Stop and Write- Using Read Alouds in Making Words Activities!

As you know, I do “making words” activities with my little kindergartners and 1st graders daily.  Something new I’ve done with my little friends recently combines a read aloud, iPads (with the free ShowMe app) and making words all into one quick activity!

Common Core Alignment:

Each student has an iPad in front of him/her and I choose a story to read aloud.  I am currently using simple readers that do not have too complex language because my next goal with this activity is to have a little friend do the reading while the others make words! So, I read the story and take out my stop sign every other page and have the students “stop and write.”  The students are just writing one word that I say from the page I just read.  I currently am choosing CVC words, CVCe words or sight words from the text since they all need practice with these. However, in the future I will align it with our focus of the week from our reading series, so that they can also be making words with digraphs, blends, r controlled vowels, etc. (That’ll take a little more planning on my part in regard to which book I can use as a read aloud, but will be so worth the extra effort so my little friends get some more practice with various skills!)

After I read through the whole book, each student can practice reading all the words he/she wrote and then either read their words to a partner, or if you are in the ShowMe app, they can record themselves reading it.  I am really loving this activity because it takes only a few minutes, it’s fun for the students and it provides me with a quick little assessment of who is struggling with what skills.  I love the fact that I am able to use a read aloud as yet another way to practice some literacy skills– aren’t books just amazing? 🙂

Oh and of course you can definitely also do this exact same activity with whiteboards, notebooks, magnet strips, computers (or whatever else you have!), but I choose to do it with iPads since we are so lucky to have them! So far I feel like it has been a success with my little friends, so I think I may spend the last few minutes every other day doing this activity. This is something you may want to consider adding to your small group lessons or even to whole group read alouds.  For more “making words” ideas, check out this post!

One last important thing for the day: I’m linking up with Dana over at Fun in 1st Grade for Inspiration Monday…on Tuesday. 🙂  I found this on Pinterest (of course!) and I have to say that I really do love to learn new things and this quote kinda just says it perfectly…. Hope you are inspired today! Head on over to Dana’s post to read more inspiring quotes.