Sight words??????

Question

My son and daughter are both in kindergarten.Thay both are having trouble learning there sight words.If you know what these are and if you have any ideas please let me know.I already have flash cards.And thay write each one three times every day.Thanks for all the help.

Answer 1

label up everything in your home

stick the flash cards to the house

door on the door

table on the table

fridge on the fridge

etc...

make games

after a week or so of getting used to them say stand in the garden and give them the door word and see if they can run and find its pair.

- it teaches them how relevant writing is to their world.

'Your' the parent its your job to teach your child to want to learn, its the teachers job to teach.

They are children, they are individuals, its only kindy and they progress at different speeds

There are no conclusive studies showing the benifits of whipping these children into advanced learning. In fact so far it only seems to have detrimental effects.

Answer 2

Anytime you can find a way to turn this into a game, you'll succeed.

I used to play "concentration" with my kids. I had 2 cards for each word then turned them face down, arranging them in a rectangular fashion. The children would pick a card, turn it over to reveal the word on it, and then turn over another card looking for a perfect match. If the word matched, they would have to successfully read the word to be able to keep the pair of cards. If they matched but could not read the words, the words got returned to the pile and the next child got a shot at "collecting the pair."

Another game was to have the kids line up in front of the trash can. I wrote the sight words on slips of paper. (I always used the back of old papers so as to not waste!) I would hand a slip of paper to the first child. If they read the card successfully, they could ball it up and "make a basket" into the trash can. I usually kept score and the highest scorer got something small like a Hershey’s kiss.

We also had an Olympic chart. We broke the sight cards down into smaller groups of say 5. Once a child could read all the words in the first group, they got a "brass Medal". All that meant is that I wrote their name under the word Brass Medal. They got something small like a pack of Smarties because they were such "smarties." They would then work their way through the Olympics earning first Brass, then Copper, then Bronze, then silver, then Gold. Once they got to the Gold we went out for pizza and ice-cream.

Finally, once they learned all their words, we played Poisoned Island. My kids LOVED this one. I took all the words and laid them face up scattered throughout the room (not touching. you must leave room between each card for the children to walk around them.) One child would play first. I would call out one of their words and they would have to walk around the cards and pick up the card that contained the word I read. The thing was they couldn't touch any other card with any part of their body, or they'd fall off Poison Island into the hazardous waters. (They were so animated. They played it like they were playing Twister. It really made them want to learn the sight words.) If at any point they fell off the island, they would have to forfeit all their cards. I would return them, face up, to the floor and the next child would play. They cheered each other on and wanted to play this all the time.

I guess what I'm saying is be creative and be fun. Give lots of positive feedback and rewards. Best of Luck.

Answer 3

Has their teachers offered any advice for you? If they are struggling, they should be able to offer some tips. If the teachers recognize that they are having a lot of difficulty, they could refer them for extra reading help.

To help at home I would label everything in the house, like most kindergarten classroom have done. The children will able to see the words and sound them out, wherever they happen to be.

I would also give them a little recipe box that has about 10 index cards with sight words on them. Let the children pull them out and practice the words. Let them read it, use it in a sentence, play games with them, etc. Once they master the word then they can go to the back and you can add a new word. The goal is to see how many they can move to the back and only keep 10 up front. 10 words is less overwhelming then 150.

Get creative with the games you use to reinforce sight words. I would write the letters of the words on individual squares. Let them take turns choosing letters and try to make the words.

You can also give them the individual letters and let them put them together on their own. Let them time themselves and see how many they can do in 3 minutes or whatever time.

good luck. Sd

Answer 4

I usually give my son a sentence to go with the sight word.  It seems to help him remember.  I also give him 3 words each week to work on, once he has those down we go over 3 more.  We always revisit the ones he already knows to keep them in his mind.

Hope this helps

Answer 5

There are some resources on this website below with 'fun' things like wordsearches to teach sight words...

Answer 6

My son is also in kindergarten learning site words.  try googling site words, i did and got several different ideas.  But i found a website that my son loves he has learned so much from it.  Good luck, just remember they are little it is hard and will come eventually

http://www.starfall.com/

Answer 7

I don't know about your school, but in my little sister's kindergarten class they have to know all the letters of the alphabet in lowercase and capital form, and were tested on it, and any student who did not learn it was excluded from the "52 Letter Club" party in which they went to a movie (at like 6 o'clock.) they also are being tested on sight words, of which I'm assuming another "club" will be formed. If you ask me, this is unfair for the other kids who do not learn the letters or sight words. My little sister has more homework than me in middle school! She had flash cards that she went over daily. We also tried to play games with her to make it more fun such as identifying the sight words with something she knew of.