A new school-year, a new group of students, and so much to teach that it can already be overwhelming. However, we all know that the only place to begin is with community building. From the very first day, it is crucial that we create an inviting classroom environment where students feel safe, welcome, and accountable. And although there are numerous character traits that we can teach throughout the year to facilitate a positive classroom environment, I propose that we begin the year with citizenship. Hear me out!

Being a good citizen requires respect, cooperation, honesty, responsibility, fairness, and a host of other positive character traits that you will be focusing on throughout the year. Why not begin with the all-encompassing, community-centered character trait of citizenship? Are you on board with me now? Let’s get started!

Who lives in a community?

You guessed it! Citizens! This might sound like a no-brainer, but sometimes we forget that the easiest way to reach our students is by being intentional with our language and keeping it simple. Explain that you are all starting a new classroom community and that each student is a citizen of that community. Then discuss the language surrounding citizenship:

– Citizen: A member of a particular community who has certain rights, privileges and responsibilities.

– Rights: Rules about what a person can do or have, that people think shouldn’t be taken away.

– Privileges: Things a person can do or have that must be earned and can be taken away.

– Responsibilities: Duties someone is accountable for.

Making Connections

Use discussion questions to get your students thinking about what a good citizen looks like, and when and where they have seen citizenship exhibited in their own communities. Discuss scenarios to practice how they can be a good citizen in the classroom and at school. Finally, have your students reflect on what they have learned with writing.

Download my Daily Character Trait Discussion Questions for four whole weeks of discussion questions, scenarios and reflections!

Incentivize

Looking for a way to promote and reward good citizenship in your classroom? Try Character Cash! Read all about how I use Character Cash in my classroom here.

And BONUS! As we talked about before, good citizenship can be shown through so many other positive character traits! So you’ll be passing out Character Cash like it grows on trees and well on your way to the classroom community of your teacher dreams. You’re welcome!

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Are your kindergarteners having trouble one-to-one matching when reading? Are they unable to identify all upper and lowercase letters? Let’s move our kindergarteners up to grade level in reading using Tier II interventions!

Using the Common Core State Standard RF.K.1: Organization and Basic Features of Print, I will help you figure out the 5 simple steps to help your struggling students. Although we will be focusing on this standard for the purpose of this post, these steps can be applied to any standard in reading or math!

All of the resources in this post can be found in the Tier II Reading Intervention Progress Monitoring Kit For Kindergarten RF.K.1.

And if you’re looking for information about what Tier II Intervention is, check out my previous post here.

1- Baseline assessment

When monitoring progress in reading, it is essential that you get a beginning benchmark score for each of your students. This baseline data helps to inform:

1- where each of your students are in their developmental continuum of learning

2- what strengths or deficiencies each student has in their mastery of the standard(s) being taught

3- where you will start teaching in order to help your students reach mastery, and (hopefully) exit Tier II interventions.

Use simple texts like the one below with your students. You can:

Start with a picture walk.

Go through each page one by one and discuss what the students see on each page. Make sure to use the words on the page in your discussion. For example, “What do you SEE on this page?” “Yes, that is an AIRPLANE. We can also just call it a PLANE.”

Give the student the book and ask them to read it.

After doing a picture walk, and using all of the language from the page in your discussion, the students may be able to read it. If not, then model reading the entire book, and give it back to the student. Have them reread it to you.

Track the data.

Record whether or not the student could read the book on their own. Whether they read it on their own the first time or reread it after you a second time, you can use a running record or any other type of tracking system of your choice to record any errors in their reading.

2- Identify the standard you will teach

Use the baseline assessment to determine what skills your student has already mastered and where they need some intervention. Standard RF.K.1 states that the student must be able to:

– Follow words from left to right, top to bottom, and page by page.

– Recognize that spoken words are represented in written language by specific sequences of letters.

– Understand that words are separated by spaces in print

– Recognize and name all upper- and lowercase letters of the alphabet.

If your student is struggling with any of those aspects of the standard, that will be the focus of your intervention for your student.

3- Create intervention groups based around the standard

If you have multiple students who are struggling with the same standard, group them together in a Tier II intervention group.

Find a space for your group to meet that has as few distractions as possible and use your time to focus on intensive instruction around the skills they are lacking.

Tier II instruction should take place 30 minutes per day, 5 days per week. A typical intervention cycle will last 6-9 weeks.

