Choosing the Right Phonics Activities

Apr 24

When we sit down to plan our small group time, we must keep the end goal of phonics in mind: we want to produce strong decoders and strong writers. When students are strong in decoding, they can become fluent. And when they become fluent, they can comprehend - that is our ultimate goal! I’ve put together a checklist of six things to keep in mind when choosing the right activities for your small group time.

Ways we can ensure we’re choosing the right phonics activities:

Have predictable routines

Our routines, activities, and games must be predictable.
When students sit down at our small group table, students should know what to expect.

This makes more room for learning the specific phonics skill being taught.

Choose your favorite activities and stick to them - quality over quantity.
Check out my phonics Lesson in Action Podcasts: Part 1: Walkthrough and Warm-Up and Part 2: Explicit teaching/Application of Skills for some ideas.

Leave time for reviewing previously taught skills

Circle back and review previously-taught concepts and skills.
Reflect upon what students have learned within the past 4-6 weeks and ensure your lessons contain those skills.
While planning, ask yourself:

How can I pull previously-taught skills and incorporate them into this current lesson?
How can I leave time for review?
Do the decodable I’ve chosen contain these previously-taught skills?
During my dictation, are we dealing with words we’ve previously studied?

As you’re reviewing, activities should be consistent and ones that they’ve already done.
Incorporate review into your current lesson

Example: if you worked on short a last week and are working on short i this week, use this to your advantage while word chaining. Begin with the word hat and have students change it to hit, etc. Additionally, the decodable should only contain skills that have been previously taught.

Incorporate heart words into your lesson

Students learn heart words faster when they’re applied to phonics skills.

Example: if you’re focusing on the short u sound, choosing the heart word was is a good start. The word had the short u sound, but the heart portion is the letter a.

After students have built the word, phoneme-grapheme mapped the word and orthographically mapped it into their brain, you may then use flashcards to work on automaticity!

Spend lots of time at the application level of a phonics skill

We need to have students apply their new skills to reading and writing as soon as possible.
While planning, ask yourself:

Am I giving them ample time to focus on these skills while they’re reading and writing?
Am I choosing activities that connect sound to print (phoneme to the grapheme)?

Word chaining is a very effective strategy

Example: students build the word map and pull down letters while saying sounds. They change the words rap → trap → trip → rip, etc.

Think about why and how you’re choosing your phonics activities.

Ensure that you have good assessments so that you can track your student’s progress.
Use the data to fill in gaps or to move on from a skill that’s been mastered.
While planning, ask yourself:

Am I looking at the data?
Am I using my assessments in a way that promotes progress?
Are my activities aligning with what my students need?

Make lessons fun and engaging

Use scripts for rules, generalizations, and directions.
Have fun!
When activities are fun and engaging, students learn more. It’s important for them to see teachers excited about reading!
Things like fun manipulatives (mini erasers, pom poms, small candies, etc.) and Friday Fun activities are a great start.