Top Things To Know About Sight Words

Have you ever felt crunched with time during your language arts block and thought, do I really need to review the sight words with my class? Can't I just pass out a list of words and hope for the best?

Here are the top things to know about sight words.

#1  Sight words are also called High Frequency Words. They appear not only in the written language but are most frequently used in spoken language as well. Therefore, by the time a child is school age he has these words in his verbal vocabulary and only needs to make the connection with its print version.

#2  The top 300 sight words make up about 2/3 of the written language.  Think about that. If a child is able to recognize 300 sight words he is 2/3 of the way there to becoming a fluent reader.


#3  Some sight words can be sounded out because they are phonetically regular where others can not and must be memorized as a whole.  Of course there are those sight words that half your class will read and say E-A-S-Y (at, on, it)  but then we throw in those irregular ones like should, though, know and it is suddenly clear why we spend time practicing our sight words.


#4  Recognition of sight words leads to better comprehension.  An advanced reader will read words as a whole.  Try reading this sentence right here but pausing in between each letter and word.  You need to read that several times for it to make sense.  Now try reading an entire article or chapter in that broken manner.


#5  Word Walls are helpful.  Whether you think you have the wall space or not, a primary classroom needs to have a word wall. I can't tell you how often my students refer back to this word wall during their writing throughout all subject areas. Isn't that what we want them to do?!


#6 Sight words make a great center activity.  You don't have to spend direct instruction time every day going over the sight words.  You can work them into a center activity and the students will get their daily practice with the words. I can't tell you how many weeks I need a quick NO PREP word center and quickly put out the week's sight word cards to be put in alphabetical order.

My advanced students will take it a step further and use their sight words in a sentence.

I've also developed these High Frequency Word Practice materials which follow the McGraw-Hill Wonders reading program for second grade. 

At the start of the week I hand them a packet containing all the practice pages for their weekly words (10 words).

 The students practice their sight words by tracing, writing, and reading them in a sentence. Then they cut out the word card on the bottom of the page to practice throughout the week.  

We store them in our homework folders in these plastic pencil cases that I found "el cheapo" for 40 cents each. 

The school year is about to start so here is a Freebie of the first set of words to begin the year.  I also have the complete set of units 1-6 in my TpT store.  

Click the image below to get the complete set of Second Grade High Frequency Words and be set for the year!!!!  

The Best Shape To Be

Our class is starting the next math unit on Geometry.  This is one of my favorite units to teach because there are so many fun lessons centered around shapes.
I can't think of a better way to start out the geometry unit than by reading, "The Greedy Triangle" by Marilyn Burns.

This is a cute story about a triangle who is always looking to be something better than he is. "Just one more side, and one more angle" will make him happy. So he thinks...

After reading the story we spent some time making a list of all the shapes that the triangle becomes. We also brainstormed what would be best about being that shape. For example being a rectangle would be the best because you could be a yummy ice cream sandwich.  A hexagon would be best because you could be a trampoline.  We had some trouble coming up with real world shapes for some of them but used our iPads to do a quick google image search and found so many more ideas.

I love being able to tie in Language Arts (especially writing) into Math lessons so I came up with this little writing activity that goes along with our unit on Persuasive/Opinion writing.  It begins like this

"Hello Shapeshifter make me a _________. In my opinion a  ______ is the best shape to be."

The students really had fun with this.  They were able to support their opinion with three reasons/examples and details to support.  

We then made our little shape man to go with our writing.

They add a little life to the hallways....

You can download my Greedy Triangle Craftivity here and if you do it today you get an additional 20% off during the Teachers Are Heroes Sale.

Use Promo code:  HEROES and save 28% on all items in my TPT store.

Happy Shopping!!

A "Lot" of summer on my mind, and a "little" bit of school...

A "Lot of Summer"

All of a sudden it is mid July?????  It feels like summer just started but truthfully I have been on summer vacation for almost a month now.  I have been packing my days and nights full with summer fun but now is the part where I beg for time to PLEEEAASE slow down.  Here is what I've been up to.

The first weekend of summer was our son Mark's Christening.  It was a gorgeous day and everything (no matter how stressed I was pulling it all together) went better than planned. Here is our cutie-patootie.

Let's see, the rest of the weeks up until now have pretty much been... beach, pool, relax, repeat...

 

We mixed a little fourth of July fun in there too!!

                                         

Another highlight of my summer so far was the Rugged Maniac 5K Obstacle Course that we participated in with some friends.  It was a very muddy day spent doing a lot of challenging obstacles but I LOVED every minute of it.  Can't wait to do it again next year.  This picture is before the race so we are not looking so muddy but believe me it took four shampoos to get all the mud out of my hair when we got home.

Oh, and I discovered a way to make parenting easier with this....