4- Regular progress monitoring

Every 2-3 weeks, depending on how long your intervention cycle will last, reassess your students’ progress. For 6 week cycles, assess every 2 weeks; for 9 week cycles, assess every 3 weeks.

If you would like, include your students in the process by using a “My Progress” chart, and goal setting and reflection pages. Studies have shown that students can make more gains when they take ownership over of their learning.

5- Exit a student from intervention and celebrate!

When a student has successfully met the standard three times in a row during your progress monitoring sessions, they can officially exit the intervention group! Don’t forget to celebrate their successes with certificates when they reach their goals!

Looking for more Kindergarten Tier II Intervention Resources?

RF.K.2 Tier II Reading Intervention Progress Monitoring Kit For Kindergarten

RF.K.3 Tier II Reading Intervention Progress Monitoring Kit for Kindergarten

Tier II Math Intervention Progress Monitoring Kit All CCSS MEGA Bundle Kinder

The post 5 Simple Steps to Move Your Kindergarteners to Grade Level in Reading! appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Your classroom is a home away from home for your students, and what better way to help your students feel welcome and excited about their environment than by personalizing various spaces throughout the room for them? There are so many ways to personalize your student’s individual personalities, and I’ve collected a list of creative ideas for you right here!

Use Photo Labels

Not only will your students love to see their faces on their own items throughout the room (think book boxes, name tags, pencil boxes), but photo labels will really help your visual learners and non-readers. Get the tutorial here.

Co-Create a Classroom Alphabet

How great is this?? Collaborate with your students to brainstorm ideas for each letter of the alphabet. Encourage your students to take photos of items around the classroom to match each letter, including the students themselves! Read all about it here.

Personalize Your Classroom With Peer Model Expectations

Have students model positive behaviors and document them with photos. Then include the photos on a chart with the expectations or a classroom contract! You can personalize your classroom and student expectations.

Create a Get to Know You Game

Help your students get to know one another at the beginning of the year with Friend Bingo!

Class Birthday Chart

Create a fun visual to document all of your students’ birthdays by taking a picture of students grouped by birth month. Have each student hold up the date of their birthday and voila! A fun birthday chart full of cute faces.

Personalize Your Classroom With Themed or Seasonal Bulletin Boards

Attach photos of your students faces to cute die-cuts for a fun and humorous touch to a cute bulletin board. Change it up with the seasons or to highlight units your class is working on.

What are some other ways you plan to personalize your classroom for your students?

The post Personalize Your Students’ Space in the Classroom appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Progress monitoring is one of the key aspects to a Tier II intervention plan. It is important to know how your intervention plan is coming along, and when your students have progressed to Tier I, or grade-level expectations. If you are wondering what Tier II interventions are, or would like to learn more about Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS), click here to read this post that explains it all.

What Does Progress Monitoring Look Like?

Baseline Data

When monitoring progress in math, it is essential that you get a beginning benchmark score for each of your students. This baseline data helps to inform:

1- where each of your students are in their developmental continuum of learning

2- what strengths or deficiencies each student has in their mastery of the standard(s) being taught

3- where you will start teaching in order to help your students reach mastery, and (hopefully) exit Tier II intervention

How and When

Use a quick recording sheet to assess the student’s knowledge before beginning any interventions. Then, be sure to follow up throughout the weeks of interventions to monitor their progress. You can check in weekly, monthly, per quarter, trimester or semester.

Tracking Progress

You can also include your students in this process! Studies have shown that students can make more gains when they take ownership over of their learning.

Your students can set goals, track their progress week by week, and reflect on their progress using tracking charts, goal-setting and reflection pages.

Celebrate Success!

Don’t forget to celebrate their successes with certificates when they reach their goals!

Printable Resources

If you are looking for some no-prep resources that cover ALL of the Common Core State Standards, checkout one of these Mega Bundles. It will get you through the entire school year!

Click on the links below for kindergarten through second grade bundles, or find resources for individual standards by clicking on a grade level bundle and scrolling to the bottom of the product description.

Kindergarten Math Progress Monitoring for Tier II Intervention

First Grade Math Progress Monitoring for Tier II Intervention

Second Grade Math Progress Monitoring for Tier II Intervention

Keeping track of your students progress in your intervention groups doesn’t have to be difficult or time consuming. You’ve got this!

