literacy activities

French/English Manuscript Alphabet Train

Use these classroom resources as simultaneous wall decorations! Teach kids the letters of the alphabet with clever illustrations.

The Alphabet Train pieces are designed to be placed horizontally side-by-side across the top of your wall. Each card shows two letters of the alphabet, in both upper and lowercase. Above each letter, we’ve made an illustration of the word that begins with that letter. All illustrations are applicable in both English AND French, which does double-duty for your classroom!

Every day, you can focus on one letter at a time with your students and help them identify the illustration. You can also talk about other words that begin with the letter of the day. Perhaps you could start with names; ask who in the class has a name that starts with the letter of the day. That’s a great technique for getting the conversation started!

Once you have identified the illustration, write the accompanying word onto your wallboard or brainstorming sheet.

Start with placing the locomotive engine at the front of the train. Place the next piece (the beginning of the alphabet) up against the first. When you are ready to progress to the next set of letters, add one more train car to the row. Continue in this way until you have completely filled up the board with the Alphabet Train!

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Posted on August 17, 2015February 12, 2020 by Raman

Word Mobile

Inspire learning through literacy! Just in time for this month’s Literacy Day, we’re celebrating the power of words with our Word Mobile!

Age: 5+

Duration: 20-30 minutes assembly, 1-2 hours drying time (or overnight)

Learning Objectives: Learn letter recognition through coloring in die-cut letters. Explore word and letter games. Infuse art into literacy through painting and letter design. Create neat typographic patterns, colors and effects with letters.

You’ll Need:

• R51302 Nature Mobile Maker

• R49702 Stand Up Letters

• Markers

• Scissors

• Paint

• String

• Hole punch

• Paint brush

• Paint tray

To start, pop out the Nature Mobile Maker from its card backing and place inside of a paint tray. Choose a bit of brown tempera paint to color in the branches of the nature-themed mobile. Make broad, even strokes throughout the length of the winding branch. Go back a second time with some added paint to darken the inside edge of the branch. Use a bit of white or light brown for highlights.

To pain the leaves, use green paint. Dab a generous amount across each leaf to cover it completely. Use the flat end of the brush to swipe once across the middle of the leaf. Add vein details! From the middle line, flick the brush outwards diagonally to the opposite edge. This gives the leaves a very real, textured appearance.

Leave the mobile to dry for 1 hour.

While you are waiting for the mobile to dry, pop out the Stand Up Letters from their card backings. Use markers to decorate both sides of each Stand Up Letter. Choose an assortment of vowels and consonants, as you can use the mobile for a literacy game that I’ll elaborate on at the end of this post!

I’ve patterned the letter L with some pretty polka-dots. Make sure your patterns are bright and colorful so that they appear to catch your eye!

Don’t forget to color the opposite side too!

Prep your letters for the mobile. Cut each of the letters from their card stands.

By this time, our Nature Mobile Maker is finished drying. Let’s assemble the mobile!

Punch a hole through the top of each letter. You can position the hole anywhere you like to give the letters a bit of variation as they dangle.

Cut varying lengths of string and attach to each letter.

To make use of the no-tie mobile feature, push down on the tabs cut into the center of each branch. Slide the top of the string through to the back, then press the tab back up to secure.

You want it to look something like this!

Hang your mobile up from the ceiling above your students’ desks. As the letters twirl around, they will be easily visible from anywhere in the classroom! Depending on what kinds of letters are combined together you can ask students to do the following literacy exercises:

• Keep things simple for younger students. Ask them to identify which letters are vowels and which are consonants.

• Practice repetitive writing or exploring cursive writing by selecting one or two of the letters and writing them on a sheet of paper.

• Organize the letters to represent the first letter of each student in a group of desks.

• Older students can try to form different combinations of words from the letters attached to the mobile. For instance, the letters in the image above can be used to spell the word “SPACE”!

• Use the letters as starting points for writing acronyms or poems!

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Posted on March 11, 2015February 12, 2020 by Raman

Spotlight on… Poet Tree

Say something nice for Poetry Day this March!

The R49132 Four Seasons Poet Tree comes with a full set: 32 beautiful leaf shapes in an assorted range of colors and a full sized classroom poetry tree on which to pin the leaves.

Mount the tree up on a wallboard in your classroom in a space that can be prominently seen. Tell students that the tree represents their knowledge of literacy. Anything that uses words in a descriptive way can be written onto the leaves and tacked up on the tree for everyone to see! This will fill up the tree to make it look bright, colorful and beautiful.

For early years, focus on writing simple descriptive words and attaching those to the tree. For example, you could ask students to think of a word to describe how their day is going or what the weather is like outside. Use crayons or markers to add some color to your writing!

You can also use the tree as a base for introducing students to each other at the beginning of the school year. Give each student a leaf and tell them to write their name and birth date on it. Tack up the written leaves onto the tree and arrange them by succession according to students’ birthdays. This helps to keep track of everyone’s birthday, a bit like a birthday chart!

Older students can write a more sophisticated piece that relates to their current studies in literacy. If you were teaching your students how to write topic sentences for paragraphs, use the leaves as mediums for writing example topic sentences. Students can add to the topic sentence to make a complete paragraph!

Additionally, explore lessons in poetry with the use of descriptive words. You can introduce the students to this activity by asking them to write a random word that comes to their heads on the leaves provided. Place the words around the tree. Give each student scrap paper to write on. Ask them to observe the words on the tree and use the words as inspiration for descriptive writing. Perhaps students can write a short story or a poem about the words they see. There are so many different literacy exercises you can adapt to your classroom with the Poet Tree!

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Posted on March 2, 2015February 12, 2020 by Raman