1-2-3 Come Be A Word Wizard With Me

As you go through the year, you add lots of words to your word wall.  We sometimes take for granted that because we've covered a set of words for a while, that they will have stuck in our students' brains. 

This is not necessarily true for some children; that's why it's so important to review these words on a daily basis. 

To make this more fun, a few minutes before lunch, or just before we got ready to go home, I'd turn off the lights and choose a Popsicle stick with a child's name on it. 

They got to turn on my neon laser sword and read a group of words. Then they'd point to the words and everyone would say them together.

When they were done, they'd choose another student to do the same, 'til time ran out.

My students LOVED doing this.  I'd also play "flash a word" with a flashlight.  The room was dark and I'd suddenly flash the light on a word.  The first one who identified it, got the flashlight.

Being able to recognize words is a Common Core State Standard: (RF.K.3c)

I'd often use our word wall for Daily 5 Word Work activities.

When all of the office supply stores are having huge loss leaders in August, I'd buy a class supply of notebooks. Most of the time these were only 10 or 15 cents each.

My Y5's felt very "grown up" getting a notebook and enjoyed practicing all sorts of writing activities and recording them in their notebooks.

I had my students become word wizards, which helped them enjoy vocabulary-building activities even more.

In the Word Wizard packet, I've included a cover for your students to glue to their notebook.

They can give their covers more pizzazz, if they draw or glue a picture of themselves as the word wizard.

Have children think of 4-5 adjectives that describe themselves. They write those words around their wizard.

Every day assign a numbered activity for them to do, with words from your word wall, or give them a choice of what activity to choose.

I've included a list of 51 activities that can easily be repeated with different words on another day.

This packet is a quick and easy way to cover "word work" for your Daily 5 activities.

There's also a certificate of praise to hand out at the end of the year when students have completed their notebooks.

Click on the link to view/download the Word Wizard packet.

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"The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything." -Unknown