you clever monkey

Plenty of printable activities to add to literacy rotations to help

teach CVCe words - those tricky to spell words with a final silent 'e'.

Many young children will fly along with their spelling until they reach those tricky long vowel sound word - the ones with a final silent 'e' then they can stumble.

Often they will be able to read them before they can spell them correctly.

So how do we help our children learn these harder to spell words?

Slowly and with plenty of visual support is the key. That and lots of practice reading and spelling words that have a final silent 'e'.

This post contains affiliate links.

Teaching CVCe Words - helping young children to read and spell those tricky final silent 'e' words | you clever monkey

Introducing them as part of word families can be a good place to start but once they are confident with their sound knowledge, many children just need to practice reading CVCe words so they can spot the final silent 'e' when trying to decode words.

Designed with beginning readers and spellers in mind, I been creating plenty of different printable resources with these consonant-vowel-consonant-final silent 'e' (CVCe) words provide ideal support for young children in my class beginning to spell.

These are ready to add to my literacy centres to allow children to independently practice what they have learnt in our intentional spelling lessons.

To start with, I use some of our CVCe Word Mats along with some magnetic letters and whiteboard markers to practice spelling the words as well.

These make differentiation easy as some children will just build the word while others will attempt to write it as well.

My class love puzzles so I have also created some 4-part CVCe puzzle cards for them to try and piece back together.

These ones pictured have text as support but I've also got some blank ones ready to move on to as well for my students to write the word independently.

My class love their games so I've also created a BINGO game with final silent 'e' words.

Usually I introduce these to the whole class first before adding them to our literacy centres so they have all been exposed to the game before having to play it just with their peers.

Perfect for improving listening skills, this 'I have... Who has?' CVCe game has also helped some students read CVCe words correctly.

We play it as a whole class when we have 5-10 minutes to fill in.

WANT ALL OF THESE FOR YOUR CLASSROOM?

GRAB OUR CVCe BUNDLE!

This set includes:

35 different CVCe 4-part puzzle cards with full colour photos
CVCe word mats featuring 35 words with text to match to magnetic letters
CVCe BINGO game with 24 playing mats (2 to choose from) and 3 different sets of calling cards
whole class CVCe 'I have, Who has?' game

Perfect for Daily 5 Word Word

in the Early Years.

CVCe WORD BUNDLE

US $5

CVCe BINGO GAME

This set includes:

24 different 24 BINGO playing mats - choose from 2 sets - one with images only or one with CVCe words only
3 different sets of calling cards - one with text only, one with text only with the vowel sounds highlighted in red and another set with text and visuals with support for beginning readers.

A fun way to practice reading final silent 'e' words.

CVCe BINGO GAME

US $3

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

CVCe WORD PUZZLE CARDS + MATS

This set includes:

35 different CVCe word 4-part puzzles with cutting guides - all with real life images
three different types of mats to choose from - CVCe four part puzzle cards include real life image plus dotted text as support, CVCe word mats with real life image and dotted text to support the spelling of CVCe word with either magnetic letters or laminate and use whiteboard markers, or CVCe word mat with real life image and just four boxes to support spelling the CVCe word correctly

Ideal for literacy centres activities.

CVCe WORD PUZZLE CARDS + MATS

US $2

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

CVCe WORD MATS

This set includes:

35 different CVCe word all with real life images and open text as visual support - just print and add some magnetic letters to build the words.

Perfect for Daily 5 Word Word

in the Early Years.

CVCe WORD MATS

US $1

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

CVCe I HAVE, WHO HAS?

This set includes:

27 different cards with CVCe words all with real life images and clean easy to read text.

The perfect time filler for a whole class.

CVCe I HAVE WHO HAS?

US $2

You might also like our CVC Word Activity Bundle!

CVC Printable Activities for Class | you clever monkey

This set includes:

20 pages of CVC word 3-part puzzles with cutting guides (pg 2-21)
CVC cards with and without dotted letters for support (pg 22-61)
CVC sentence strips with 2 pages of full colour photos and 2 mats (pg 63-68)
22 pages of CVC word mats with full colour photos 2 per A4 page (pg 70-92)
smaller CVC word strips with and without dotted letters plus three bonus versions focusing on initial, middle and final sounds (pg 94-138)

Ideal for literacy centres or

Daily 5 Word Word in the Early Years.

CVC WORD BUNDLE

US $5

This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Please note there is a limit of 10 downloads from the shop for this product, so it’s very important to save the file somewhere you can find it easily in the future. You will not be able to download the file more than 10 times.

Terms and Disclaimer:

Prices are in US dollars. Paypal with automatically covert the payment into the currency you are paying with.
This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
You may not share, distribute or alter this product. It is copyright © Nichole Halliday/you clever monkey. All rights reserved.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

Use this one FREE printable to build fine motor skills this Christmas season.

As educators working in Early Years settings, we all know how important fine motor skills are in early childhood.

Without good fine motor strength or control, a child cannot hold or use a pencil correctly. And studies now tell us that fine motor strength in preschool is as good a predictor as any of later success in school.

This Christmas holiday season I've created a simple printable to help build fine motor skills through play.

This post contains affiliate links.

Christmas Fine Motor Skills Mats - build and strengthen fine motor skills with the help of these Christmas themed printable play mats | you clever monkey

Children love to play.

This FREE printable provides hands-on activities for young children to build fine motor control and strength whilst learning.

How to use these mats?

For preschoolers, you can simply add playdough. Playdough is perfect for strengthening those small hand muscles.

Christmas Fine Motor Skills Mats - help build and strengthen fine motor skills with the help of these Christmas themed printable play mats | you clever monkey

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Any type of loose parts are a perfect match for these Christmas mats.

Add brightly coloured buttons, transparent counters, jingle bells or small beads and invite young children to decorate the Christmas tree or wreath.

Picking up, holding then placing such manipulatives is excellent for building fine motor skills. An activity like this also helps to build hand-eye co-ordination too.

Add a dice to create a simple counting game!

Just roll the dice then cover the number of dots to match. Play with a partner and race to see who can decorate their tree first.

One mat has 26 dots perfect for adding all the letters of the alphabet to. Decide if you want to build just letter recognition or try match upper to lower case letters. Use stickers with letters written on them to match to those on the tree. Ideal for adding to your literacy centres in kindergarten these Christmas holidays.

My children love using these fine pipettes and being able to fill each dot without overfilling it with coloured water takes a lot of control and precision.

I'd created a dot mat before to work on controlling the flow from the pipette after noticing that all my lower student academically where also the same ones that could flood their work with water using these pipettes, seemingly unable to make them drip one small drop at a time.

You can download a FREE copy of these Christmas fine motor mats from here.

This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Terms and Disclaimer:

This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
You may not share, distribute or alter this product. It is copyright © Nichole Halliday/you clever monkey. All rights reserved.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

Ready to print, these alphabet wheels are perfect for preschoolers or primary aged children learning their beginning letter sounds.

Working in an Early Years classroom, hands-on materials are a must. Countless studies tell us young children learn best through play but how to best

As a classroom teacher, I'm constantly looking for those areas that my students need further exposure too.

One concept my class still needs is more opportunities to practice differentiating between initial letter sounds in words.

This post contains affiliate links.

Initial Sounds Alphabet Circles - practice differentiating between beginning letter sounds while building fine motor skills and correct letter formation | you clever monkey

Since working in schools, I've used literacy centres or literacy centers (if you live in other parts of the world) in my classroom.

Why?

Because they're a fun, often hands-on way to engage young children in practicing early literacy concepts in a smaller group setting.

Knowing some of my students are still learning to identify beginning letter sounds, I've recently created these new initial sound alphabet circles for our literacy rotations.

Each mat has a upper case and lower case letter displayed in the middle of the mat

in large clear print and there is a individual mat for every letter of the alphabet.

To use them, I encourage the children to firstly trace each letter with their finger.

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After tracing the letters with their finger, they can then trace each letter with a whiteboard marker using the prompts in the letters to help them with the correct letter formation.

