Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Jump Words, Followers

Jump Words, Followers


Last year at my school we had an in-service to motivate our teaching.  I walked away from the in-service definitely motivated and with a lot of ideas.  One of my favorite ideas I came away with the was Spelling Word Jump.  I don't teach spelling words to my students but we do have a lot of sight words.  So I like to call it Sight Word Jump.  Here is a picture of one of my students jumping the sight word.   
This is how I do the Sight Word Jump in my classroom.  I used the suggestion of how to make a grid from the presenter last year.  I couldn't think of an area where I could lay out the grid in my classroom.  After thinking about it, I came up with using the back of my classroom rug.  It ended up being perfect for the grid.  I used the dimensions the presenter gave out and the order of the letters he gave out. (Sorry, I can't think of the presenter's name)  I first drew the grid with pencil, then I traced over it with a Sharpie.  After it was made I was so excited to try it with my class.  It was a little rough at the beginning since my kiddos don't know how to spell a lot of things but I did figure it out and now they love it.  I have my students sit on the outside of my rug.  I tell them they have to stay behind the black line.  Then I give the jumper a sight word card.  This way the student jumping can look at the letters of the word easily so they can find them and jump on them.  Now when they are jumping on the letter they need they have to say the letter name.  Once they spell the whole sight word then they say the sight word out loud.  This letter grid would be great for learning spelling words too.  Also, you could make on with numbers and practice number recognition for even addition and subtraction.  I love getting new ways to teach my kiddos their sight words and using the Sight Word Jump is another way to help them learn their words.   

I can't believe I have 19 followers.  I know that may not seem like a lot to some people but I think it is great!  If you are a follower of my blog, THANK YOU!  I hope in some way I am able to brighten your day. 

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