I ordered it online and it came in the mail over the weekend.  I can not believe how much he loves it and also how much I love it.  This morning he fell asleep in it while I unloaded the dishwasher.  Really? How did I not discover this until now, with my third child? 

A "Little" Bit of School

So, this has been my summer so far and I still have much more of it to go.  I am having a blast and soaking up every ounce of family love but I still have a little part of my brain that is tuned in to my classroom and the upcoming school year.  Some of my "me" time I have spent planning out the decor of my classroom. I'll get into more of the nitty gritty details and planning as the summer goes on, but this is a good place to start easing my mind into September.  

I put together this collection of Polka Dot Themed Classroom Labels, Signs, and Decor to use around my room.  I wanted to liven up my space this year and Polka Dots are my thing lately.  Please visit my TPT store and take a look.

I also uploaded a Free Download of my Polka Dot Themed Word Wall.

Hope you are all having a wonderful summer!!  Leave a comment about what you are up to this summer.

Haikus in the "Eyes of a Second Grader"

We are in the midst of our poetry unit.  This week we spent talking about Haikus.  I did a lot of teaching and practicing syllable counting before showing them the 5-7-5 pattern of a Haiku.  

Most of my students need a little inspiration for ideas or topics to write about.  This time their "inspiration" came in the form of a few colored blobs of paint dropped onto a piece of white paper, then folded in half.  

The kids LOVED deciding what their "paint blobs" looked like. I loved watching them turning their papers around in every direction to get the best picture.  

After they decided what their picture looked like, they wrote their Haikus about it.

This one is two bunnies:

A Pinching Crab:

An Eagle:

A Dragonfly:

My favorite,  The Head of a Horse:

Seahorses:

Memorial Day...My Hero

For my second graders defining Memorial Day was a bit of a challenge. They weren't totally sure if it was a holiday to celebrate pools and barbecues, the start of summer traffic (the only downfall of living by the shore), or remembering America's Heroes??

This writing activity really helped them to relate the importance of the holiday to their own life.
We began by brainstorming the meaning of the word Hero. The students had to choose someone in their life and write reasons why that person is their hero.

I borrowed a book from our art teacher full of these ideas for handprint crafts. This one was intended for a Fourth of July craft but I liked the idea of fireworks, they are very patriotic. I used a silver glittery paint for the "white" firework.  Next year I will use a light blue background so that the silver really "pops."

Pair of Pears-Homophones

A little fun activity we did this week for homophone practice.
First we defined homophones and "tapped into our prior knowledge" to make a little list.

I handed out homophone cards randomly to the class. The students had to find their matching homophone pair.  They had fun doing this with the added challenge of doing it silently. Together they drew pictures to illustrate the meaning of their word.

Then we made a giant homophone pear poster...

Say Goodbye to Gallon Guy, Say Hello to Gallon Butterfly

We are currently in one of our final math units of the year, Capacity.  I have been a big fan of "Gallon Guy" in the past. It is a great craft for helping my students understand the relationship of cups, pints, quarts, and gallons.  This year, I mixed things up and introduced, "Gallon Butterfly."  It was too perfect a fit for our class since we are simultaneously studying butterflies in science.  I love when lessons cross from one subject to another.  It also makes a great spring into summer display for our hallways.

Mother's Day Tea

Mother's Day is so special to me because now that my daughters are in nursery and preschool I am lucky enough to receive gifts of handprints and scribbled "I Love Yous." This may explain how over the top we go in Second Grade to make a very special afternoon for our moms.

It all begins in September...
The students make a book or journal each month of all the special memories they shared with mom. I also take a picture of them and we start building our book month by month.
Here is a picture of our September entry.

I love how each month you can see how they change and grow in both their looks and their writing.  Here is another picture from a January entry.

Here is the cover of our book (laminated and on card stock)

Just before Mother's Day we invite all the moms in for a "Mother's Day Tea."  The preparation for the event is a little time consuming but the outcome of seeing the mom's faces and emotion is so touching.

Our beverage table....

Some of our desserts...(my homemade cupcakes, aren't they fancy? ;)

 The kids are always saying, "Mom makes the best...." so I thought it'd be fun to put together a little cookbook of all the kid's favorite recipes.

Here is how their gifts were presented to mom (on top is a wrapped gift the kids made with our Art teacher).

                      

A little decor for the hallways..

 On the flowerpot the students wrote a little opinion piece which starts out, "My mom is the best mom in the world." (I got a few giggles out of reading these).

                                          

These flowers lined the hallway going up to our classroom. On each petal they wrote words to describe mom.

It was an amazing afternoon for everyone. The kids loved sharing their special gifts and crafts.  Another surprise for the moms is that our music teacher puts together an amazing little performance made up of 6 of the cutest Mother's Day themed songs.

The day was full of lots of smiles, memories, and happy tears.