Laminating the cards helps protect them for longer in a busy classroom but also allows us to write on them when we want.

Many children are still not confident recognising upper case letters so while we use these printable cards to target that in our literacy centres, having the upper and lower case letter on each card help reinforce this again.

After practicing their handwriting, the children can then work on identifying the words that share their beginning letter with the one feature on the card.

I encourage my students to say each word aloud to themselves quietly to see if they can hear the same initial sound each of the letters makes in words.

We're often trying to build up fine motor strength and control in the first years at school so once the children find the match, they can place a peg over that picture.

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE

Initial Sounds Activity Mats | you clever monkey

Each card includes a few words that don't start with the targeted sound which means children to differentiate between the sounds before deciding on the correct sound.

Our initial sound alphabet mats do the same task but require children to choose between even more sounds.These beginning letter sound circles are a nice transition from our initial sound cards to our initial sound alphabet mats.

This set includes:

26 alphabet full colour mats with traceable upper and lower case letters for every letter of the alphabet, full colour photos use throughout.

Ideal for literacy centres or

Daily 5 Word Word in the Early Years.

INITIAL SOUNDS ALPHABET CIRCLES

US $3

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Terms and Disclaimer:

Prices are in US dollars. Paypal with automatically covert the payment into the currency you are paying with.
This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
You may not share, distribute or alter this product. It is copyright © Nichole Halliday/you clever monkey. All rights reserved.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

This collection of more than 50 different delightful Christmas tree activities and crafts is sure to fill your holidays with joy.

When I was little, my most favourite thing about the holiday season was putting up our Christmas tree.

It was nothing grand. It was small, made of a metal frame with branches wrapped in plastic tinsel that you folded down to form the tree. It stood wobbly in a handmade base my mum had made years ago. With not much extra money to spend on anything growing up, we had that same tree from before I can remember to after I left home.

As a teenager, it somehow fell to me to put up the Christmas decorations. Looking back now I'm not sure if it was by want or need, but Christmas represented a magic that was often missing from my childhood.

This post contains affiliate links.

50+ Christmas Tree Crafts To Make This Christmas | you clever monkey

That love of Christmas continues now with my own family. The building of traditions - putting up the tree to High School Musical (?), creating a handmade Advent calendar each year and taking it in turn to host Christmas lunch at our house every other year.

Arguably I felt more grown up buying my own Christmas tree than I did my first car or first house.

To celebrate the coming holiday season, I've collected more than 50 of my favourite Christmas tree crafts and activities to create this Christmas.

Create your own button up Christmas Tree like Buggy and Buddy.

Stack buttons to create mini Christmas trees.

Make your own mini Christmas trees that smell divine!

Decorate our printable Christmas trees with colourful loose parts - buttons are perfect!

Make some mini button Christmas trees.

Use some large buttons to recreate this Christmas Tree sewing invitation from Paper And Glue.

Perfect for small hands to make - a yarn wrapped Christmas Tree.

Every child should create some string art! We love this Christmas Tree version from Happy Brown House.

Use some recycled materials to create this plastic lid thread invitation from I Heart Crafty Things.

Lots of lovely threading to create this felt Christmas Tree from Coloured Buttons or try these simple pop-stick and felt trees to make.

Felt is a favourite material of mine so I love these mini felt trees from Buggy and Buddy. They remind me of this large felt tree I made for my own toddler a few Christmases ago.

Build fine motor skills this Christmas creating these folded paper trees from Krokotak.

Add a pop-up Christmas tree to your cards this year from Red Ted Art.

Try these gorgeous folded paper trees from Paper and Glue.

Fold some lightweight card to create these 3D standing trees or make this origami Christmas tree as big as you like from Origami Maniacs.

Want it smaller? Try folding this paper Christmas tree bookmark.

Bring some Christmas cheer to your math centres! Ideal for young children learning to count, Christmas tree math invitation from And Next Comes L.

Build fine motor strength while practicing counting by creating this invitation from The OT Toolbox.

Just add some pattern blocks to our Christmas challenge cards.

Cut, order and count this Christmas tree craft from Mom Inspired Life.

Or throw a dice together with some colourful counters to race each other to decorate your Christmas tree using these FREE printable mats.

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Christmas Tree cutting from The Creative Classroom.

Make your cardboard Christmas tree sparkle like Housing a Forest.

Torn paper Christmas tree from Thinking Outside The Sandbox.

Create a colourful Paper Christmas Tree or use larger paper strips like Meg Duerksen.

Make your paper Christmas tree 3D like these from Twitchetts.

Make your sensory seekers happy with this contact paper Christmas Tree from No Time For Flashcards. Or try making this no-mess sensory tree from A Little Pinch of Perfect.

Create a Christmas Tree ball sort game for your toddlers from a large piece of cardboard.

Break out the paint to decorate your trees using this simple technique from hello, Wonderful.

Create some fake stained glass art to fill your windows with this Christmas. You can find the instructions here.

Paint some paper plates to construct these trees to decorate or make a spiral tree to hang and decorate.

Or curl one up to make these trees to paint and decorate like Pink Stripey Socks.

Use cardboard to create these beautiful Christmas tree garlands.

Or try tying this scrap ribbon Christmas tree from Fireflies and Mudpies.

Get cutting some Christmas Trees like The OT Toolbox.

Squeeze some glitter glue into Christmas trees like I Heart Crafty Things.

Encourage children to use their pincer grip to decorate these pine cone trees from The Imagination Tree.

Thread some leaf Christmas trees layered leaves like Mother Natured or use pipecleaners and beads like I Can Teach My Child.

Grab some clay to make these Christmas Tree pinch pots or make your own batch of salt dough to create these fingerprint Christmas tree ornaments.

Thread beads onto some pipecleaners to create mini spiral trees.

Head outside and collect enough sticks to make this spectacular Christmas tree art.

Add some STEM to your Christmas making with this 3D Paper Christmas Tree cutting invitation from Mama Smiles.

Make a fractal triangle Christmas Tree

Grab some cups to make this STEM Christmas Tree invitation from Little Bins For Little Hands.

Or for the sweet tooth, try building one from gum drops.

My children can't resist these tinker Christmas trees from Left Brain Craft Brain.

This newspaper STEM building challenge is a great activity for children of mixed ages to work together on.

Don't forget you can grab our Christmas Tree printables for FREE from here.

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

Why teaching high frequency words to beginning readers and writers is so important and how to best teach them sight words.

We've all met the beginning reader struggling with their fluency.

They stop at nearly every word trying to put their early understanding of sounds to good use to decode the word. Decoding doesn't mean they isn't just sounding out words, it requires children to take apart the sounds (segmenting) in words then blend them back together.

t-h-e... w-h-a-t... w-a-s...

A child has to have a understanding of both single sounds and digraphs to have any hope of working out those words. Many words are just not spelled the way they sound making reading hard work at the beginning reducing a child's confidence and making comprehending what they are reading near impossible.

What are sight words and why are they important to reading and writing in the Early Years?

This post contains affiliate links.

Teaching Sight Words - practical ways to teach high frequency words plus printable sight word mats to use | you clever monkey

WHAT ARE SIGHT WORDS?

Sight or high frequency words are those we see and use most often when reading or writing. They account for as much as 75% of all words used in the English language.

They are called sight words because ideally, children should be able to read them by 'sight' and not have to utilise any of their reading strategies like decoding or chunking to be able to read the word correctly.

Many of sight words do not follow the basic phonics principle we teach making them difficult to decode.

Being able to automatically recognise sight words helps young children become faster and more fluent readers.

HOW TO TEACH SIGHT WORDS

There's no real magic to teaching sight words.

Constant and repeated exposure to these words until they 'stick' is the best way to teach them.

Many teachers will create a word wall in their classroom with these high frequency words. Somewhere students can see them often works best. I utilise the area under my whiteboard at the front of class, adding new words as we introduce them. Children are encouraged to take them from the word wall to use them in their writing as they need. Word walls can include both decodable and non-decodable words.

