Fabulous Find!!

 

LANTERNFISH

Wow! This website is a fabulous find! It is meant to be used for ESL teachers (English as a second language) or TEFL teachers (teaching English as a foreign language); however, the worksheets, flashcards, games, and teaching resources are great and can work for any child learning to read!

Today I printed out all the Long Vowel Silent E flashcards for Savanna. There are 8 sets with color illustrations. I also printed several Long Vowel Spelling Sheets to introduce Savanna to the long vowel sounds. She loved it and it was so easy! They also have word searches, rhymes, bingo, text only flashcards (for assessment and review), and much more. I will be using this site often and I highly recommend it!

Bye for now,

Kristina

Ps. If you have trouble printing from their site as I did, just open a blank word doc, copy their page to your word doc, and print from there. No biggie!

All things A through C

Here's the lesson plans I used for teaching Samuel letters A through C. We are doing one letter per week using a combination of a preschool workbook, coloring pages, crafts, and lapbooks or pouches. All the activities not only teach letter recognition by sight and sound, but also strengthen those basic skills of cutting and pasting, coloring within the lines, sorting, matching, etc. Enjoy!

Letter A a

Letter Aa People - We created our own "A" people using our imagination. Samuel thought this was hilarious by the way! If you don't feel like getting creative though, here's a link to some pre-made templates for alphabet people and other crafts.

Letter Aa Lapbook - You'll need the lapbook printables, manilla folder, scissors, glue, and crayons.

Letter Aa Coloring Pages, Rhymes, and Letter Searches - We used our Starfall membership to print these out. If you don't have a membership, you can find several free coloring pages on the D L T K site that your child might enjoy. We also discovered really neat Bible Alphabet coloring pages that he might like as well.

Samuel's Letter Aa Study

Letter B b
Letter Bb Pouch - You'll need the pouch printables, manilla folder, stapler, scissors, glue, crayons. (Note: Cut the manilla folder in half while still folded. Then cut 1/4 off the top. The fold will act as the bottom of your pouch. Staple the sides.)














Letter Bb Scavenger Hunt - No supplies needed! Just go to a park, store, or even the backyard and look for things that start with the letter b sound. We did this at Target and Samuel had a blast! You can also look for the letter b on signs and advertisements around town.

Letter Bb Coloring Pages, Rhymes, and Letter Searches - We used our Starfall membership to print these out. If you don't have a membership, you can find several free coloring pages on the D L T K site that your child might enjoy. We also discovered really neat Bible Alphabet coloring pages that he might like as well.

Itsy Bitsy B Book - You'll need the book printable, scissors, crayons, and a stapler. Samuel thought this was really neat and wanted to read his itsy bitsy book to everyone!



Samuel's Letter Bb Study

Letter Cc
Letter Cc Lapbook - You'll need the lapbook printables, manilla folder, scissors, glue, and crayons.

Cookie Monster Craft - You'll need the cookie monster printable, a T.P. roll, and glue. I also made extra cookies and wrote big C's and little c's on them. Big hit!

C is for Captain America coloring page! Oh yeah! Samuel flipped when he saw this page hee-hee! I made this specifically for him but there are many characters that children love that you can make for your little one. Some ideas include:

• C is for Care Bears
• C is for Candace (from Phineas & Ferb)
• C is for Clifford
• C is for Cookie Monster
• C is for Mr. Crabs (from Spongebob)

C is for Crayons - We loved this! We took a bunch of old broken crayons and used them to glue to a big C and little c I drew on a piece of construction paper. Fun!

Letter Cc Coloring Pages, Rhymes, and Letter Searches - We used our Starfall membership to print these out. If you don't have a membership, you can find several free coloring pages on the D L T K site that your child might enjoy. We also discovered really neat Bible Alphabet coloring pages that he might like as well.

Samuel's Letter Cc Study

More letters to come!

Bye for now,

Kristina





Hammer Home Short Vowel Sounds

Here's a fun activity to hammer home short vowel sounds! Savanna loved it and I'm sure your child will too!

Materials:

• Pouch Printables
• Manilla folder
• Stapler
• Scissors
• Glue
• Crayons/Coloring Pencils

Step 1: Print out pouch printables using the link above. Separate the pages with words/letters from the pages with pictures.

Step 2: Trim the top of a manilla folder (the tab) to make it flat on the top. Use the stapler to staple the sides of the folder, leaving the top open to form the pouch. Trim off the bottom 1/4 of the pages with words/letters. Place the papers inside the pouch and have them ready for your student.
 


Step 3: Have your child cut out the pictures. Note: There are quite a few pictures so you can have her do one sheet while you cut out the other. This is what Savanna and I did, and it was just the right amount of scissors practice.

Step 4: Have your child color the pouch cover and all the vowel pages. Have her glue the cover to the pouch and decorate it as she likes.






Step 5: Spread out all the pictures in random order and have her identify the pictures that go with each vowel. Some pictures begin with the vowel, some have the vowel in the middle (ie. APPLE starts with a short A, CAT has a short A in the middle). Each vowel has 5 corresponding pictures. Glue the correct pictures to each vowel page.

Short A

Short E

Short I

Short O

Short U

Step 6: Insert the vowel sheets into the pouch and use them again and again for practice!

