CVCe Word Wheels

CVCe Word Wheels

A while back I made a blending activity which I called Word Wheels. This is a new edition to the word wheels series. This new edition focused on CVCe words. The concept of remains the same. Students look at the picture in the centre of the "wheel". They then blend the letters around the wheel to work out which direction the wheel turns. Students then have to draw a line to connect the letters to form the word. 

This activity is available from my TPT store.

As I mentioned in my post about CVC word Wheels, I tried using highlighters but it doesn't seem to work well on laminated paper, so I have put these cards onto a ring along with some whiteboard markers into a box and have used it as a guided reading activity.

Happpy teaching!

Xx Laura

3 Ways to Improve Conversations with Kids

I've recently took part in a professional learning course about enhancing language use through conversation in the classroom. It was nice and affirming to find out that I am already doing a great job with my students in terms of building language through conversation but there were a few stand out strategies that I really wanted to share and have been trying in my classroom. They're not hard, it's just that I needed to be more aware and try to use them more often. Of course there are times where it will not be appropriate to use eg. while giving explicit teaching instructions but these strategies can be used by parents/teachers or any adult to encourage better conversations with kids.

1. Strive for 5

Strive for 5 is a strategy that teachers/parents can employ to engage students in sustained conversation. The aim is to have a total of at least 5 turns in speaking. Teachers/parents need to consider the types of questions/comments they make to children that will encourage them to take another turn. Sometimes a comment can bring about more conversation than asking a closed question. Here are some examples:

Example 1 (3 Turns)

1. Child: "I have a toy"

2. Adult: "What is it?" (closed question)

3. Child: "A doll". Child walks away to continue playing.

Example 2 (5 Turns)

1. Child: " I have a toy"

2. Adult: " That looks like an interesting toy. Tell me about your toy"

3. Child: "It's a doll and she like to play with me"

4. Adult: "Ooh, what things do you like doing with your doll?" (open question)

5. Child: "I like to dance, dress up and pretend cook"

As you can see, the second example of asking open questions leads to further conversation with a child as opposed to the closed question in the example 1.

  

2. OWL Strategy

I like this strategy because it allows children to lead the conversation on a topic or issue that they are interested in. It allows for all sorts of opportunities for communication.

0 - Observe

Sometimes it difficult to work out what is on a child's mind. And so adults need to observe and see what the child is doing (body language, hand gestures and facial expressions) and initiate a conversation based on what the child is interested in.

W - Wait

After initiating a conversation based on what you have observed a child doing, you need to WAIT! I feel like this is probably the most difficult part of this strategy because we as adult so often want to fill in the silence but waiting is a powerful tool. Waiting actually refers to 3 things:

1) stop talking

2) focus on the child by making eye contact or slightly leaning forward and

3) looking at the child expectantly.

This sends signals to the child that you're ready to them to respond to you or to take the lead in the conversation.  

If the child does not respond at all, the adult can ask a question or make a comment about the topic. Such as:  "Did you know...", "I wonder ...",  Try not to say "Thanks for sharing that with me" as that closes the conversation and the child is prompted to move along.

L - Listen

The listening part of this strategy is simple. Simply LISTEN to the child without interrupting. Whether or not you have understood the child's message just let the child speak. This lets them know what they are saying is important and it helps build their confidence in speaking to others.

Here is some further information about the OWL strategy from the Hanen's Early Language Program that I found online in addition to what I learnt on the course. 

3. Cueing Hierarchy

This is a great strategy to help those little ones who are anxious, unsure of what to say. It is a prompting guide for teachers/parents and is my favourite strategy of the 3. Here is a visual of this cueing system.

When you ask a question, allow waiting time for children to respond. If the child does not respond go through the cueing system. Start by giving the child a semantic clue (clue about the meaning), followed by a phonemic cue (clue about the sound). If this gets no response, provide the child with a binary choice. If by this stage the child has still not responded, model the word or sentence for them.

Here is an example:

Question: "What animal is the main character is the story?"

Wait for a response. If there is no response, provide a semantic cue.

Semantic cue: "Some people call this animal the king of the jungle."

Wait for a response. If there is no response, provide a phonemic cue.

Phonemic cue: "The animals starts with a 'l' sound like leaf"

Wait for a response. If there is no response, provide the child with a binary choice.

Binary choice: Do you think it could be a lion or a turtle?

Wait for a response. If there is no response, provide the child with a sentence starter or word.