At my school, mini word lists are send home to practice reading nightly along with their school readers.

Then it's just practice, practice, practice!

The most effective activities tend to utilise a multisensory approach - ones that include an element of movement, sight or sound.

Literacy centres provide the perfect opportunity to practice sight words in different ways.

Reading then making the word from playdough, WixStix or pipecleaners is a fun way to engage school starters.

With slightly older children, we might switch to magnetic letters or stamps.

I created these sight word mats that allow them to use the word in a simple sentence as well because sight words help provide context in many texts.

With four different colours for each group of 25 words, my students find it easy to differentiate the task to suit their individual reading levels.

Any games you can create with sight words is going to be a hit!

My class love this game of Sight Word Splat.

Or play pick up sticks, word BINGO, build them with alphabet beads. Write them with chalk outside then call them out and spray them with water.

Learning to recognise some words by sight does not and should not take the place of a intentionally taught phonics program but we do know that learning to read successfully involves both decoding and learning high frequency words at sight.

This set includes:

First 100 Oxford Word List words broken into five groups of 20 words each making differentiation easier.
Formatted to A4 page, 2 mats per page.

Ideal for literacy centres or

Daily 5 Word Word in the Early Years.

SAY IT MAKE IT WRITE IT SIGHT WORD MATS

US $3

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

This set includes:

First 100 Oxford Word List words broken into four groups of 25 words each with different coloured post-it notes featured.
Formatted to fit one mat per A4 page.

Ideal for beginner readers and writers.

SAY IT MAKE IT WRITE IT SIGHT WORD MATS

US $3

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Terms and Disclaimer:

Prices are in US dollars. Paypal with automatically covert the payment into the currency you are paying with.
This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
You may not share, distribute or alter this product. It is copyright © Nichole Halliday/you clever monkey. All rights reserved.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Or grab our FREE Say It Make It Write Mat!

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

Use these ready to print resources in class to help support young children learning to read simple CVC words.

One of the first literacy skills young children must have as they start to read and spell simple words, is the ability to break words into sounds and to blend sounds together to make words.

As teachers of kindergarten aged children, we know this is just one of the phonological awareness skills that develop between starting preschool and moving into primary school.

Often in my literacy centres, I try to incorporate an activity that focuses on building these phonological awareness skills but I recently realised that while I was allowing my students plenty of practice spelling CVC words, I wasn't giving them enough opportunities to practice their reading.

This post contains affiliate links.

Learning to Read CVC Words - use these ready to print resources to help young children learning to read | you clever monkey

My solution?

I created a few different CVC resources for our literacy centre rotations that would allow the children more reading practice.

The first were a new set of clip cards. My class are used to using these and they are perfect for building up fine motor strength while they work.

With this set of cards, the children are encouraged to say the letter sounds aloud then blend them together to form the word.

They can then decide which picture out of the three matches the word they just read. Children can mark their choice with a clothes peg, counter or laminate the cards and use a erasable marker to choose the matching photo.

Another addition to our literacy centers, are these CVC 'I can read' cards.

Again children are encouraged to sound out the letter sounds to form the three letter word before choosing the correct word to match the real life photo included on the card.

I consider these a step up from the CVC clip cards as the children now have to read and choose between three different words rather than pictures.

These cards also encourage young children to read through the word rather than just guess at it after only reading the first couple of letters.

CVC I Can Read Cards | you clever monkey

When children are ready, move them onto our CVC Word Mats. These are based on our popular 'Say It, Make It, Read It' mats. The mats still included a real life photos as visual support while also including some reading and spelling practice.

You can find these CVC word mats here.

CVC Word Say It Read It Make It Write It Word Mats | you clever monkey

Of course, like many concepts at this age, repetition and practice help make learning to read and spell easier.

For more teaching and learning ideas using CVC words check out our post - How To Help Children Learn To Spell.

This pack includes over 50 different word cards!

Just add clothes pegs or counters to

match the correct picture to the word.

This set includes:

13 pages of CVC words with 4 cards per A4 card
large clear CVC word featured on each card to sound out or read plus three real life photos to choose from to find the match the CVC word per card

Ideal for beginning readers.

CVC WORD CLIP CARDS

US $2

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

With 40 different word cards to choose from, just add clothes pegs or counters to mark the correct word.

This set includes:

20 pages of CVC words with 2 cards per A4 card
real life photos used as visual prompts along with three CVC words per card

Ideal for literacy centres or

Daily 5 Word Word in the Early Years.

CVC I CAN READ CARDS

US $2

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

This set includes:

30 pages of CVC words with real life photos used as visual support along with three CVC words per card

Ideal for literacy centres.

Just add magnetic letters or play dough.

CVC Say It Read It Make It Write It

US $2

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM OUR TpT STORE

This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Terms and Disclaimer:

Prices are in US dollars. Paypal with automatically covert the payment into the currency you are paying with.
This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
You may not share, distribute or alter this product. It is copyright © Nichole Halliday/you clever monkey. All rights reserved.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Not on our mailing list?

It's the perfect time to join us and

grab a FREE copy of our 50 Time Saving, Easy to Prep Literacy Centres guide!

Teaching young children about the days of the week or months of the year won't be dull with these engaging ideas and printables for the Early Years!

With lots of teaching time dedicated to reading clocks in classrooms, how do we best teach young children about the other measurements of time like days and months?

This post contains affiliate links.

How to teach time in the Early Years classroom - days of the week + months of the year | you clever monkey

TEACHING the concept of TIME

The concept of time is a difficult one to explain and even more difficult for young children to grasp. When you think about time and what it is, it can be hard to simplify the more you think about it.

Ponder for a moment about what time is?

How does it pass?

How do we record the passing of time?

Is it uniform across our globe?

Why or why not?

Here in Australia the southern states enjoy four seasons while our most northern parts only see two - a wet and a dry season. When it's summer time here in the Southern Hemisphere, much of the Northern Hemisphere can be blanketed with snow.

TELLING TIME

The telling of time using clocks is often where we spend a lot of our teaching time but in the Early Years, children also need to be able to define time using other forms of measurement and there is plenty of vocabulary that needs to be learnt in relation to the concept of time - seconds, minutes, hours, mornings, afternoons, nights, days, weeks, months, seasons, years and more.

If you're looking for teaching ideas for reading time and becoming familiar with digital and analogue clocks, you might find our telling time post useful. You can find it here.

TEACHING THE DAYS OF THE WEEK + MONTHS OF THE YEAR

The curriculum tells us in their first year at school, children will be able to connect days of the week to familiar events and actions then in their second and third year at school, describe duration using months, weeks, days and hours and name and order months and seasons.

Having a classroom calendar is a useful way for children to learn about the passing of time along with the months of the year and their correct order.

Print Your Own Tropical Calendar | you clever monkey

I've printed my own the past couple of years and included each of my student's birthdays on the calendar for them to follow. It certain helps foster a sense of belonging and community within a classroom. You can find our different print-your-own calendars here.

Another way to incorporate a calendar within your classroom is to build a birthday display.

Classroom Birthday Display | you clever monkey

At the start of each school year, each of my students creates their own birthday crown which is displayed on our birthday wall in calendar order. I also take photos of each child holding a sign with the date of their birthday which I add to our wall. During the year, each of the children gets to wear their birthday crown on the day of their birthday along with a few other privileges.

It's a real way to show the passing of time young children can connect to.

As Early Childhood teachers we know that any task that has an element of play will allow more children to more easily access the learning.

Teaching the days of the week, we'll often play this sorting game as a warm-up routine. Seven children will stand in a line each holding a board with the day of the week while the rest of the class will give them instructions to put them in the correct order.

Once they have got the idea, we make it more interesting by counting how many instructions we have to give to arrange all the days in the correct order then we try to beat that by making our instructions more precise.

Providing your children with visual supports as they master the order of days, months and seasons is vital. My students used our birthday wall and flicked through our calendar to help them learn the months of the year. We also have some Southern Hemisphere season posters on display from Teach Starter.

