Introducing sight words and other foundational reading skills is essential for budding readers. Throughout my tenure as a kindergarten teacher, I’ve identified several strategies that have proven successful in teaching sight words. Here’s what’s worked for me:
Develop daily sight word practices with your class. One activity I adore involves assembling our sight words using magnets as a collective exercise. After assembling them, we individually pronounce each letter, and then we incorporate SNAP, TAP, and CLAP motions. My students adore this method! Here’s an example using the word ‘like’:
LIKE L-I-K-E LIKE (Snap with each letter as pronounced!)
LIKE L-I-K-E LIKE (Clap during each letter’s pronunciation!)
LIKE L-I-K-E LIKE (Tap your toe with each letter’s vocalization!)
We engage in this activity for every sight word during our morning meetings. This helps students quickly identify and spell words.
Stay Steady
To offer consistent sight word exposure, consider a daily slideshow presentation. Even a simple one can be impactful. For instance, having your students recite the words while projecting them keeps them attentive. Each week, I incorporate new words to the slideshow and shuffle them to ensure the students are alert. I often append these words to my kindergarten review presentation.
Incorporate Sight Words in Reading Material
Leverage poems to present sight words in context. My students enjoy discovering new poems, and it’s a win-win as they get acquainted with their sight words and other reading competencies like fluency and rhyme. Each student has a poetry notebook containing 40 sight word poems for communal reading. These poems are sight word-rich. We read them in unison, spotlight the sight words, and even recite them with peers. The notebook gets updated seasonally with relevant poems.
Prioritize Tangible Activities
It’s vital for young learners to engage in physical activities. Introduce a dedicated sight word corner focusing on the week’s new words. Equip it with versatile hands-on materials like plastic cups, play-doh, and magnets, ensuring minimal setup. These tools are always popular among the students.
Prominently Display Sight Words
Students should encounter sight words at every turn. Here’s a tip: designate sight words as ‘table names’. Display a word above each table and use them for transitions rather than table numbers. Refresh these words weekly with newer ones and reuse them annually.
Additionally, involve students in making sight word anchor charts and display them as references. Another method is using pocket chart activities to exhibit sight words, allowing students to formulate sentences with them. Keep these sentences on display for revisiting later. Pocket charts excel in this regard; I often source mine from a collection I have.
Frequent Evaluations
Regularly assessing student progress on sight words is instrumental. The insights help in focusing on what the students genuinely require. During guided reading sessions, I swiftly evaluate them, making for an effective introduction to the reading lesson.
In conclusion, young readers can grasp sight words effectively if there’s a structured routine, consistency, context-based teaching, tactile learning, omnipresent word display, and periodic assessments.