Insert the vowels sheets into pouch

Finished pouch :)

Bye for now,
Kristina

More Free Phonics Booklets

If your child liked reading and illustrating our Tig the Pig booklet, she will love our newest additions!

Tom the Kid is about a boy who has a lot of pets and a house that's too small. I know she will enjoy drawing the animals just as much as Savanna did!

Pam the Dog is about a dog that loves doing tricks but isn't too busy to stop and help out her mother. (Hint: Savanna made Pam and her mother sheep dogs.)

I hope your child is having a blast learning to read!! I know Savanna is enjoying it and very excited with each new word. What a blessing to be a part of her reading experience!

Bye for now,
Kristina

Superhero Shapes

My son loves superheroes! What 3yr old boy doesn't!? His favorite are the Marvel characters Spiderman and The Avengers. I decided to incorporate his love for superheroes with his love of learning and created some very simple shapes for him. Each shape has a character or symbol on it from the Marvel comics. With the help of superheroes, he has learned all the major shapes: circle, triangle, square, rectangle, star, heart, oval, and diamond.

You can look online and find clipart or black & white images of your child's favorite characters, (ie. Spiderman, My Little Pony, Chuck & Friends, Strawberry Shortcakes etc.) and cut & paste them onto cardstock. If you have laminating capabilities, that would help! If not, (I do not) you can use clear  packing tape and it will make a similar effect. This can be something you do together as a project (if you print black & white images he can help color them) or you can do it on your own.  Either way, he will love it and learn his shapes quickly!

My son liked the black & white look so ours are not colored.

Here's Samuel naming all his shapes!

Bye for now,
Kristina

Project: Stars & Stripes

Since today is America's birthday, I thought I'd share a recent project we did on the Pledge of Allegiance and the American flag. We started Project: Stars & Stripes on Memorial Day, continued through Flag Day, and completed it today on Independence Day. It's a wonderful summer project for those of you who stick to the traditional school year, or a great way to start the year for you year-arounders. Patriotism in the hearts of young children is a beautiful thing and I have enjoyed watching my children come to love America and what we once stood for. Here are the things we did:

1) BOOKS: The local library has a TON of books on the flag and that's the best (free) place to start! I checked out as many age-appropriate books as I could to help my kids gain interest in the flag.  Our favorite was I Pledge Allegiance by Bill Martin Jr. and Michael Sampson. This book teaches the meaning of each part of the Pledge in a simple way for children to grasp.

2) SCAVENGER HUNT: We did a photo scavenger hunt for 50 flags. The kids LOVED this! Everywhere we went (and even in our own house) if they found a flag we took their picture with it or in front of it. It didn't take long at all for us to find 50 flags. In fact, they still do this even though we have finished this part of the project. The other day in the car on the way home from the park they found 93 flags! Here's a few of my favorite pictures...

Samuel realized he had a flag
on his PJ's

The kids in the train museum after
a long day outside in the sun

This is the flag at the front of our
Sanctuary at chruch

Savanna drew her first flag

      The kids saw flag stamps on

a letter from their best friends

This is a car lot down the
street from us. Jackpot!

3) FLAG LAPBOOK: We love lapbooks! They're so much fun, informative, and easy to make. I couldn't find a template with the info I liked so I made my own. Here's the Flag Lapbook for you to download. You will also need: manilla folder, blue and red construction paper, scissors, glue, pencil, blue and red crayons or markers. My kids loved making these and the info provided would be good for PK - 5th grade. (NOTE: You can adjust the level of difficulty. For example, I cut out most of the booklets and filled in all the words for Samuel (3yrs) and just let him cut out a couple of the squares since he's learning to use scissors and doesn't know how to write. But for Savanna I allowed her to cut out more and to copy my writing. For an older child you may let them cut out all the materials and try to fill in the blanks on their own. However you do it, this is a fun part of the flag project.)

Ready to start our Lapbook

Savanna coloring the cover
for her lapbook

Samuel coloring the cover
for his lapbook

Samuel's finished lapbook
(Front Cover)

Samuel's finished lapbook
(Inside)

Savanna's finished lapbook
(Inside)

Savanna's finished lapbook
(Front Cover)

Savanna's Pledge of Allegiance

My completed lapbook

Fold down booklet about the stars & stripes

Fold open booklet about the flag colors

Fold over booklet about the Flag Code

Hope you enjoy this project and have a wonderful Independence Day!

Bye for now,

Kristina

Tig the Pig

My daughter has an incredible memory. This is a wonderful thing except she tends to memorize the pages of her books based on the picture. Instead of reading the words. This is obviously frustrating when she zooms through a book like she’s "reading" it but she’s missing words or saying words that aren’t correct. So I decided to have her illustrate her own book. This was my first attempt and she did GREAT with it! She had a lot of fun illustrating each page and the best part… she was ACTUALLY READING!  I will definitely be making more of these.

Tig the Pig is the book we made. Each page has a sentence and a picture of Tig. Just Tig. Once Savanna read the sentence correctly, she was allowed to decorate Tig accordingly.

ie. “Tig can wear a pink wig.”

Then once each page is decorated, you can cut them in half (printed landscape in two columns) and staple the book together. Your child will be so excited to share this book with everyone because she REALLY CAN READ IT all by herself!

Check out Savanna reading Tig the Pig J

Bye for now,

Kristina