My students also loved learning the Days of the Week song to the tune of the Addams Family theme song and doing the Months of the Year to the Macarena. Music is a perfect way for children to learn order by rote. You can see a clip of another class dancing to the Macarena here.

You could hear many children singing the song to themselves as they tried to reorder the days of the week and then the months of the year independently. We used this sorting activity to check our understanding. For the days of the week, the children cut and sorted the days of the week in their math books but for the months of the year, we decided to make them into paper chains.

It's the sort of activity that is simply shows you who can sort the months of the year correctly or not but in a more engaging way than just filling in some worksheet.

They do look so lovely hanging up in our classroom at the moment.

For a short time you can download our days of the week/months of the year sorting activity for FREE! Grab your copy from here.

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How to best teach initial sounds - teaching ideas and printable resources ideal for young children learning beginning letter sounds.

Learning to tell sounds apart is a key literacy skill in the Early Years and a first step in being able to read and write.

As parents and teachers we do this orally - helping our children distinguish between sounds like 'd is for dog, c is for cat'. Being able to tell sounds apart in this way is called sound discrimination.

Learning beginning letter sounds is the next step to linking a child's oral language skills to written language - what they see and will attempt to write themselves.

But how best to teach preschoolers beginning sounds? What resources to use?

I've rounded up some of my favourite printables for introducing and teaching children initial letter sounds at school or at home.

This post contains affiliate links.

How To Best Teach Initial Sounds | you clever monkey

INTRODUCING LETTERS NAMES AND SOUNDS

Some experts will probably disagree with me but I introduce both the letter name and the letter's initial sound to children at the same time. I also introduce the upper and lower case letter forms but then spend most of our time teaching the beginning sound using the lower case letter.

I believe young children need to be taught early the distinction between a letter's name and the sound it makes in words - D said as 'dee' as it's letter name but makes a shorter 'd' sound phonetically.

If a child trying to decode the word dog 'dee-oo-gee' isn't going to make much sense so they need to understand that each letter has a name and a sound or possibly more than one sound - g = g as in goat and game and j as in giraffe and gem.

TEACHING BEGINNING SOUNDS

Depending on your literacy program (think Jolly Phonics, Words There Way, Sounds and Letters, Thrass, Soundwaves), each has a particular order for introducing the letters.

My preferred way is to teach a letter a day so that over a week you have a handful of letters to review and consolidate at a time. The most common - SATPIN start, then allows children to begin to mix and match these letters to start making simple words - at, it, in, pat, sat, tin, pin.

Having visual prompts around your classroom to help support young children check their thinking is key at this stage. As Early Childhood teachers, we know children 'read' pictures before they read words.

I created some picture/sound based alphabet posters for my own classroom which I often catch children 'reading'. You can find a copy of these posters here.

How To Best Teach Initial Sounds - teaching ideas and printable resources ideal for young children learning beginning letter sounds | you clever monkey

With one Reception class, we made our own alphabet wall charts which was such a fun term long project that helped the children understand initial sounds and make connections across different words.

After teach the letter and the sound it makes, resources that allow children to make this connection themselves and practice it are what you need.

Anything hands-on is a winner in my classroom. My students love playdough so being able to make the letter using these alphabet mats has been a great way to consolidate their knowledge independently in our literacy centres.

I've created mats for the entire alphabet but just use the letters we are focusing on until we have taught all of the alphabet. You can find the alphabet mats here.

With many young children starting school with poor or underdeveloped fine motor skills, I often use clothes pegs in our centre activities to help strengthen those small hand muscles while allowing them to practice other skills.

These peg clip cards are a perfect example. Once the children have learnt their letter sounds they can practice differentiating between just three pictures to find the one that matches the letter displayed on the cards. You can find these cards here.

The next step up from our peg clip cards are our letter sound wheels as they still require children to use their growing understanding of initial letter sounds but now have a few pictures that don't belong. We've also thrown in some handwriting practice making these initial sound wheels one of my favourite resources ever.

Disguised as a game, our letter sound mazes ask children to do the same as our letter sound wheels in they have to differentiate between sounds to find their way through the maze from the start to the finish.

A little less complex, these initial sound mats have long been a favourite in my classroom. Simply print and add magnetic letters or laminate and write the letter to match the beginning sound.

These letter sound wheels ask children to do the same but they have individually labeled clothes pegs to match the letter to the first sound in each word. You can find these wheels along with our FREE upper/lower case letter match wheels here.

Few have been able to resist our initial sound alphabet mats! Simple to prep, just print and add some counters for children to search for all the words that start with the letter sound displayed in the middle of each mat.

With a mat for each letter included, the children can see clearly that few words start with 'X' or 'Q' compared to 'B' or 'T'. You can download the mats from here.

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Use our ready to print resources to help make learning to write informational text for early elementary students easier to teach!

Some genres like recounts and narratives can seem easier to teach as our young students are often more familiar and comfortable with them but others like information reports can prove more challenging to beginning writers.

Personally, I love teaching informational texts particuarly if you choose topics your students already have some prior knowledge of and are interested in. Animals are my first pick for the early primary or elementary years at school.

Information Text Writing Made Easier For Elementary Grades | you clever monkey

Writing informatives allow you the perfect opportunity to introduce your students to how to research information as well.

Fill your classroom libraries with both fiction and non-fiction texts that feature the same animals. Use computers or iPads to research your chosen animal. I love the Montessori Geography apps like African Animals for young children as they can hear the information read to them.

YouTube is another great source of information.

My class love the National Geographic Amazing Animal clips. As a whole class, choose a clip to watch then ask your students what they remember or what they learnt about the animal. Introduce the idea of a mind map as an effective tool for recording short pieces of information. You can find a blank mind map for in our Information Text packs below.

Watch the Amazing Animals clip again then ask your students to use the mind map page to record some information about penguins.

It’s important at this stage to also talk about facts vs opinions. A fact is always something that is true. It’s real information. An opinion might be based on facts but it’s usually what someone thinks. For example –

Tigers are the largest cats = FACT
Tigers are the most beautiful cats = OPINION

Depending on the age of your students, some might write only 1-3 words for each fact. Encourage your children to also think about their prior knowledge to help them add information to their mind maps.

In another lesson, students can use the facts recorded in their mind maps to complete one of our Information Text templates. Choose from the blank template or one with photos as visual support. Our Animal Adjective Word Wall Posters can help your children to think about what type of information they may want to include – APPEARANCE/DIET/HABITAT.

Again, younger children may only record single word answers in the template.

For example – MAIN IDEA = penguins, HABITAT = sea, APPEARANCE = black and white, DIET = fish. While older children might start writing related sentences.

The great thing I find about using these templates in class, is that they make differentiation much easier in mixed year level classes particularly.

Prior to this you may want to use a short information text to highlight the structure of informatives.

Or use our Read, Cut and Sort activity to help your children identify the purpose of each sentence or group of sentences. You can find each of these resources in our Information Text Packs.

Completing activties like our Add An Adjective task as a whole class and then as an independent writing centre can also help young children become more familar with the type of language they will us when writing informatives.

ANIMAL ADJECTIVE WORD WALL POSTERS
PERFECT FOR CREATING A NON-FICTION WORD WALL WHEN LEARNING TO WRITE INFORMATIVES. INCLUDES OVER 30 FULL COLOUR POSTERS ALL WITH REAL LIFE PHOTOS.
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INFORMATION TEXT PACK - BIRDS
designed to help young children strengthen their reading, research and writing of non-fiction text. includes teaching ideas, templates + short text.
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ADD AN ADJECTIVE WRITING TASK
CHOOSE FROM 25 DIFFERENT ANIMALS TO HELP CHILDREN LEARN ABOUT ADJECTIVES. USE WITH YOUR WHOLE CLASS OR FOR INDEPENDENT WRITING CENTRES.
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Useful, actionable ways to prompt rich storytelling in your Early Years classroom.

