Reading Rainbows

YAY, it's FRIDAY!!!  This means that I only have 10 student days left!!!  Starting the Countdown to Summer on Monday, SO EXCITED!!!

Today I wanted to share with you something I've been doing this year with sight words.  A few years ago I came across a sight word tracking system that another teacher had created.  I can't find the original link or teacher, so if you're out there somewhere I give you serious credit, because I love doing sight words this way!!  (if you are the creative mind behind this, please leave a comment so I can give credit where credit is due!!)  The sight words are taken from the pre-primer and primer Dolch lists.  They are split up into different color groups, one color for each part of the rainbow (except indigo).  The students study the words in their color group, and when they are able to read all of those words they can color in the matching bar on the rainbow and move up to the next color group.

Everyone starts with a blank rainbow page that they keep for the entire year.  It's nothing that I created, just something I found one day a few years ago when I was surfing around.  I honestly don't even remember where I found it.  I think I did a sear for 'rainbow templates' and this one popped up.  Since it perfectly fit my needs, I have been using it for a few years.

I really like how the color words are printed right inside the bars of the rainbow.  My littles color in each bar as they master that group's words.  I start from the bottom of the rainbow, so the words in the purple group are the easiest and the red words are the hardest.  Every time I test them, I send home a letter to let their grown-ups know which words they know and which they still need to work on. 

The super-creative teacher who thought up the rainbow words activity typed up all these letters in Word and offered them up as a freebie that way, so I am able to edit them to fit my needs (again, I'm SO SORRY I never kept the original link!!) 

While I am working with individual students, the rest of their Guided Reading group will be practicing their words.  My kinders' favorite way to practice is to use their 'Sight Word Laptops' (I can't take credit for that idea, either.  Found it on Pinterest a few years ago and I made my own).  Each student gets a copy of their words as well as a sight word laptop and a dry erase marker and eraser.

Here are my Sight Word Laptops.  They are nothing more complicated than a file folder with a laptop graphic I found and added text to for the outside, and a piece of handwriting paper and a keyboard graphic on the inside.  Once I assembled them, I laminated them.  The students write their words on the handwriting lines and then type them on the keyboard.  They get sight word practice AND keyboarding practice. SCORE!!

I give each student a list of their words that they can refer to while they're using their sight word laptops.  Once I have assessed them, I keep track of their progress on a sheet I whipped up. 

I write the date I tested them on the side and highlight the date, and use that same color to highlight the words they know.  Once they have mastered a group they get to color that bar on their rainbow and I put it back up on the Reading Rainbow Wall.

This is a picture of my 'Reading Rainbow Wall'.  For some reason, I didn't take one in the very beginning of the year (D'oh), so this picture is from early January.  At the beginning of the year, everyone starts out in the purple group and has a blank rainbow on the wall.  They work at their own pace to learn their words, and every time they are able to read them all they move on to the next group.  You can see that, as of this January picture, most of my kinders were only in the first or second group of the rainbow.  Some of them still have not managed to move out of the purple group. 

Every Thursday (or at least ALMOST every Thursday) I assess each student on their words.  I highlight the ones they know and send home the letter to let their grown-ups know their progress.  I assessed them again yesterday, and I was AMAZED at how far they have come with their sight word recognition.  I LOVE to see the excitement in their faces when they conquer a color group, it never ceases to make me smile. 

Look at all those colors!!!  I even have a friend who has mastered all of the color groups and I had to scramble to come up with some more words for her.  She has passed the 'Sun Words' and is now working on the 'Grass Words'.  If she keeps up, she'll be working on 'Cloud Words', 'Flower Words', and 'Pot o' Gold Words'.  I am SO PROUD of how far they have come this year with their sight word recognition, and I just HAD to share it with the blogging world!!

I would LOVE to hear how you tackle sight word recognition in your room!!  I hope you all have an AMAZING weekend, and if I don't get a chance to post again this weekend, know that I will on Monday!!  :-)

St. Patrick's Day Activities

It's Tuesday!!  St. Patrick's Day is less than a week away!!  Since it is my favorite holiday, as well as a reminder that spring is right around the corner, I wanted to make a few activities to incorporate the holiday into my classroom.  I needed a new activity for my Pocket Chart Center, so I made two that had a St. Pat's Day theme.  One is a Language Arts and the other is Math.

This activity has students reading sight words to check behind them to see if there's a leprechaun hiding there.  After I printed out the cards, I glued them onto sheets of construction paper.  I used colors that matched the groups I have.  Red, blue, and green are the colors of my groups.

My students pick the set of cards that match their group and put those into the pocket chart.  Then they hide the leprechauns behind them and take turns reading the cards to check behind them and see if they can catch the leprechaun!

The other activity I made for the pocket chart was for math. 

In this activity, students choose a numeral card and have to find the matching set.  Once found, they can check behind the set to see if there's a pot of gold hiding there.  They can continue searching for pots of gold until they find them all, and the one with the most cards is the winner!  :-)

Tomorrow I'll be sharing all about my newest rhyming activity.  On our kindergarten assessment, as a grade level we showed a deficit in rhyming skills, so I'll be making several activities to try and help address that need!!

Name Game and Sight Words

Hello blogging friends!!  I must apologize for my sporadic posts lately.  Things just haven't been right in my world since my mom died!  I had so many plans and ideas to start the year off, so many things I wanted to get started and try!  Then life smacked me upside the head and I've been trying to recover ever since!!  I would like to give a huge thank you to all of the people who still check my lil' blog and read my posts!  I am going to continue to try and do better!!

This past week we have been doing a lot of work with our names.  My students completed a cute name activity during their Independent Group Time this week.  They were given a typed outline of their name, which I made simply by choosing my favorite font in PowerPoint, making it large enough to cover the entire page (without going off the edges), and then choosing the 'text outline' feature to create an outline of their name.  I gave them choices of tissue paper they could use to fill the letters of their names, and they each chose a different way to fill in their letters.  Here are a few pictures of the activity that we did!

 

I used one of my favorite fonts, called 'Doctor Soos Bold'.  I found it as a freebie onine a while ago, and a sweet teaching partner pointed out it was spelled wrong.  I'm thinking it's spelled that way so it doesn't violate copyright laws.  

 Here are the buckets of tissue paper that I had available for my littles to use.

This is a sample of some of their completed work.  It was interesting to see the different styles and methods my kiddos used to fill in their names with tissue paper!

On to a freebie!!  In my room, we are working hard to learn our sight words.  I have created a few coloring pages where my littles must follow the code to color in the pictures.  I'm working on getting them together as a pack and adding it to my TPT store, but for now I only have a few done.  I'm sharing one as a freebie!!

Please leave me a comment or two to tell me your favorite ways to teach sight words!!