Early Dictation
Did you know that dictation actually starts at the sound and CVC level? Yep, it’s true, even our youngest readers can begin to put dictation into practice! Let me share with you how we do it! Check out these dictation sheets, specially designed with young readers in mind!
Why We Love It
Dictation is a fancy word for another fancy word: encoding. And encoding? Well, it simply means spelling! Dictation is a very effective way to tell if students are successfully able to transfer sounds they hear to print. As we all know, encoding and decoding go hand-in-hand. When you’re practicing one, you’re also practicing the other. Dictation exercises also enforce the idea that sounds can be more than just one letter. One of the best aspects of pretty much any dictation activity is that it’s simple and effective - and that’s why we love this one so much. It simply requires some pieces of paper and a pencil and you’re set!
When doing a dictation activity, ensure that the sounds you’re using have already been taught, as well as any high-frequency words you may be practicing as well. These activities can include sound dictation, word dictation, or sentence dictation. Of course, whichever you choose, ensure that you’ve done them in order, as they build upon one another. Dictation activities like this one help students spell words and understand the relationship between what they hear and what’s on their paper.
How to Use
This activity provides you six weeks’ worth of dictation exercises that cover the alphabet.
Students will receive a student sheet with blank lines and numbers 1-7.
Teachers will read from the teacher portion (the half sheets) and read each sentence out loud.
Students will dictate (write down) the letter sound they hear or spell the word that’s requested.