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Now it’s time to talk about the “what” of enrichment. What should my students do? How do I differentiate for my high-achieving students? The Bloom’s Verbs you use determine the enrichment activity decisions you make in your classroom.

Did you miss the first blog post about the Six W’s of Planning for Enrichment? Click here to catch up!

There are a couple of things to consider when thinking about enrichment activities and projects based on Bloom’s Taxonomy; length of time and rigor. As a refresher, Bloom’s Taxonomy verbs are set up in six levels: knowledge (remember), comprehension (understand), application (apply), analysis (analyze), synthesis (create) and evaluation (evaluate).

The Remember level will take the least amount of time and is least rigorous while the top level, Evaluate, is most rigorous and will take more time.

Next, are your students going to be working on activities that they will finish in one sitting? Are they doing projects that they will work on over the course of several days? Again, the Bloom’s verbs you use determines what your students will be doing and for how long.

Here are a few verb examples categorized by the length of time and potential level of rigor. 

One-Day Verbs: The Knowledge, Comprehension and Evaluation verbs will more than likely be completed in one day/sitting depending on the student.

Explain, Predict, Discuss, Solve, Critique, Justify

Multi-Day Projects: The application, and synthesis verbs can take more than one sitting to complete.

Apply, Modify, Construct, Design, Invent, Investigate

Analysis verbs can be one-day or multi-day activites depending on the verb.

Bloom’s Verbs are a fantastic way to differentiate for your high-achieving students within your content area standards.

Click these links if you are interested in some ready-to-go math or reading enrichment projects! 

Want these Bloom’s Posters for your classroom? Click here.

The post Using Bloom’s to Guide Enrichment Activities appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Tier II intervention is part of a broader system called Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS). There are three tiers in MTSS; Tier I, Tier II, Tier III.

Tier I instruction refers to all of the students receiving core grade-level instruction (i.e. your whole class, the whole grade level).

Tier II intervention refers to students who are not making adequate progress toward grade-level expectations with their core instruction. They are pulled outside of their core instructional time for extra, intensive interventions in a small group setting.

Tier III intervention refers to students who have received Tier I and Tier II instruction, and are still not making adequate progress. These students receive additional or unique individualized instruction to support their learning (i.e. students with Individualized Education Plans (IEP’s) ).

Are you needing to start an intervention group, but not sure where to start? Keep reading for some more logistics.

Who

Students who have received core grade-level instruction, and are not making adequate progress.

What

It is extra instruction that is specifically targeted to the skills and standards that the student is not making progress in.

When

Tier II instruction should take place 30 minutes a day, five days a week.

Where

It can take place anywhere there is space for a small group of students to work (with as few distractions as possible).

How

Tier II instruction can be given by a specialist who is trained in that content area (Reading, Math..etc) or simply a certificated teacher.

The post What is Tier II Intervention? appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

I started my career as a teacher (longer ago than I’d like to admit) knowing that I needed to meet the needs of all of my students. 

In college, I was taught how to meet the needs of students who are below grade level, but what about those who already ‘get it’? I had no idea how to meet the needs of my students who needed a challenge. They didn’t teach me that in undergrad. They didn’t even touch on it in my Master’s program.

It took a group of students in my 12th year of teaching to realize that I had been doing a disservice to so many of my students over the years. I didn’t have just one or two students who needed enrichment that year, I had seven. That’s right, SEVEN! As a first grade teacher, that had never happened to me in my career, and I realized that now was the time that I needed to make a change.

Below are the top five things I needed to think about when figuring out where to start with student enrichment. If you haven’t yet, start thinking about the 6 W’s. 

Who

First, I need to figure out which students are ready for enrichment. Will I use previous year’s scores and data? A pre-test? Observation? A conversation? Enrichment isn’t always a one size fits all. Many students will move back and forth, in and out of enrichment based on the standards being taught. 

What

Now it’s time to determine what my students will be doing for enrichment. Will they be sticking to the same standard, but going deeper and more complex? Will they be working on the same standard, but at the grade level above? Will they be working on a completely different standard? Will it be a project or a quick, one lesson activity? 

When

When will my students be doing their enrichment projects/activities? During the whole group lesson when the other students are learning new content? One thing to consider is whether or not enrichment students need to sit through the whole group lesson if they already understand the content. Can they just work while the other students are learning? If not, then is it when the rest of the students are applying their new learning during independent work time?