There are many different ways to encourage rich storytelling in early childhood.

Studies show the development of strong oral language skills strongly influences a child's ability to write well later but, as a teacher, I often see children draw a blank when asked to tell or write a story.

Thankfully there are many ways through play and classroom invitations to empower young children to become capable, confident storytellers.

This post contains affiliate links.

How To Promote Rich Storytelling by Young Children | you clever monkey

Before children reach school, storytelling skills can easily be developed through play at home.

While reading provides a library of storytelling material for preschoolers, pretend play is perfect for building narratives. Whether it be dinosaurs, animals, fairies or people, children can make believe and start to tell their own stories during play. Just a handful of things either found or purchased can spark such rich imaginative play.

Story stones are a favourite DIY resource of mine and are ideal for storytelling and easy to make. You can just use stickers or print our pictures to use. You can find out how we make ours in this post.

Making anything into a game is always going to be a hit with any aged child. My students love when we have a 'mystery bag' in class. Add some story stones, objects, letters or pictures to a bag then choose out an item at a time and create a story.

Dress-ups or puppets are another way to develop storytelling skills. Both allow children to step into the role of other characters. They can collaborate to retell familiar and unfamiliar stories in a way that encourages activity.

Many of these activities are favourites among the preschool crowd and are great activities to add to literacy centres in those first weeks of school. Focusing on building oral language skills before written work, activities such as these also help build communication between the small groups of children, many who might still be learning how to work together co-operatively.

Another favourite activity are these 'Tell Me A Story' cards. Designed to make differentiation easy between groups, I created them with different levels of support and expectations of task.

Tell Me A Story Writing Center | you clever monkey

When introducing these, we just use the cards. They're similar enough to our other creative story cards but with both visual prompt and text, they provide perfect support for beginning writers who are wanting to take that next step.

For those pre-writers, they can just 'tell' each other the story but for the beginning writers, they can start recording their story.

For older more capable writers, I provide a different sheet with more space for their writing and room for an illustration.

Tell Me A Story Cards | you clever monkey

After using these in our literacy stations, I use this same Tell Me A Story pack to create an independent writing center in class.

My students love trying to make the silliest stories they can with these. One minute there's hula-hooping dinosaurs on school buses and next there's unicorns on the moon eating too much icecream. You can see why this proves to be irresistible to 6 and 7 year olds!

Want to create your own writing center in class or at home? Grab our Tell Me A Story pack!

This set includes:

140+ picture cards with text support (setting/character/event)
3 different 'Tell Me A Story' mats

Ideal for literacy or writing centers in the Early Years.

TELL ME A STORY WRITING CENTER

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This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

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Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

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No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

If you're looking for more ideas to use in class or at home, I highly recommend the book 'Show Me A Story' by Emily K Neuburger. I bought it years ago and it's full of simple inspirational projects you can do to engage children in rich storytelling.

Make picking student partners or small groups in class quick, easy and painless with these fun pick a partner cards while learning at the same time!

It should be easy to partner up students or put them in groups, right?

But any teacher who has been in the classroom knows that’s not always the case. To make the process easier and as pain free as possible, we put together our favorite classroom ideas for choosing partners and putting students into groups.

This post contains affiliate links.

Clever Ways To Pick a Partner in Class - quick, fun and easy ways to organize your students into partners or small groups | you clever monke

There are so many different ways to group your students in class so we've put together so of our favourite ideas for organising children into pairs or small groups.

One of the simplest (and cheapest) is to grab some pop sticks or craft sticks and write your students names on them. Add them to a cup then pull out two at a time to pick your partners.

Clever Ways To Pick a Partner in Class - quick, fun and easy ways to organize your students into partners or small groups | you clever monkey

I make a class set at the beginning of the school year. You can also use these to call on individuals to do small jobs in the class. Turn the stick the other way so you can see who has already had a turn.

Alternatively, gather pairs of different coloured craft sticks, pipe cleaners, pencils or small painted stones to draw out of a container two at a time.

Pairs of magnetic letters - one upper case + one lower case letter works just as well.

Never one to miss a learning opportunity, my students love using our pick a partner cards.

As teachers we know, choosing a partner can be a daunting task for students and teachers alike. Why not make it random? These fun cards help students "find" their own partner. They choose a card and search for their classmate who has the matching one! They provide an easy way to pair students but allow an opportunity to review a concept while getting organised - WIN - WIN!

Pick A Partner Cards - Telling Time Pack | you clever monkey

It can all appear quite random taking the pressure away but you can control the randomness by placing the pick a partner cards down on student's desks before you start to help avoid those pairings you don't want.

Pick A Partner - Rhyming Words Pack | you clever monkey

Another cheap DIY option is to grab some paint chips from a hardware store. Make some matching pairs of colours to select from.

Or hand write numbers to match up on some small cards. We practice making our rainbow facts or our ways to make 10 or 100 this way. For example, on one card write 8 and on another 2. Together they make 10 or for 100 use 80 and 20 or 60 and 40. You get the idea.

It's a quick warm-up activity but also helps to pick a partner at the start of a lesson.

What are your favourite ways to pick groups or partners in your class?

ALL OUR PICK A PARTNER CARDS

PICK A PARTNER - RHYMING WORD PACK
provide more practice of phonological awareness skills while choosing your next partner.
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PICK A PARTNER - COMPOUND WORD PACK
such a fun hands-on way to learn about compound words - all while organising your class into pairs.
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PICK A PARTNER - BEGINNING SOUNDS
an easy way of pairing students while also allowing practice producing and recognising sounds.
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PICK A PARTNER - 2D SHAPE + 3D OBJECTS
learn to recognise 2d shape and 3D objects from real life examples while picking your partner in class.
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PICK A PARTNER - TELLING TIME PACK
learning to tell time is tricky so provide another way for your class to practice with these cards.
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This is a digital product, no physical item will be posted to you.

This is an A4 PDF file, you will need Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF reading software to open the file.

This file is available for download via link in an email from 'SENDOWL' sent immediately after payment.

Please check your promotional/junk folders as some email services are very good at sorting your email. If you can not find the email from SENDOWL, please email me at support@youclevermonkey.com

You should open and save this product to your computer, not your mobile device.

Terms and Disclaimer:

Prices are in US dollars. Paypal with automatically covert the payment into the currency you are paying with.
This product is for personal, non commercial - single classroom use only.
No refunds are available on digital products.
This file restricts the copying and editing of any texts or images.
Colour between the printed item and the computer monitor may vary.

Teachers are constantly trialing and testing new ways of doing things in the classroom, trying to find the best ways to engage and teach the children in our care for the school year.

Many teachers have asked me about what has worked in my classroom and one thing that I will always make time for in my busy program is our 'Picture Book of the Week'.

Why? It's a perfect way to bring your class together and promote a love of reading. You can share favourite books, highlight authors and illustrators, build vocabulary, model comprehension strategies, focus on different parts of speech and so much more.

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Picture Book of the Week - how using picture books as weekly read alouds can improve the reading skills of a class | you clever monkey

I've use a 'Picture Book of the Week' in class for the past few years and it has improved the reading outcomes for all my students.

Reading comprehension levels, vocabulary usage and understanding of language conventions have all grown after making this a regular part of our classroom routine.

WHY DO I USE PICTURE BOOKS?

For the past couple of years I've used a carefully selected picture book as a focus and made it a feature in our classroom. It rests on an easel for the week highlighting it as our 'Picture Book of the Week'.

It looks important because it is.

I don't use novels as many might do as children move through school. Picture books have some incredibly rich and diverse language in them and other useful tools like illustrations that are capable of immersing children in other places and times more easily than just language alone at this age.

They also don't take as long to finish. I love a good long book but classroom can be places full of distractions so shorter works better in Early Childhood. Picture books can capture a whole lots of different things in a smaller package.

HOW DO I PICK THE RIGHT BOOK?

Not all picture books are suitable.
Not all picture book make great read aloud books.