Sentence/Word starter: The main character in the story is a l... (stress the 'l' sound so the child can say lion with you).

Using this cueing system allow many opportunities for a child to respond.

Hope this has been a helpful hint to you about how to engage children in conversation.

Xx Laura

CVC Word Wheels

Look at what I just finish making! It's been a while since I have had the chance to sit down and make a resource. So I'm happy to share these. I'm calling these Word Wheels and hope *fingers crossed* that I will find the time make other sets. 

How this works: Students look at the picture in the centre of the "wheel". They then blend the letters around the wheel to work out which direction the wheel turns. The initial sound is always at the top of the wheel. Students then have to draw a line to connect the letters to form the word. 

I've tried using highlighters but it doesn't seem to work well on laminated paper, so I'm going to put these cards onto a ring along with some whiteboard markers into a box and use it as a guided reading activity.

I have made a set of 60 cards that cover all short vowel sounds. They can be found here:

If you would like to try these out in your classroom, I have posted 10 cards from the set of 60 here: 

Enjoy the last day of the term break! 

How often do you check students' understanding?

A little while back, I came across this clever and simple way of checking and monitoring students' understanding. I loved the posters but could not manage to find a copy of them anywhere on the internet or TpT, so I decided to make them. Here is what they look like in my classroom.

Here is a closer look at the original classroom posters that I came across but couldn't find and eventually made.

Show my Understanding is a self assessing strategy. An important step in using these posters was to teach children how to be honest and reflective about their learning. It takes some practise but I found after about a week the children really understood what each poster meant and could give honest evaluations of their understanding.

I normally begin the lesson/unit with a WALT (We are learning to...) or WALA (We are learning about) statement. This could be your goals or learning targets.

After an explicit teaching lesson, I would say " Show your understanding" students would then hold up 1, 2, 3, or 4 fingers to indicate what stage of learning they are at. This gives me an indication of how well students have understood what was taught and who I need to do further work with. Children who indicate a 3-4 I would send off to do an independent task while the 1 & 2s would do some further work with me.

As I continued to use this system, I realised that I could use this system as means of assessing and grouping my students so I made some complimentary resources to go with the posters to make it easier for me to keep record of how students were going with learning the objective of the lesson (I was hoping to use some of this informal assessment to inform report writing as well).

This is the teacher monitoring sheet I use. I have used this sheet in two ways.

1. I record the names of students as they are learning so it is for my own records of who achieved what.

2. At the end of the lesson, I tell students to go and write their name on the sheet displayed on my whiteboard to indicate where they are with their learning if I didn't get around to writing all the names down myself.

 I also made a student reflection sheet for those lessons where the objective was quite big and I really wanted students to articulate what they have or have not yet mastered.

I later added another component to this system. I felt the posters that I made originally reflected how students learnt at the end of an explicit teaching lesson but I wanted to engage in what their learning was like at the end of the lesson especially after doing some independent work themselves, so I changed the wording on the posters to:

1 = I need more practice with a teacher

2 = I need more practice with a capable friend

3 = I need more practice this a little more by myself

4 = I can help others with learning this

After a couple of weeks of using this strategy, II introduce "mini teachers". The children loved this! Mini teachers are students who have mastered a certain skill/learning target. They then get to support other students in their learning. I found this was a great motivator for students to work towards the learning goal as well as freeing me up to work with those students who were really struggling. I would generally pair up a mini teacher with children who are 3's (have understood the work, but need more practise).

I made little badges to make my mini teachers feel special. The children are so proud when they get to wear one.

Other ways to use this system:

1. Peg chart: Put names of students on pegs and they can move their peg up and down the chart as they learn the key concepts.

2. Put names of magnets and children can slide them across the whiteboard under each poster.

3. Desk strips: I have made desk strips with the 4 levels of understanding. Each child has a strip on their desk and a counter. They place their counter on the level they are working at, so when the teacher walks around they can assist children without children having to move around and ask for help.

You can get a free copy of the original classroom posters {here}. OR if you would like the complete set with all the additional resources click {here}.

Hope this has been a helpful post. Happy Teaching!

X Laura

Better late than never!

Hi Everyone! 

I've finally gotten around to setting up my blog. I wanted to start blogging at the beginning of the school year but well with a busy start to the year it didn't quite happen. Now that semester 1 reports are over and the mid year school holidays are just round the corner, I thought I would try achieve my blogging goal of posting once a fortnight! Wish me luck!!

Xx Mrs N