Where

Where will my students work on enrichment projects? At their desks? At my small group table? Out in the studio space?

Why

Why do we want to provide enrichment for our students who are ready? Why should we meet the needs of our students, even if it is just one student, when the rest of the class isn’t ready to move on to harder concepts?

How

How will my students complete their enrichment projects? By themselves? With a para or parent helper’s support? With my support? With a partner or in a group? This question may depend on their age. Are students able to read and understand their enrichment project on their own? If not, how will I explain it to them so that they can work on it independently or with a partner/group? This is especially the case if I am supporting the students who are still working on learning the new content. If I am the one supporting my students, another thing I want to consider is how they approach me if I am working with other students? Wait in between each of my small groups? Raise their hand?

Freebie

Check out this 10-Page Enrichment Planning freebie for a hard copy of all of these questions, and specific things you can do, or look for, to address each of the 6 W’s.

The post Student Enrichment; Where Do I Start? appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Whether your students are learning in-person or remotely, check out some brain break games that you can play with your students to provide them the brain breaks that they so desperately need!

Mystery Person

Give students clues to a mystery person. It can be someone famous, a character from a book, or someone in the school, including classmates!

Detective

Have the detective close their eyes. Assign an unknown person to be ‘it’. Have all of your students perform a particular motion (like clapping their hands). When the detective opens their eyes, the person who is ‘it’ changes the motion and the others follow suit. The detective tries to guess who was ‘it’.

Simon Says

Give students an action to perform after saying, “Simon Says”. If you give an action without saying, “Simon Says”, and a student still performs the action, they are out!

I Spy

Look for an object somewhere in the room. Give your students a clue using one adjective (ex: I spy something round). Students take turns trying to guess what the object is that you spy.

For distance learning: Show a collage of objects and have students try to find a specific object.

20 20 Questions

20 Questions

Choose a topic (ex: nouns). Think of something that fits that category. Students can ask up to 20 questions to guess the thing you are thinking of.

Mystery Sound

Have your students close their eyes. Make a sound (like shuffling cards). Students try to guess what made that sound.

Freeze Dance

Students dance while the music is playing. When you stop the music, students freeze. Once the music starts back up, they continue to dance.

Scattergories

Choose a letter of the alphabet. Students find an object that begins with that letter.

Memory

Put some objects on display for students to see. Then, take one (or more) objects away. See who can name which objects are missing!

Story Chain

One student (or the teacher) starts a story. Then, each student adds to the story one by one, until the whole story is told.

Last Word

Set a timer. Give a category for students to talk about (let’s say breakfast foods). When the timer is up, the student who gave the last word (breakfast food) wins!

Charades

Students act something out while their classmates try to guess what they are doing. It can be an action, an animal or even a a saying!

The post 12 Brain Break Games for the Classroom and on Zoom appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Not sure how to differentiate for your high-achievers who have already met the standard before you even teach it? Don’t have time to search for new resources or recreate the wheel for each and every lesson for each and every student? Have no fear! There are several things you can do to take what you are already teaching to the majority of your students, and create a way to enrich your high-achieving students.

Stick With the Same Standards

There’s no need to go searching for separate standards for your high-achieving students. Stick with the same standards the rest of your class is working on for each lesson. Just follow one of these steps:

1. Look to the grade above to see what the standard looks like at that grade level. Tweak the small group instruction and assignments you are giving your high-achievers to match the standard for the grade level above.
2. Use the grade level standard as is, and follow one the ideas listed below.

Incorporate Bloom’s Verbs

Incorporating higher-level Bloom’s Taxonomy verbs into your student’s tasks instantly raises the rigor. Many times, students are asked questions that consist of simple recall. We can easily increase the rigor for our high-achievers just by changing the questions that we ask.

No need to reinvent the wheel. Just take basic knowledge level questions and that are being asked such as:

• recall
• draw
• label
• write
• list
• name
• select

and change the questions/tasks to include higher-level bloom’s verbs such as:

• modify
• produce
• analyze
• compose
• invent
• assess
• critique

Before bumping up the tasks using higher-level Bloom’s verbs, you may want to consider spending some time giving some mini-lessons on what each of the Bloom’s verbs mean. Spending some time pre-teaching the verbs, or posting visuals like Bloom’s Taxonomy posters for students to reference will ensure success down the road for your students.

