Today was a short day at school. We were dismissed early and will not have school tomorrow due to Sandy. Being in the northeast, we luckily we have emergency days built into our school year for snowstorms and other emergencies. Who knew we would use the some of those days for hurricanes two years in a row? Good news is that it has given me time to let you know what I've been up to!!
I have mentioned in previous posts that my district has adopted and implemented AIMSweb for the first time this year. Through this assessment, many of my firsties showed weaknesses in both Letter Naming Fluency (LNF) and Letter Sound Fluency (LSF). For those of you who are not familiar with the assessment, the students are presented with rows of random upper and lower case letters and are asked to name as many letters as they can in one minute for LNF, or as many sounds as they can in one minute for LSF.
I have mentioned in previous posts that my district has adopted and implemented AIMSweb for the first time this year. Through this assessment, many of my firsties showed weaknesses in both Letter Naming Fluency (LNF) and Letter Sound Fluency (LSF). For those of you who are not familiar with the assessment, the students are presented with rows of random upper and lower case letters and are asked to name as many letters as they can in one minute for LNF, or as many sounds as they can in one minute for LSF.
LNF and LSF does not tell me what letters and sounds my students know or continue to need more practice with. To help learn more about this, I also assessed them with my
I found that they did know most of their letters and sounds. When I put the results of the two assessments together, it showed me that they need extra practice naming their letters and producing their sounds automatically and fluently.
As a reading teacher, my time with students is limited. So in addition to providing instruction to my firsties, I also want to provide them with some time for extra fluency practice. The first few minutes of my intervention time is devoted to practicing this fluency through a quick activity, depending on the day of the week. Here is what I have started to do:
On Move it Monday, I generally play a quick game where the students are moving game pieces or their bodies. For example, games like
and
On Time it Tuesday I have been using my
I just updated this pack to include a combination of upper and lower case letters.
On Time it Tuesday I have been using my
For One Breath Wednesday, a wonderful colleague and I created several little ticket-sized boxes with two rows of letters. My students select their "ticket" and then read each line in one breath.
For Throw it Thursday we will play
Flip it Friday is usually done with some type of alphabet letter cards. I have many different sets with different themes, so they are "new" to the kiddos almost each and every time. I quickly flip through the pile for my students to name the letters or produce the sounds as quickly as they can.
Hopefully these quick daily speed drills will help my firsties increase their automaticity and fluency with their letters and sounds! What are some activities you do to help promote these skills?
And for those of you who are also affected by Sandy, my thoughts and prayers are with you! Stay safe!
Hopefully these quick daily speed drills will help my firsties increase their automaticity and fluency with their letters and sounds! What are some activities you do to help promote these skills?
And for those of you who are also affected by Sandy, my thoughts and prayers are with you! Stay safe!
