Words From Earth/Words From Mars: Real vs. Nonsense Words

4 posts in 4 days... can you tell I am on fall break?  Well, I guess I am not taking much of a break, but I love when time off lends itself to some creative time in between paper grading!

So... nonsense words.  I used to have a HUGE problem with this.  I mean, we're always telling kids, "Does that make sense?  Does that sound right?" and then here I am, giving them nonsense words?!  I figured out something, though.  Well, I think I did anyway.  When kids are learning to read, don't a lot of their words sound like nonsense words to them as they are trying to decode?  Does it really hurt to show them how to decode any word, real or not, and then decide if it is real?  I have decided that it's not so bad, especially when I get to do a fun activity like this with the class!

Words from Earth/Words from Mars takes common word families like -an, -ad, -am, and -at and gives kids a list of real and nonsense words from these families.  They have to decode the word using the phonics rules (in this case using the short a sound), and then decide if the word is real (from Earth) or nonsense (from Mars).

Click here to grab this from my TpT page!

This came from one of my many many word works activity books I have stashed in the closet.

 
 I LOVE this book!  Sometimes I just don't feel like doing a worksheet, though, and if I don't, I can guarantee my kids don't!  As I said in the last post, I was looking for some brain breaks to work on reading skills and decided to turn this activity into something I could use on the projector.  A word flashes on the screen and the kids have to decode the word.  Then they make an Earthling face or a Martian face (see how quiet this one is... yeah!) to vote whether it is a real word or a nonsense word.  I made it self-checking by making the following slide have the same word with either a picture of a boy or girl astronaut or an alien.  This way it could be printed out and put in a binder for work in small groups or centers.  I was also thinking about printing smaller cards and laminating them to make flashcards and a Memory game! 

So far we have just done this either with the worksheet or I have handwritten the words on sentence strips and done them as a whole class pocket chart activity, so I am super excited to try this as a brain break when I get back to school on Tuesday!  The real test will be whether or not the kids find these as fun as Mr. Harry's songs.  I can only hope to be a close 2nd!










http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Practicing-Real-vs-Nonsense-Words-Short-a-Words-From-EarthWords-From-Marshttp://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Practicing-Real-vs-Nonsense-Words-Short-a-Words-From-EarthWords-From-Marshttp://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Practicing-Real-vs-Nonsense-Words-Short-a-Words-From-EarthWords-From-Mars

Pirates and Parrots

It's the end of the first grading period and sight word assessments are in.  While I'm happy with the progress of the class, there is always room for improvement!  This class LOVES brain breaks in between activities, and it really cuts down on transition time.  Students are excited to get cleaned up and get to the brain break, and the brain break not only gets the wiggles out, but also provides extra practice on skills.

So far this year, our brain breaks have been mostly math songs from Harry Kindergarten- if you haven't checked out his work on You Tube, you really should.  But, I digress!  Back to Pirates and Parrots.  I needed some brain breaks that focus on reading skills.  This is something I learned from the I Teach First Conference with speaker Laureen Reynolds.  She told us about a game called Cowboys and Chickens, where students read sight words until they come to a cowboy or chicken on the screen.  When they see a cowboy, students yell, "Yeehaw!" and when they see a chicken, they yell, "Bawk-bawk!"

This is an adaptation of that game.  Basically, you can pick anything your students are interested in, or can match it up to whatever you are studying, like owls, bats, etc.  I chose pirates because, well,  I love pirates and who doesn't love making the good old, "Arrrr!" noise.  It's also a great tie in later to the /ar/ sound.  Personally, I'd prefer to use Johnny Depp as Captain Jack, but this is probably more school appropriate.  It's called Pirates and Parrots because I used to have a parrot in there, however, that noise was just too annoying!

So the rules are like this:  see a sight word, read it, see a pirate, yell, "Arrr!"  Easy, right?  The point is to get the kids to read the sight words as quickly and accurately as possible.  The pirates are just a fun way to keep the kids engaged.  I've been making these for my class and have posted one on TpT to share.  I really love this game and recommend it for whole class activities, small group interventions, or print out small slides and give them to individual students to practice on their own.  So fun!