So, CVC words have been our lives for the past couple weeks. We've been eating short vowels for breakfast and consonants for lunch. Or something like that. Sorry. We had a birthday party today (cupcakes!) and I'm still a little incoherent.
CVC words. I spend the first six weeks of school hitting them hard before moving onto blends. I like to use a lot of nonsense words when teaching CVC. It's funny, because I didn't see the point of nonsense words my first year of teaching. Now I love it, because I saw how they force the students to use their decoding strategies.
The thing is, a lot of my students come to first grade with no blending skills... and many of them haven't mastered letter sounds yet. We have to do some intense intervention in order to master CVC words within the first six weeks.
These fluency charts have made intervention time a lot easier. No, they are not cute or crafty, but they give me results. RESULTS, ya'll!
These have two uses: intense, quick, individual practice and assessment.
For practice, we just read the charts. I know that sounds pathetically simple, but that's the beauty of it. I pull students individually during Daily Five/Literacy Stations, or even during independent work... whenever I can find a spare minute. I give each student one or two minutes to read as many words as they can. I scaffold, address any issues (trouble blending, confusing letters), and make note on what issues to follow up on later.
It's intensive practice, as the kiddos are exposed to a lot of words in a short period of time. They get a lot more practice reading from this than they do with any game or activity that requires them to wait for a word... or wait for their turn... they just get to read, even though the words aren't real.
For assessment, I give each student one minute to read. On a separate sheet, I mark any mistakes they may make. I count how many words they read correctly, and we graph that together. We also set a goal for the next reading, which I write on a sticky note and attach to their graph. This is great for RTI, tiered interventions, or any type of regular assessment that requires graphing/tracking data.
For practice, we just read the charts. I know that sounds pathetically simple, but that's the beauty of it. I pull students individually during Daily Five/Literacy Stations, or even during independent work... whenever I can find a spare minute. I give each student one or two minutes to read as many words as they can. I scaffold, address any issues (trouble blending, confusing letters), and make note on what issues to follow up on later.
It's intensive practice, as the kiddos are exposed to a lot of words in a short period of time. They get a lot more practice reading from this than they do with any game or activity that requires them to wait for a word... or wait for their turn... they just get to read, even though the words aren't real.
For assessment, I give each student one minute to read. On a separate sheet, I mark any mistakes they may make. I count how many words they read correctly, and we graph that together. We also set a goal for the next reading, which I write on a sticky note and attach to their graph. This is great for RTI, tiered interventions, or any type of regular assessment that requires graphing/tracking data.
Now, my favorite part of this pack is the comparing vowels file. A lot of my students mix up their short vowel sounds, especially a/e and e/i. Practicing with only two sounds help them differentiation between the two. There are also charts that contain only one short vowel sounds, which is great for beginners.
The kids actually love them. It surprised me at first, because like I said, they are a little lacking in the cute-department. I think the key to their success is that the kids like to see results (RESULTS!) too. We graph their progress, and they looove to see their bars rise. I also think they appreciate the simplicity of just reading.
You can check them out here in my TPT store.
You can check them out here in my TPT store.
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