Kindergarten Help
ambrvan
member
Ok, so when I was a kid, we learned how letters and letter combination sound so that we could take any word and sound it out. But now my 5yo step daughter is in kindergarten and they are memorizing words to recall by sight. This seems inefficient to me, but not matter. The best way to help my SD is to be in sync with the teacher, I guess.
Anyway, her first report card was wonderful. But we just received her second, and she failed all of her sight words. I don't understand. We work on them every night, and she does very well at home. She reads her book assignments well if not perfect. Her graded papers that are sent home are always 3 stars (highest she can get).
I don't know what else to do to work on these sight words. After receiving her report card, I made flashcards. We used them for the first time last night, and she recalled almost all of the words without problem. Only a few words "like" and "we" and "have" caused real problems. But by the end of the session, she was good with everything except "like." For some reason that word is like a wall.
Any advice on what else we could do to help with these words?
Re: Kindergarten Help
She will learn to sound things out - probably more after Christmas. I think that some of the high frequency words aren't that sound-out-able, if you know what I mean, so it's easier to memorize them.
I would wonder why it is that she's doing so well at home, but then failing the "test" that the teacher gives. I know that in K, they were given a sheet of paper and had to read them out and then the teacher marked which ones they didn't do.
Maybe it's performance anxiety? Or maybe she's overwhelmed by all the words on the page when she's used to individual flashcards?
I wouldn't stress out too much. She'll get it...
As Gin and Tonic said above, many of those "high frequency" sight words are hard to sound out. My sense is that the reading program in kindergarten teaches both phonics and memorization of "word wall" words that help kids gain fluency in reading.
What helped my kids was to learn to see/recognize sight words in actual books, rather than on flashcards.
For instance, wouldn't it be easier to recognize and know the four letters "l i k e" are the word "like" when you hear this sentence: "Ice cream is yummy. I ____ to eat ice cream."
That way, instead of just memorizing the shape of the word "like" they could use their sense of the sentence + phonetic awareness (starts with an L sound) + memorization to really read the word. Pick up some easy reader books that feature the words she's learning. You read them out loud to her, pointing to each word as you go. When you reach a word that's one of her sight words, let her say it. When you reach a word that she can sound out on her own, stop and help her sound it out. Model for her how you figure out a word by sounding it out, by using the sense of the sentence, and by using picture clues.
Like PPs have said, don't consider this a "failure" on her part. The teacher (I hope!) is not saying she "failed" her sight words. She's letting you know she hasn't memorized them YET. She will!
Sight words are meant to be learned by memory, not by sounding out. Flash cards are good but there are a few other ways you can try.......write on a chalkboard or whiteboard for her to read (or on a tablet if you have one), have her spell them when she reads them (the spelling helps it click with my daughter what words they are), use easy reader books with the sight words in it, or use a computer program (try starfall.com)
I'm a teacher, and I don't really like the whole flashcard thing, either. Our school is heavily into Accelerated Reader (which I don't feel is necessary if you have children who read, read a lot, etc), so I rather have my students get Margaret Hillert books, which I hate btw, but are great for sight words. I find that reading books with many of the HFW's in context is a more effective way to do it.
A lot of these titles may be at you local library. There are a lot of pages/text in these books, so I wouldn't tackle more than a couple of pages at a time with a "beginning reader."
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/margaret-hillert-easy-readers
I also like the BOB Books-they have the Short Vowel set, High Frequency words, etc.
Charlotte Ella 07.16.10
Emmeline Grace 03.27.13