Make It Cross-Curricular

Combining curricular subject areas takes learning to the next level. It allows students to use both the right brain and left brain, all while honing their knowledge of the skills that are being addressed.

For example, if your students are learning about place value, you can have your students create an educational children’s book to teach their classmates about tens and ones. They can generate a page for each of the decades, including a clever title page and a story to match the illustrations about the tens and ones on each page. Once they are done they can read it to a classmate.

Now your students are taking a simple math concept and incorporating reading and writing to solidify their knowledge of the topic. Plus, they are teaching their peers what they know!

Another idea is to have students create games for their classmates. No matter if they are math games or reading games, students are using higher-level thinking skills to create the game, and then combining reading, writing and math to execute the task. The best part is that they can then play it with their classmates when it’s all said and done!

Make It Into a MultiStep Project

Taking a standard and making it into a project is similar to the idea above, but does not necessarily have to be cross-curricular. Students can take a reading skill such as rhyming words (standard RF.K.2.A or RF.1.2) and work on a multi-day project around this topic. If you can find a way to incorporate technology, that can be a big hit for a lot of students!

The post Differentiation for High-Achievers appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Looking for some fun ideas to incorporate into your independent math centers? Hundred chart center games may be just what you’re looking for!

There’s no need for copying thick packets or having students complete boring worksheets. Give them something hands-on or make their learning into a game. Engagement and learning will skyrocket.

Each of the hundred chart center games below discuss what the students would be doing and the logistics of how they will do it. Before getting into the how, here are some tips to consider:

1- Laminate the paper hundred charts so that they can be reused over and over. It not only saves paper and time rushing to the copier, students love writing on (and erasing) laminated paper.

2- To make the laminated hundred charts thicker, glue the chart to a piece of construction paper before you laminate. It will make it more colorful and sturdy.

3- If using highlighters captures your students’ attention instead, by all means, use them on regular pieces of paper!

4- Pocket chart hundred charts can be so engaging for students. Especially if they’re usually only used by the teacher or during calendar/focus wall time. Incorporating them into your Math centers is a sure hit.

Find the Patterns

What: Students find (and mark) the patterns throughout the hundred chart.

How: Using a pointer on a pocket chart hundred chart, highlighting a paper hundred chart or using markers on a laminated hundred chart. Students can even use different colors for different patterns.

Skip, Skip, Skip Count the Chart

What: Students practice skip counting using a hundred chart.

How: Using the pocket chart hundred chart, highlighting a paper hundred chart or using markers on a laminated hundred chart. Students can use different colors for different ways they skip count (by 5’s, by 10’s, by 2’s…etc.).

Fill It In

What: Students fill in the missing numbers on a hundred chart.

How: Using markers on a laminated hundred chart that has some numbers missing. (You can find premade hundred charts with numbers already missing, or you can whiteout some of the numbers from a hundred chart before you copy and laminate them.)

Which Numbers are Missing?

What: Students determine which numbers are missing on the hundred chart.

How: Using the pocket chart hundred chart. In partners or small groups, one student takes out several numbers from the pocket chart while the others close their eyes. When they open their eyes, they use their concept of number or knowledge of the hundred chart to determine which numbers are missing.

Puzzle Me This

What: Students put chunks of/pieces of a hundred chart back together.

How: Using precut and laminated chunks of a hundred chart. (Making each set of puzzle pieces a different color is helpful in case the puzzle pieces get mixed up and/or placed in the wrong baggie.)

Which Number Am I?

What: Students guess which number their partner is thinking of on the hundred chart.

How: Using the pocket chart hundred chart, highlighting a paper hundred chart or using markers on a laminated hundred chart. Students can take numbers out or highlight/cross them off the hundred chart as they narrow down the correct number that their partner is thinking of.

10 More, 10 Less

What: Students find what is 10 more or 10 less of a number on a hundred chart.

How: Using the pocket chart hundred chart, highlighting a paper hundred chart or using markers on a laminated hundred chart.

What’s My Place Value?

What: Students determine the place value of numbers on the hundred chart.

How: Using the pocket chart hundred chart. Students say or write the place value of a given number from the hundred chart. ( 24 = _2_ tens _4_ ones)

Your Turn, My Turn

What: Students use the hundred chart to add or subtract with a partner.