Some are better shared on laps of parents at bedtime (think 'The Runaway Hug' or 'The Color Monster'). Some are better explored alone when you can take your time to absorb every detail (think 'Journey' or 'What Do You Do With An Idea')

When selecting a book to be our picture book of the week I run through a mental check list when reading it beforehand.

Does it read well out loud?
Do I like the story or the message it is sending?
Does it have some rich language/unusual vocabulary but not too much we're having to stop all the time?
Are the illustrations easy to see when held up in class? If the story relies on small details hidden in the illustrations, it's probably a better addition to our classroom library.
Is it not too short or too long but just right to read aloud with stops and starts?
Will many of my students be familiar with the book? (No one likes spoilers!)

I also give some thought as to what else is being taught at the time.

Are we looking at adjectives? I might look for a book that uses adjectives well.
Introducing fractions in maths? I look for a picture book that uses sharing as part of the story.
Talking about author's purpose? Or maybe you're doing an author study.

You're always looking for those overlaps. The books that have everything you want.

HOW DO IMPLEMENT 'PICTURE BOOK OF THE WEEK' IN MY CLASSROOM?

Like any program you introduce in class, you need to establish some expectations as you settle it into your week.

I typically read our picture book of the week twice in the same week. At the start of the week I will read the book for the first time. I have found scheduling it straight after a break, the perfect way to settle everyone back into the classroom. It needs to become a regular part of your timetable.

When you first introduce the concept, you might need to explain at this time each week we will read the 'Picture Book of the Week' and it's going to be different than our usual read alouds. During the reading, we're going to stop and start and questions will be asked. And that during our first reading of our picture book of the week, we'll also record the words we are unfamiliar with. We either haven't heard them before or don't really understand them.

We do this by stopping briefly after reading each page to ask my class if they heard any new words. The children take it in turns to do the recording of any new words. Before I tell them what the word means, I ask the other children if they have any ideas. Often someone will be able to define the word or if I have to provide the meaning, I might then ask if they can think of other words the author might have used instead and then why they think the author choose that word like furious instead of angry?

It's a perfect opportunity to build vocab and discuss the nuances of words along with the reasons authors write the way they do.

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30+ Great Read Aloud Picture Books For Class | you clever monkey

Before reading we might talk about the cover - does it remind us of anything? Other books? Other characters? What do we think the book is about? What type of book is it?

Having a 'Picture Book of the Week' allows you to do so much of the modelling you do in the Early Years when teaching children how to read and comprehend what they are reading.

Later in the week we re-read the 'Picture Book of the Week'. Sometimes we might talk about what remember about the story. What happened? What order did it happen? Then instead of recording unfamiliar words, this reading might see you focusing on maths words or a particular part of speech like adjectives, prepositions or adverbs.

Prereading the book ahead of reading it in class can help you decide on what type of words to focus on in your second read through.

It can be used as a way to reinforce concepts taught.

There are so many benefits to introducing a 'Picture Book of the Week' into your classroom

Want to create a sense of belonging in your classroom? Add a birthday chart to help everyone feel included and valued.

There's no more exciting day in a child's calendar than their birthday. Not even Christmas matches the excitement of counting down to that special day which is all about them.

And celebrating that with friends?

Even better!

That's just one of the reasons I make room for a birthday display every year in my classroom.

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USING A BIRTHDAY CHART IN CLASS - why you should have a birthday display in class and how to create and use it | you clever monkey

Celebrating birthdays in your class doesn't need to be a big deal.

The best advice I can offer is that whatever you decide to do or how you choose to celebrate each birthday - make it sustainable and everyone is acknowledged throughout the school year including those whose birthdays fall with the holidays.

Just make whatever you do special.

That might be having everyone sing happy birthday, getting a special birthday sticker, being the teacher's helper for the day, sitting in a special spot or wearing a birthday crown.

Every year during the first week back at school, I have my children create their own birthday crowns which then become part of our birthday display until we reach their birthday and we get their crowns down for them to wear.

We make ours from a single length of light weight card paired together with some crayons and watercolour paint but you could try these paper plate hats from Art Bar Blog or keep it 2-dimensional with these other crown designs found on Pinterest.

Another reason to have a birthday chart on display is because it can be a useful tool when teaching the concept of time.

The children can see a real world example of the sequence of months.

They can count down the days to a birthday and it's not just their own birthday they count down to.

If you have a classroom calendar, add everyone's birthdays to that as well.

You can decorate using photos of the children themselves holding a sign with their birthday. This makes a perfect display for pre-readers particularly.

Or use a birthday chart like this and edit it to include everyone's birthdays. You can find simple ones or if you have a themed classroom, your birthday chart could be part of the theme.

If you want to save on printing, why not use clothes pegs to mark each child's birthday.

My teacher hack? Cover the peg with colorful tape then write on the tape.

This means at the end of the school year you can remove the tape and reused the peg for another child the following year.

As I mentioned before, don't ever miss a child!

Children can forgive most things but not forgetting their birthdays.

They'll probably do this for you but encourage your children to remind you when a birthday is coming. Discuss ahead of time how and when you will celebrate those with birthdays in the school breaks and summer holidays. Doing this can help prevent some children experiencing anxiety around their own day and wondering when it will be celebrated.
Include families in your celebrations.

Having a Class Dojo or other private class group online means special events like birthdays can be shared creating a sense of community. Like most things, guidelines need to be made clear and the beginning of the school year is a great time to talk to parents about birthday guidelines at your school.

Add these reminders to your meet the teacher night packet or your back to school newsletters.

With some parents liking to send cakes to school to help celebrate, having some guidelines in place regarding the preparation and sharing of food from the start of the year can save you time (and frustration) during the year.

Of course, the handing out of birthday invitations can be another thing worth setting some guidelines around. It's always devastating for a young child not to be invited to someone's party. Asking families to allow you to hand out the invitations can help avoid this situation in class.

Looking for a fun way to learn to recognize 2D shapes? Try this game of dominoes featuring 2D shapes as words, clip art and real world examples to match.

Some math concepts and language take longer for children to grasp which means teaching and re-teaching and then teaching them again.

Shapes have a very specific language which can take some children longer to remember as they are not terms we use often in our every day speech.

Many more teaching moments help but how to teach the same material yet again without losing engagement?

These 2D shape dominoes should help!

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2D SHAPE GAMES - DOMINOES CARDS - hands-on fun way to learn the different 2D shape and their different representations | you clever monkey #2Dshapes #2Dshapegames #mathcenters

Shapes can be represented by drawings, words and pictures. Making those connections - that the world 'circle' is equal to ◯ takes practice and exposure to the different representations.

Creating a print rich environment helps. Our word wall and posters are on display around the classroom and provide much needed support to the children to help consolidate their understanding of these concepts.

Many studies tell us that play is crucial for learning - children need many opportunities for hands-on play with shapes and objects to make sense of them.

For working on 2D shape, I created these domino cards for our math centers. They use all three different representations of 2D shapes - clip art drawings, words and pictures of real life objects.

Like regular dominoes, the children need to simply match each end up - circle=circle, square=square to play.

Although I've found not many children come to school knowing how to play dominoes but their unawareness of the proper rules means you can play an easier version or a more challenging one as a small group.

Learn how to create playful hands-on invitations to play to learn about 2D shapes and 3D shapes and their properties.

Hands down one of of my favourite maths topics to teach would have to be shapes and there's no better way to introduce 2D shapes and 3D shapes than with play in preschool and kindergarten.

Creating invitations to play doesn't require huge amounts of time, effort or resources to be effective but they do need to be created with some thought as to the outcomes you are wanting the children in your care to reach through such play.

In this post, I'm sharing some of my favourite invitations for learning about shapes and why I use these space with my class in the hope that it will inspire some play-based exploration in your own classroom.

This post contains some affiliate links.

