Language Arts: Short and Long Vowels

Children learn to read and spell using phonics. Those phonics skills include: letter-sound correspondences, letter-sound relationships and sound-symbol associations. 

My steps to teaching students how to read and spell include:

1. Can my student recognize each letter by sight?

2. Can my student sound out each letter?

3. Can my student recognize the letter I am sounding out?

4. Does my student understand that words make up a variety of spelling patterns (CV, CVC, etc.)

5. Can my student recognize and pronounce blends (th, sh, wh, bl, etc.)

Students must also understand that when reading a word, they must first identify the most common sounds of each letter, then blend the sounds together. 

It's important to remember that in the English language not every word is said the way it is spelled. I call those words, "Sight Words." Sight words need to be identified automatically and there are about 100 of them for Pre-K/Kindergarten. I use the Fry word list over the Dolch word list because the Dolch word list has not been updated in decades.  

Once students are able to identify words automatically and have an effective strategy for decoding unknown words, they will be able to read successfully, independently and construct meaning from the text. 

Now back to the short and long vowel sounds...

Vowels are the building block of words. There are 5 vowels (a, e, i, o, u) in the English language, but each vowel makes two different sounds; long and short sounds. For short vowel sounds you sound out the letter and for long vowel sounds you say the letter. Understanding this concept allows students to become successful readers. 

To teach this skill I made an anchor chart, watched two different videos and then we practiced using worksheets. The videos include ONE and TWO. 

Science: Let it Snow

Oh the weather outside is frightful, 

But the fire is so delightful, 

And since we've no place to go, 

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

My students are fascinated with snow. Actually fascination isn't even a strong enough word. Every time we read a book, watch a video or have a discussion about snow, my students eyes light up. They are so intrigued and just want to learn more and more about snow. I wish so badly I could give them my experiences with snow. Since I've lived in Indiana and spent my childhood winter months playing in snow, it's hard to understand what it's like not to build snowmen or make snow balls. 

I saw this science experiment at Hobby Lobby, a teacher and craft heaven, and knew I had to purchase this for my students. They really enjoyed completing this activity! After we completed this activity my students went to the other classrooms to show other students how to grow snow! :)

Science: Investigation

Today Ivy students became scientists that investigated why The Statue of Liberty is green if it is made of copper! 

We discussed that The Statue of Liberty was built of copper and that copper is normally brown, but overtime when mixed with air and water copper turns green. I found several pennies that were made before 1981, when pennies were still made of copper, and were slightly green similar to that of The Statue of Liberty. We then mixed vinegar and salt and added the pennies to the mixture. Students were shocked when they noticed that their pennies were turning back to the original copper color! One student asked, "Why can't they do this to The Statue of Liberty?" Good question!! :)

Overall, students learned that copper can turn green overtime when it's mixed with water and air. They also learned that copper that has been turned green can become brown again when mixed with vinegar and salt.