How: Highlighting a paper hundred chart or using markers on a laminated hundred chart. Students take turns finding the answer to addition or subtraction equations using the hundred chart.

No matter which game (or games) you choose, your students will love playing any of these hundred chart center games!

Check out this post to read more about hundred charts, and different ways that you can use them with your students.

The post Math Center Games Using a Hundred Chart appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Hundred charts can be a very powerful tool to help students with the concept of number. Many teachers classically use them during their calendar or ‘focus wall’ time, but there are so many more ways to use them throughout the day to help students take ownership over their learning.

1. Use Pocket Chart Hundred Charts

Over the years, I have rarely walked into a primary classroom that does not have a pocket chart hundred chart. This is the classic way that we see hundred charts being used, especially during calendar or focus wall time. Here are just a few of the many ways you can use them:

Keeping Track of the Number of Days in School

Students can add one number card a day to keep track of how many days they’ve been in school. 

Noticing Patterns in Numbers

Once students have added enough numbers in the hundred chart, you can start some discussions on the patterns they see in the numbers. One student might notice that all of the numbers in each column have the same number ‘at the end’, while another student may notice that the numbers ‘go in order; 1, 2, 3, 4’ when you move diagonally across the hundred chart. These discussions about patterns really solidify the concept of number for students, and will help them later on in their math journey.

Skip Counting

Once the hundred chart is full (or at least half full), students can practice skip counting. Many hundred chart pocket charts come with cards that are different colors for just that. Skip counting by 5’s typically come in blue, 2’s in pink and 3’s in green. Depending on the grade that you teach, you will want to start with the easiest form of skip coutnting (by 10’s) and move up. To skip count by 10’s, use the blue cards, and just leave out the numbers that end in 5. 

Games

There are so many games that can be played using a paper hundred chart. When it is in a pocket chart, one favorite is: “Which Numbers are Missing?”. In this game, students close their eyes while the teacher (or another student) flips some number cards around. When the students open their eyes, they have to use their concept of number and hundred chart knowledge to guess which numbers are ‘missing’. I’m tellin’ ya, engagement is high on this one!

2. Modify Hundred Charts Based on Standards

Knowing your standards will help you base which hundred chart your students will be working with. Following the Common Core State Standards:

Kindergarten- 100 Chart

This is the easy one. Hundred charts come with 100 numbers. Check!

First Grade- 120 Chart

With this ‘hundred’ chart, you’ll either have to make your own by making a table that is 12 rows long rather than 10, and fill in the extra numbers accordingly, or you can find premade 120 charts. 

Second Grade- 200 Chart

Just copy the 100 chart back-to-back with a chart that goes from 101-200. She the link above for a free version!

3. Highlight Paper Hundred Charts

Kids love to use highlighters. Seriously. Change out a yellow one for a pink or blue and you’ll think they’ve won the lottery. Using highlighters on a hundred chart is so versatile. You can do many different ways.

Remember all of the activities mentioned above for pocket chart hundred charts? Well those can be done with a highlighter on a paper hundred chart. Students can highlight while skip counting and by finding patterns that they notice. They can even use different colored highlighters for different patterns or types of skip counting. Give them some sticky notes and they can also play, “Which number is missing?”. 

Want them to use it for adding or subtracting? Easy. Highlight the first number, count up or down the hundred chart, and highlight the answer. Check out this post on Using Highlighters in Math for other ideas.

4. Use Hundred Charts in Privacy Folders

Privacy folders are a great way to minimize distractions for students while they are taking an assessment. For students who need scaffolds, have accomodations on the IEP’s or even to just support any of your developing learners, glue a hundred chart on the inside of their privacy folder. How you’ve taught them to use it during your Math instruction will guide how they use it to show their knowledge during an assessment. 

5. Use Hundred Charts During Independent Math Centers

Finding ways for students to be independent during Math center time, while not innondating them with worksheets or packets can prove to be a challenge. Hundred chart games during centers can be a life saver! This post on Math Center Games Using Hundred Charts has some fun, hands-on ideas!

*Don’t Forget to Teach Other Strategies*

As with anything you do in teaching, make sure students are learning other strategies to be successful. While hundred charts are great learning tools and scaffolds, we don’t want students to become too dependent on them. Plus, in the upper grades, they cannot be used during high stakes tests like the SBAC or the PARCC.  