LEARNING ABOUT SHAPES THROUGH PLAY - how to creating simple invitations to play to learn about 2D shapes + 3D objects | you clever monkey

HOW TO CREATE INVITATIONS TO PLAY

I regularly create small invitations to play in my classroom which allow for children to independently explore different topics and concepts through hands-on activity. They might access these spaces before lessons start for the day, during math lessons or math centers or during their free time.

When planning an invitation I start by looking at what topics we are covering in maths or have recently covered but children would benefit from having further time to explore at their own pace.

During the first year of school here, children learn to sort, describe and name familiar 2D shapes and 3D objects then learn to recognise both and are able to describe the different features of shapes and objects.

Children need to develop understanding and fluency around shapes while also building problem solving and reasoning skills.

By carefully choosing materials, all of these outcomes can be achieved.

Take this invitation. It was simple to create. Just some posters and some pop-sticks with magnets on one side along with a question -

What shape can you make?

The children select a shape and then try to make it using the pop-sticks. They're being exposed to spelling of the word while being able to see the shape on the poster.

Being all straight lines, they soon find that some shapes are much harder to make than others and they can't make a circle or oval at all.

Why?

'Because they have curved lines not straight which is why I can't make them'and with this simple invitation they have started to build understanding, become more fluent when recognising and naming the different shapes, they are starting to problem solve and reason how and why some shapes could be built and other couldn't.

When beginning your invitations, keep it simple.

Allow your children to become familiar with the materials firstly. Help support their growing understanding of shapes with clear visuals.

Many of us are visual learners and absorb information more readily through visuals.

Many young children show a clear preference for building materials in preschool and kindergarten and learning about shapes, making these types of invitations popular spots in the classroom. They are perfect for building visual discrimination skills, fine motor strength and spatial awareness.

Games are another easy invitation and can be the perfect way to build friendships in class too as it provides a space for 2-3 people to play without having to be planned ahead of time.

It can help alleviate some of the anxiety the start of each school day can bring some children. They can also help parents and teachers alike as the support children experiencing any separation anxiety as they can be directed to play before the parent leaves the classroom.

Having invitations set up can also provide some useful calm down spaces in class.

First thing in the morning they can be useful spots for children to spend time after they've unpacked their bags but are not sure what else to do before their friends arrive.

During class time they can be used as spots to retreat to when a child has become overwhelmed.

I also consider how the group of children I'm teaching might interact with different materials - some might be sensory seekers so have a mix of soft and hard materials like these felt shapes, might help to engage them in the invitation for longer periods.

Don't be afraid to reintroduce an invitation to play.

When using printables such as these shape mats, just add different materials to use with the prompt.

For the first invitation, I only provided playdough with the mats to make the shapes.

Second time, I added toothpicks and playdough to the invitation.

You can even use invitations such as this as an assessment task as they allow children the opportunity to explain their thinking when prompted.

As you can see from this maker space, several different materials have been provided.

Children might use the paper stripes to make a circle but the blocks to make a cube, the string to make an oval but the playdough to make a pyramid.

Being able to explain their choices can show their level of understanding making tasks such as these important when trying to decide if a child is working at level (C grade) or at a higher lever (A grade).

Like some of the resources you've seen in this post?

A collection of the must have resources for teaching young children about 2D shapes!

Exploring shapes with children can be so much fun!

Having access to quality toys and resources that invite hands-on exploration is key to children developing strong spatial awareness and reasoning skills while building their awareness of 2D shape names and properties.

I'm often asked for suggestions as to what resources to invest in so I've collected a list of 20 of my favourites for exploring 2D shapes.

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20 OF THE BEST RESOURCES FOR TEACHING SHAPES - A must have collection of toys, puzzles, blocks, manipulatives and building materials for teaching preschool, kindergarten and first grade children about 2D shapes and their attributes #kindergartenmathactivities #2Dshapes #preschoolmath #mathcenters #firstgrademath

Starting with some traditional favourites, you can't go past a set of geoboards. I love these wooden geoboards for exploring the different 2D shapes with rubber bangs or loom bands. Larger clear ones are handy to have too.

Stacking toys are perfect for the preschool set and the right one should be able to be used several different ways - sorted by colour, sorted by shape, as well as for threading. This stacking toy from edx Education is a great choice.

Others like this wooden stacking one with five shapes requires children to manipulate the shapes into place while also working on building number sense to 5. This stacking one requires children to match colours, numbers and shapes to 10.

Shape bean bags are also popular with young children being so tactile. Perfect for throwing or posting into shape sorting boxes you can easily make with some cardboard boxes.

Shape puzzles are another essential item. Chunky simple puzzles are ideal for toddlers but I love this set of 3 puzzles that will grow with your child and introduce them to how shapes can be used to form new shapes as well as fractions.

For play on the go, these different shape puzzles are perfect. They encourage children to manipulate to different shapes to match the cards included helping build visual discrimination skills and their imaginations.

Shape tracing templates are a handy resource for tracing or painting with. Just grab a plastic set to make clean up easy.

Stamping is always popular in preschool and kindergarten. These chunky handle ones are perfect for smaller hands. For older children, why not use 3D shapes as stamps to investigate their attributes and see how the faces are 2D shapes.

Kinetic sand makes an irresistible base for stamping if you want to avoid getting messy. Just add some 3D shapes like these ones with a removable base to stamp or just a sharp pencil for some shape drawing.

I'm a big fan of building toys and there's plenty of these for exploring shape.

Our long time favourite of these are MagnaTiles. We love them! And they are a must-have for early childhood.

We bought our first set just over 7 years ago and have kept adding to them. They are incredibly versatile and so valuable for making early math concepts like shapes, objects and fractions visual.

Other sets children never seem to tire of are things like Rainbow Blocks, STEM Straw Constructors, KEVA Plank Blocks and Magnetic Balls and Sticks. Obviously with any resources with small parts be sure the children using them have outgrown the mouthing stage.

A set or two of these linking blocks are another must for the classroom. You can use them to build with but they can be used to make patterns, for counting, addition and subtraction later.

Pattern blocks are a firm favourite here. We love the traditional wooden pattern blocks which are perfect for exploring tessellation as well as shapes.

Grab these printable 2D Shape STEM challenge cards to add to your pattern blocks! Hands-on way for kindergarten aged children and first graders to learn how to make new shapes from other 2D shapes. These easy to prep printable 2D shape cards include three different sets of cards to challenge children while they learn about shapes and geometry in math while making differentiation easier than ever! #kindergartenmathcenters #stemcenters #firstgrademath #2dshapes #patternblockactivities

Another favourite of mine is this tub of geometric shapes from Learning Resources. It's full of lots of different sized shapes that can be transposed on top of each other or easily used together to create new shapes. They can be used for tracing, sorting, shape making and later for fractions.

A firm favourite since we opened the box are these edx Education GeoStix. They are incredibly satisfying to play with!

They link together easily by gently pressing on the multiple connection points which snap together with a lovely soft 'click'. We still coming up with different ways to use our GeoStix - they're ideal for different math concepts like shape, measurement and angles.

Another resource we love here are these Geometric Shape Building Set from Learning Resources. Whenever I post one of our invitations to make shapes on social media with these I'm inundated with questions about them. And they are as good as they look!

Looking for something more high tech? Pair your iPad with Osmo Little Genius set. We loved using their Tangram and Sticks and Rings Sets.

Or you you're wanting to start exploring coding, I highly recommend Sphero. Controlled by an app, you can program the Sphero to make different shapes and if you add paint, you can even see the shape once the Sphero has finished!

Of course the great thing about many of these resources is they can also be used to teach children about 3D shapes as well making them even better value for money!

Recreate this Christmas STEM challenge in your classroom this festive holiday season with materials you might already have at school!

Looking for a simple to prep STEM challenge for the countdown to Christmas?

You'll love this Christmas tree building challenge then!

It's perfect for small groups encouraging them to work together and communicate clearly to problem solve and then implement their strategy as a team.

