When Heidi and I were both teaching 2nd grade, we had a dream. We had a dream of THE IDEAL WORD STUDY PROGRAM. We both feel like we had some really solid practices in place for teaching phonics and spelling. But we had complaints about our cobbled together word study program: It never quite seemed…
words their way
Dollar Store Word Work Activities
Do you do Daily 5? It was a total game changer for my daily schedule! You can read more about how I manage Daily 5 here. My students have a few tasks to do every day for the Word Work station of Daily 5. First, they do their word sort. Second, they practice their sight…
Christmas Consonant Blends
We’re back again with some adorable Christmas literacy centers. This time we’re tackling consonant blends : s blends, l blends, and r blends. These centers are a fun and seasonal compliment to our phonics program. Word Play Phonics for 1st and 2nd grade is a differentiated word study program that incorporates weekly word sorting, chunk spelling, phonics…
1 Easy Trick to Simplify Word Sorting
Aren’t we all looking for a way to simplify the management of 25+ students and all their little word sort cards each week? A reader told us this tip a few years ago and we couldn’t believe how simple and easy it was. It’s a CRAYON. Here’s what you do… Buy a big box of…
Words Their Way : The Ultimate How To Guide
Around here we are big fans of Words Their Way, an assessment-based, differentiated, leveled approach to spelling and word work. Here’s a little background on our experience with the Words Their Way program: It’s encouraged, not required in our district. Teachers can implement the program however they see fit. Heidi has taken some trainings but…