The post 5 Ways to Use Hundred Charts in Math appeared first on Enriching Young Minds & Hearts.

Kids want to have fun. All day, all night. Inside or outside. Clean or dirty. Loud or quiet. Life simply needs to be fun. That’s where games come in! Here is a peek at some of the many engaging fluency games that students can play at school (and home) to help become fluent in each subject area.

Reading Fluency Games

Flashlight, Flashlight

This fun little chant is great for younger students, and will keep them excited and engaged. It works best whole class since the lights will be off.

Materials Needed: A flashlight

Directions: Turn the lights off, and turn the flashlight on. When your students are finished singing the chant below, shine your flashlight on a word that is posted somewhere in your room, and have your students read it.

Chant: Flashlight, flashlight oh so bright.

Shine on a word with your light!

Modifications: Give control of the flashlight to your students. Students LOVE to ‘be in charge’. Allow them to shine the flashlight on different words. You can even have them choose who goes next.

Guess The Word

This game is fun for any age and really hones in on comprehension. It can be done whole class or in small group.

Materials Needed: Sticky notes, a story (preferrably a big book if done whole class)

Directions: Choose a book that you will be reading with your students. Cover a word or two on each page with a sticky note. Have your students guess what the word is when you come to each sticky note.

Modifications: Start with easy, predictable words to build success and confidence. Vary the number of words you cover up depending on the age and reading ability of students you are working with.

Side Note: In case you are up-to-date on the science of reading, this activity is not meant to be used as a reading strategy. It is just a fun way to practice comprehension as a game.

Speed

This game is great for fluency, and your students who are competitive will love it! Don’t worry, there are ways to make it non-competitive, which are outlined below.

Materials Needed: A set of word cards (Words written on index cards works great for small group. Words shone onto the wall with the projector works best for whole group.)

Directions for the head-to-head version (competitve version): Split students into two groups, and have them form two lines. The students at the head of each line go head-to-head to be the first one to read the word correctly. The student who reads it correctly earns a point for their team, and then goes to the end of their line. The next students at the front of the line take their turn. Play continues to until all words are done.

Directions for the team version (competitive, but less daunting): Split students into groups, and have them sit together. Show the word to be read and the first team to get it correct gets a point. Your choice on how they signal they know the word (shout it out, raise their hand, ring a buzzer or bell…etc.). The team who answers it correctly first gets a point.

Directions for the team version (non-competitive version): Split students into groups, and have them sit together. Alternate between groups to have each group read the word as fast as they can.

Modifications: This can be done during small group instruction. Modify the words based on the groups of students you are working with, to give them words that are at their developmental level. Students can all go independently, in pairs or altogether.

Hide and Seek

Another great game for fluency, and just like the game of Speed, there are ways to make it non-competitive.

Materials Needed: A large group of words (click on the image below for an example)

Directions for the head-to-head version (competitve version): Split students into two groups, and have them form two lines. The students at the head of each line go head-to-head to be the first one to seek the given word hidden in the group of words. The student who finds it first earns a point for their team, and then goes to the end of their line. The next students at the front of the line take their turn. Play continues to until all words are done.

Directions for the non-competitive version: Have students come up one by one or in pairs to find the hidden word. The whole group cheers for them when they find the word.

Modifications: If the word they are seeking is in the group more than once, you can have them find it two, three, four…etc. times.

Spelling Fluency Games

Guess My Word

A more appropriate version of the game Hangman, this game allows students to practice spelling words in a more engaging way than the typical (and sometimes boring) repeated practice.

Materials Needed: A whiteboard (or chart paper) and a marker

Directions: Choose someone to go first. If you are working with younger students, I would suggest having you go first for the first few times so that the students can get the hang of the game. Once the students start taking their own turns, you can give them a cool name like the trickster or something similar to create buy-in.

The ‘trickster’ thinks of a word and writes a dash for each letter in that word. For littles, I would suggest a word that is written on the word wall or somewhere around the room so that the students playing have a visual to look at when guessing letters and words. The ‘trickster’ then calls on students one by one to guess a letter. If the letter called is not in the word, the ‘trickster’ writes it off to the side so that the letter is not called again. If the letter is in the word, the trickster writes it on the corresponding line. The student called on then gets a set amount of time to guess the word. If they are correct, they get to be the next ‘trickster’.

