also be added to the ‘wonder word sheet’.
For more information visit this website: https://sightwords.com/sight-words/games/bingo/