Literacy Block Routine

Happy Monday!  It’s officially my birthday week!!!  And it’s Monday.  There is a story from my Monday that I just had to make into a video…make sure to check it out at the end of the post!

Today I want to share part of my literacy block routine.  I have used this routine for 3 years without much tweaking and I credit this routine for a big part of the success in teaching my students to read.  This is one of the questions I get most often:   what do you do to help your kids read so well?  So, here’s part of the answer!

Our day starts at 7:45 with arrival.  Arrival lasts until 8:00.  Announcements last unti 8:05.  Morning Meeting lasts from 8:05 until 8:20 (give or take!).   After morning meeting we sing 4 songs.  Little Hands is a great movement song that gets us ready for the day.  Alien Alphabet teaches us our letters in order.  Alphardy teaches letters and sounds with a motion for each sound (this is important later!).  and The Alphabet Zoo is just a super fun animal alphabet song that we love to sing!  As soon as we finish our songs,  we begin our literacy block.  Our literacy block lasts from 8:20-10:10 and then 11:10-12:10 is literacy with a writing focus.  Today I want to share our literacy kick off routine!

As soon as the morning meeting ends, we do our letters and sounds.  I ask the ‘staches what’s next and they say “letters and sounds.”  I ask why we do letters and sounds every day and they say so we can be better readers and writers.  I want them to understand that we have to know our letters and sounds to be better readers and writers.  I also use a football/cheerleader analogy with them.  It’s all about practice.  Do football players get to be good by sitting on the bench?  No.  They practice every day.  Do cheerleaders get to be great at cheering by standing around?  No.  They practice every day.  Can we be good readers and writers if we don’t work hard every day?  No.

Our letter and sound routine goes like this:

I point to a picture.  They say the letter, the picture and the sound.  Remember the Alphardy song (Dr. Jean, btw!)?  That is where our letter and sound chart comes from.  For example:  A apple /a/.  B bounce /b/.  And so on.  Early in the year, we do them in order.  After we get good at the routine, I switch it up and we do them in random order.  I also switch between whole group and individual turns.  This is key to our strong foundations in reading.  They are exposed to every letter and every sound every day!

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And now my story of the day……………remember, this is the start of my birthday week………..yeah, all about me week………….