Side Note: Unlike Hangman, there are no penalties for wrong letters, and the students get as many chances to guess the word.

Find A Partner

This matching game gets students up and moving around. Great for brain or movement breaks.

Materials Needed: Picture Cards, Word Cards that Match the Picture Cards

Directions: Mix up your picture and word cards. Hand them out to your students. On go, have the students find their partner; the person who has the match of the picture with the correct spelling of that word.

Modifications: This game can be played with just word cards. Students can match words that are similar, but spelled differently (there, their; two, too),  match a word with how it is broken into syllables…etc.

Math Fluency Games

War

In a sea of math card fluency games, I had a hard time choosing which one to write about. Seriously. There are a million and one different card games for students to play for math fluency. Now that I think about it, I should devote a whole blog post to it. For now, here is one of my favorites.

Materials Needed: Decks of Cards

Directions: Students grab a partner, shuffle the deck and divide the cards evenly between the two of them. They each flip over their top card to see which person has the greater value. That person wins both cards. Play repeats until all of the cards in each of their decks are gone.

Modifications: My favorite part about this game is that there are SO.MANY.DIFFERENT.WAYS to modify this game based on student’s developmental levels. They can play:

• Double War: Students flip over their top two cards. They add them together and the person with the highest value wins all four cards.
• Triple War: Students flip over their top three cards. They add them together and the person with the highest value wins all four cards.
• Multiplication War: Students flip over their top two cards. They multiply them together and the person with the highest value wins all four cards.

Around the World

This fun fluency game is great for those who are competitive. For those who aren’t, I am again showing a way to make it non-competitive, but still fun.

Materials Needed: Math Fact Flashcards

Directions for head-to-head (competitive version): Students sit at their desks or sit/stand in a circle. After deciding who goes first, two students go head-to-head to answer the math fact flashcard. The winner goes to the next student, and the other student sits down in the spot they battled. Play continues until one student has gone ‘around the world’ beating all students in the class. 

Directions for the non-competitive version: Give the class a target (a total amount of points to reach; let’s say 30). Go around the class, showing each student a flashcard. With every correct answer, the class receives a point. Once they reach the desired total, they all win. This way there is no head-to-head, no stress with having to be super quick, and the students can feel more confident with coming up with the correct answer without feeling rushed. 

Modifications: Students can play in partners. Each set would go head-to-head with another set of partners. You can be intentional to match shy or reluctant students up with outgoing or enthusiastic students to help relieve stress or anxiety. 

Review Games

Bingo

This is a classic. I am sure I could just leave this title and move on. BUT, there are so many different ways to use it for review. It can be teacher-led or student-led (my favorite part), so I will focus on that.

Materials Needed: Paper with square grids (3×3, 4×4, 5×5), markers to cover the spaces (counters, cubes, coins, cereal…etc.)

Directions for the Teacher-Led Version: I would search the Internet for bingo boards that are already filled in pertaining to the skill that your students are reviewing (making your own takes a LOT of time). Pass out the boards and markers, start calling the clues, and when a student has BINGO (3, 4, or 5 in a row), they shout, BINGO!

Directions for the Student-Led Version: Students grab a blank board (using a laminated one works great as they can be used over and over again with whiteboard markers and erasers). Have the students fill in the skill you are working on, in whatever order they want. For example: If you are working on sight words, the students would write the words randomly on their board. If you are working on multiplication, students would write multiplication facts (3×6, 4×8…etc.) randomly on their board. Once all students are done, you can start the game. If you want it to be fully student-led, students can pass out all of the materials and one of your students can also be the caller! 

Modifications: Students can work in partners to help struggling students. For enrichment, you can use harder sets of words or equations. 

I Have, Who Has

This game keeps students engaged and on their toes when reviewing a concept because they will never know when it will be their turn!

Materials Needed: I would look up sets of I Have, Who Has games that are premade based on the skill you are reviewing (or click on the picture below to see an example to create your own).

Directions: The student with the starter card says: “I have _____, who has _____?” The student who has what the first student said stands up and says what they have and calls the next. It continues until all students have had a turn. For example (multiplication review): “I have 8, who has 6×4?” “I have 24, who has 3×5?” “I have 15, who has 8×8?” For example (sight word review): “I have the, who has said?” “I have said, who has there?” “I have there, who has and?”

Modifications: Students can work in partners to help struggling students. 

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