Ready to Read -at Word Family Active Instruction Lesson 1

Ready to Read – Word Family -at with Picture Reinforcement.  Multi-Sensory Instruction with a Letter and Sound Review, Auditory Drill, Blending Drill, Decodable Reading, Word Dictation, and a Phonemic Awareness Activity: Rhyme.

These lessons were created to use with whole group blended learning (virtual and in-person students) for kindergarten and beginning First Grade.  They were so successful that once all students returned to in-person instruction, I continued using them.  All students can easily see the Smartboard, and it is so much easier than if I have to juggle letter cards, books, and different materials.  I can easily save different versions of the presentation, and edit each one to fit the needs of various students for additional work with a tutor or in small group. It also works well with small groups, RTI, Resource, and SPED.

These lessons build on each other, and will eventually last about 30 - 45 minutes depending on changes you make, the size of your group, and the pace. Of course, some students/classes go through quicker, some slower, so adapt as needed.  These earlier lessons are quicker – Lesson 1 (-at) has 120 slides and you can actually click through it in about 5 minutes.  But it takes longer when your students are learning what to do, and you must also factor in time for them to get paper and pencil and complete the 5-word dictation at the end of the lesson.  So estimate a 30 minute block initially and modify and adapt as needed.

You will download a zip file that contains a PowerPoint Presentation, a note to read first, a file with extra slides if you need to change or add some slides, and a PDF that has a link to make a copy in Google Slides if you do not use PowerPoint.

The slides start out with a quick attention-getter, followed by letter review - say letter, say sound, and keyword (" B, ball, /b/"). All letters are included, however, I typically use only the ones my students need to work on and not in alphabetical order - especially in later lessons. You may want to do this first lesson in alphabetical order and change future lessons to meet your needs as you see how this works for your class.

This is followed by an auditory drill. IF you have letter tiles or magnetic letters, this is a great time to get those out. If not, just use the letter tiles on the SmartBoard without additional student material or have them air write the letters or write with crayons, pencil and paper, or simply say the letter. For this, there are letter tiles on the slide. The teacher says the sound of one of the letters. The students repeat the sound and then identify the letter. For example, teacher says /b/. Students repeat /b/ and then say B. If they have letter tiles or magnetic letters they can pull those, or point to them.

There is a fun "sneak peak" of the word family - an embedded video "If you can read -at." I do not own rights to this video and cannot guarantee it will always be available. If the link is no longer available, delete that slide, or add your own link to something related.

Then we are on to blending. Students say the sound of the letter the car is beneath. /a/ on one slide, /t/ on the next. Then the car "drives" beneath "at" and the students will read "at." This continues through multiple -at word family words.

Time to Read - this starts with reading the words we just blended. A picture of the word on the following slides reinforce the correct answer, and really help out some of the students who struggle more - they are able to put that picture reinforcement with the word which really helps many students.

High Frequency Word Review. Slides for Red Words, Sight Words, and Trick Words are included in an additional file, so you can easily use the term that correlates with your preference or curriculum. Add any other words you are working on. I have a few basic ones, and what the students will need to read the next slides.

Sentence Reading - a few very basic sentences. Especially here on this first lesson. The presentations will build on each other, so students constantly review what they have learned and build on it.

We then review rhyme - Thumbs up or down with rhyming pairs. Typically phonemic awareness activities are done prior to a lesson like this, but for the past couple of years, my students had so much trouble with rhyme, and when I put the rhyming activity after all the word family work, they are more successful than if I start with it. Of course, you can move the rhyme slides to the beginning of the presentation if you want to stick with traditional format.

Finally, there is the Exit Ticket or Dictation - slides show pictures from earlier in the lesson - in this presentation, there is a cat, a rat, a hat, a bat, and finally a mat. They will write each word on their paper (or if you have your letter tiles or magnetic letters you can easily use them). Written work is important, and it will help show progress, allow you to examine which students need help and hopefully see their misconceptions, and it helps you to give grades if required.

Orton-Gillingham, IMSE, Wilson Reading System, and FUNdations curriculums influenced the way this is put together. If you have access to Hooked on Phonics Videos, they work well to plug into these lessons. They are quick little "brain brakes" of sorts, or sometimes attention getters, but always educational and catchy, and my students loved them.