One of the biggest challenges for me as an educator during this quarantine is finding ways to deliver the curriculum using hands-on materials. I want students to be able to use materials they already have at home to play and learn! Yes, there are times they might benefit from printing a worksheet or game and trying that, but for the most part I really want to take the pressure off of always printing and completing worksheets. In fact, I encourage students to document their own work, by drawing or writing about it.
LITERACY GAMES
Here are a few fun literacy games that your students can play at home!
SORTING SYLLABLES
Ask students to collect a variety of materials around their house (i.e., paperclip, marker, etc.) and sort them according to syllables. They can write the headers on top.
SPELLING CVC WORDS
I used 3 colours of Popsicle sticks (but you can use whatever you have at home) and wrote letters on them. If you use the same colour sticks, I would write vowels in another colour to help students find medial vowel.
Separate sticks into 3 groups (C-V-C) and pick one stick from each.
Did you make a work? Does it make sense?
SIGHT WORD MUFFIN TIN GAME
Using a muffin tin and cupcake liners, write sight words in each. Use a small object (button, coin, pom pom) and throw towards tin. If it lands inside a word, read it and record it!
How many words can you get?
ALPHABET SORT
Can you find objects around your home that begin with each letter of the alphabet? You can have your students create their own alphabet chart by drawing in what they found!
LETTER CHART
If you focus on a letter a week, you might like to have your students brainstorm things that begin with that letter!
LETTER BOOKS
Students can create their own letter books!
These alphabet activities are from my new "I Know My ABCs!" pack on TpT if you'd like to see more.
SPELL-A-WORD USING STICKERS
Take some stickers and slowly sound out the word. Write down all the sounds you hear!
You can watch me explain how to play this game on our *NEW* You Tube channel:
SIGHT WORD BINGO
My class LOVES playing Bingo! So when I held a Google Meet with them last week, I decided to play virtually! I created these personalized sight word Bingo cards and sent them out via Google Classroom. Students could print, copy on paper, or leave up on screen and cover with sticky notes to play.
You can find this activity here:
BOOK SCAVENGER HUNT
Take some stickers and slowly sound out the word. Write down all the sounds you hear!
SIGHT WORD BINGO
My class LOVES playing Bingo! So when I held a Google Meet with them last week, I decided to play virtually! I created these personalized sight word Bingo cards and sent them out via Google Classroom. Students could print, copy on paper, or leave up on screen and cover with sticky notes to play.
BOOK SCAVENGER HUNT
Grab some of you favourite books and use this checklist to find everything!
BUTTERFLY LOOSE PARTS
We are going to be exploring the butterfly life cycle and thought it would be fun to have students use loose parts from around their house (i.e. buttons, pasta, beads, etc.) to create a butterfly!
You can download this template for free by clicking on the picture.
Here are a few of my favourite You Tube videos focusing on literacy:
Phonics Song -> such a catchy tune children quickly sing along to!
Storybots -> I love all of their letter songs! This is a complete collection of the entire alphabet but you can also search for just one letter at a time
Vowel Bat by Sheri Sloane -> I met Sheri a few years ago when I presented at the I Teach K! Conference in Las Vegas and she is just amazing!!!
Sesame Street: Usher's ABC Song -> ok, so ANYTHING that Usher sings is awesome, am I right?
Phonercise -> Dr. Jean makes everything fun when you can have your students stand up and stretch out the letters
My colleague (Ms. Cipollone) created this wonderful video outlining many ways you can work on sight words at home. She graciously allowed me to share it here with you!
MATH GAMES
Try these fun math games!
ADD IT UP WITH DOMINOES
Choose a domino and write the 2 numbers as an addition sentence. Solve it!
(I didn't have any dominoes at home - not sure if students do either - so I made these using clip art. I added this page to my Addition in Kindergarten pack on TpT so if you own that go back and re-download).
You can watch me explain how to play this game on our *NEW* You Tube channel:
HOW MANY ARE HIDING UNDER THE CUP?
Place 10 small objects (I used pom poms) on the table. Count. Have your child close their eyes and move some under a cup. Ask your child to open their eyes and guess how many are under the cup.
TIP: To make this more challenging, try it using 20 objects or more!
You can watch me explain how to play this game on our *NEW* You Tube channel:
BEFORE AND AFTER
Set up a 3 column grid. I like to draw an arrow pointing to the middle box.
Roll a die (or 2 to make it more challenging!). Write that number in the middle box.
Think about what number comes before and what number comes after. Write them in the remaining boxes.
You can watch me explain how to play this game on our *NEW* You Tube channel:
SPIN AND SHOW
This is one of those games parents will probably have to print (or at least draw on paper).
Spin the spinner and show that many on the 10-frame.
Add or take away to show the next number.
I made 2 versions of this game for students who want a challenge!
You can watch me explain how to play this game on our *NEW* You Tube channel:
Download this game for FREE by clicking on the link below.
Here are a few of my favourite You Tube videos focusing on math:
When You Add with a Pirate -> all of Harry Kindergarten's songs are fabulous!
Search them in You Tube!
Jack Hartmann songs -> he's another one of my go-to's for all things math!
Counting on (Mr. R's songs for teaching) -> such an important concept to teach little ones!
BIRD RESEARCH PROJECT
We are learning all about birds during Week 9!
Students visited the National Geographic Kids - Birds website and chose 1 bird that they wanted to research.
Then they were encouraged to document their findings! We provided this template (they could also draw on a scrap paper).
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