Word Families
How to Use the Printouts
Here's how I use the printouts: I like to introduce two or three word families at a time.
The families I introduce have something in common (ex: all short vowel
families, all long vowel families, all families that end with an \e\, etc).
The order I do my lessons is as follows (all of the
sheets mentioned in dark green can be found for each word family in the Free
Printable Worksheets Sections -- links to these sections can be found
here):
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- print out the List of Word Family words sheets
and hang them in our study area (we just use a cork board strip). Read
through the words together -- fairly quickly -- we spend more time on the
flashcards than the big list.
- print out the Flash cards for the word
families. Read
through them together (we run our fingers under each word as we sound them
out). Then hang them up on the 'word
wall' (I have a little pocketed holder for them, but you can just tack them
on the bulletin board). I let the kids cut pictures out of magazines
or draw pictures to put with the flash cards on the word wall -- I like
letting them make their own picture clues when they want to
- We make a Word Family Book -- again,
allowing them to draw or clip out images to help them identify the
words
- I also print out two more sets of the Flash cards for the word
families to play
games with (sentence
sequencing activities, concentration,
go
fish or snap)
- We read stories or nursery rhymes that reinforce the word
family we're working on -- sometimes we write our own poems too.
Sometimes we sing songs, do crafts or coloring pages.
- The vast majority of our 'study' time is spent playing the
'flash card games' I mentioned and
reading.
- For review, I let the kids do the activity worksheets
independently (I don't help them with it at this point - I usually introduce
one per day toward the end of the week). Depending on how well they do, I know whether
we're ready to
move on to the next word family or if we should keep playing word family games. I introduce one
of the worksheets... Assess... Second worksheet... Assess... Third
worksheet. Hopefully by then we're set. To move on. The order I
use is:
- Fill in the blank and draw the sentence
- Draw a line from the picture and the word
- Fill in the blanks to make the right word
- Once we're 'done' with a word family, I include the Word
Family Endings flash cards for that word family in my 'review box'.
Once a week or so, we play the Word Families Card Game
or spelling
go fish with the cards from the review box.
And that's pretty much it... I introduce a new set of word
families each week and just repeat the process. I change the games around
a little bit, sometimes we color a bit more, sometimes we make a craft or two
that supports the word family we're working on, sometimes we read a bit more --
we've even been known to 'bake a cake'
*grin*. But the above gives the basic outline of how I introduce word
families.
Other suggestions:
Print out the lower case letter flash cards and the phonics
(word families) flash cards. You can print all of the endings or just work on one sheet at a
time.
Cut out the squares. If you want them to last longer as
a flash card type activity, print them on cardstock or glue them onto cardstock
after printing. You can also laminate or cover with clear contact paper.
Here are some activities you might do with worksheets:
- Word Family Endings Flash Cards
- Set 1: an, ap, at
- Set 2: ab, ad, am
- Set 3: ack, and, ash
- Set 4: ail, ain, air
- Set 5: ake, ate
- Set 6: ale, ame, ay
- Set 7: all, aw
- Set 8: ar, ark, art
- Set 9: ank, ink
- Set 10: ed, en, et
- Set 11: eck, ell, est
- Set 12: in,
ip, it
- Lower Case Letters Flash Cards