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CHRISTMAS TREE STEM CUP STACKING CHALLENGE FOR CLASS - Recreate this Christmas STEM challenge in your classroom this festive holiday season with materials you might already have at school! #stemactivities #christmasstemactivities #christmasactivitiesforfirstgrade #christmasactvitiesforsecondgrade

To prepare the challenge, you will need to collect only a few things - string, rubber or elastic bands and some cups.

I choose green and red cups seeing as our challenge was to build a Christmas tree but if you're using this task at the beginning of the school year to build team work and communication skills, the color doesn't matter.

At the start of the challenge, organise your class into small groups of 3-5 children. This activity is perfect for buddy classes to do together as an end of year task.

Explain to your groups they are to build a Christmas tree from their stack of cups. I show them how to build a basic pyramid stack of cups by hand at this stage.

Easy right?

So they think...

I then explain that they will need to build the same structure from the cups without touching the cups at all with their bodies.

Saying bodies stops the elbows, forearms, chins, mouths, being utilised.

I then supply each group with 1 rubber band, a piece of string for each children and a small stack of cups and set them to work out how to solve the problem of not being able to touch the cups by hand.

I've done this challenge with several classes now and am constantly surprised with the different ways children will come up with to move the cups into position.

Some will loop the lengths of string through the rubber band saving them from having to tie knots. Others have just tried to loop the rubber band around the cup stretching it to hold it.

Others, like these groups, tie the end of the string to the rubber band to stretch it over the top of each cup.

Each method requires the children to work together and communicate clearly.

With the string tied or looped around the one rubber band, they all need to move at the same time and speed to ensure the cup lands exactly where they want it.

You can hear in this short video, how well this group is working together.

We hadn't assigned roles but some naturally took up the role of manager to ensure everyone worked together to reach the goal set.

Hands-on resources for car loving preschoolers wanting to learn how to recognize, quantify and write numbers to 10.

It's seems to be universal ➡ cars + preschoolers = engaged play.

Utilizing a child's love of play for learning and identifying their interests is the work of every Early Years teacher.

Using the children's love of all things transport themed, I've created some printable resources to help our preschool class learn about numbers - how to recognise them and how to write them correctly as well as learning to count and quantify amounts to 10.

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TRANSPORT THEMED NUMBER POSTERS + MATS - Hands-on resources for car loving preschoolers wanting to learn how to recognize, quantify and write numbers to 10 | you clever monkey

We've been using number posters with cars to make amounts. These were a simple introduction to numbers to 10 as the children can count the cars pictured or match the amount with objects.

Number posters plus a quantity of cars created a simple invitation to count.

Last year I made these car park mats for both letter and numbers. They have been a fun way for the children to learn to match numerals to the number word.

Another simple invitation that didn't take much to time to prep or set up.

We've also been looking at writing numbers correctly.

These road themed number posters with traffic signs - go to start, stop sign to finish, have be a hit in class and a gentle introduction to correct number formation.

We've used them for hands-on invitations complete with cars for 'writing' practice and as posters as visual aids too.

As is typical in preschool classroom, there's always a range of abilities and developmental stages present.

Some will be uninterested in such play at this age while others are wanting to learn more.

For those keen to practice their handwriting I created these car number mats.

They invite the children to trace and then write each numeral and number word as well as counting the correct number of cars.

Perfect for building fine motor strength and control. Writing with markers doesn't provide the same feedback as putting pencil to paper so I've also turned these into number books for some classes.

GRAB YOUR OWN COPY OF OUR TRANSPORT RESOURCES

Teaching ideas and resources to use in class when introducing nouns

in Kindergarten and First Grade.

When starting to teach the different parts of speech, most programs start by teaching common nouns as it is the least abstract concept to teach kindergarten aged children.

Children are already able to name what they can see around them by this stage.

Nouns are the names we give people, places and things. Teaching the concept of nouns is just putting a label to something they already do.

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HOW TO TEACH NOUNS IN KINDERGARTEN - teaching ideas and resources for introducing and teaching common nouns to kindergarten aged children | you clever monkey

Usually I introduce nouns over a few weeks.

I start by focusing on nouns around us in the classroom - things that can be touched.

Using our interactive whiteboard, I have 2-3 children at a time move around the room and touch something to make a list of nouns together.

I also introduce the idea that nouns can also be people - girl, boy, teacher, student, and places - school, classroom, library, office.

In a follow up lesson, we revise what nouns are 👉 people, place or thing, then work together as a group to sort these picture cards from our Noun Sorting Pack in to three groups - people, places and things (objects + animals).

As a follow on activity I have my class work in small groups to complete their own noun posters together like these ones created by Kindergarten Smiles. I love this task and have used many times while introducing nouns.

Children are often better at expressing themselves through drawing at this age so it's a perfect way to check their understanding so far. Collaborating helps those uncertain learn about the concept again from their peers. The students become the teachers.

Some will want to use the sorting cards to help them think of different nouns and others will want to use them to help write the word correctly.

I'm often using our literacy centres to help reinforce concepts taught in lessons so I add these Noun Clip Cards in our literacy rotations during the following weeks for children further practice independently sorting nouns.

It's the perfect activity for strengthening fine motor skills as well.

Later in the semester, I'll add the same activity back in to our literacy rotations followed by our Noun Sorting Centre.

With older grades, I ask that they record the cards they sorted to check their accuracy.

Once the children have been taught about nouns, verbs and adjectives, I also use these word sticks as a literacy centre.

Easy to make, this activity is reliant on having some capable readers in each group so I tend to use this one with Yr1s and 2s.

Being able to break words into syllables and correctly count the number of syllables is one of the first phonological awareness skills young children master.

It is a early literacy skill earmarked as a preschool milestone. Beyond preschool, it's a skill children will use to help them spell unfamiliar words correctly. An importance that is sometimes not emphasized enough.

How do children master counting syllables? Like most things, through practice, practice and more practice.

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SYLLABLE BINGO GAME - a fun hands-on printable game to help preschoolers and kindergarten aged children master counting syllables correctly | you clever monkey

How do you practice counting syllables in preschool?

It can be more challenging as you don't have many children who are reading at this age so visuals become key.

Games are perfect way to engage children of this age and BINGO is always a popular centre activity so I created this simple syllable BINGO game for our class.

Using a mix of 1-4 syllable words, this BINGO game is designed for small group work and is something children can play independently once familiar with the rules.

With over 170 different picture cards included, it's also works to build vocabulary as well and allow for the game to be played frequently without the children always seeing the same cards.

Each card has a clear coloured picture of an object, person, place or thing for those pre-readers to interpret.

We've also paired these cards with our FREE syllable sorting mats for another centre activity.

FREE SYLLABLE SORTING MATS | you clever monkey

In our BINGO game, after 'reading' the word, the child who has turned over the card must work out the correct number of syllables.

Tractor = 2 syllables 👉 they can then cover the number 2 on their BINGO mat then the next child can have their turn. They keep playing until all their numbers are covered.

Children need frequent practice at counting syllables throughout preschool and kindergarten. Even in first and second grade I will add some of our syllable counting resources to our literacy rotations to revise the concept and check that everyone has indeed mastered it in preschool as expected.

FIND ALL OUR SYLLABLE RESOURCES HERE

WHAT ARE SIGHT WORDS?

HOW TO TEACH SIGHT WORDS

TEACHING the concept of TIME

TELLING TIME

TEACHING THE DAYS OF THE WEEK + MONTHS OF THE YEAR

INTRODUCING LETTERS NAMES AND SOUNDS

TEACHING BEGINNING SOUNDS

ANIMAL ADJECTIVE WORD WALL POSTERS

PERFECT FOR CREATING A NON-FICTION WORD WALL WHEN LEARNING TO WRITE INFORMATIVES. INCLUDES OVER 30 FULL COLOUR POSTERS ALL WITH REAL LIFE PHOTOS.

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INFORMATION TEXT PACK - BIRDS

designed to help young children strengthen their reading, research and writing of non-fiction text. includes teaching ideas, templates + short text.

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ADD AN ADJECTIVE WRITING TASK

CHOOSE FROM 25 DIFFERENT ANIMALS TO HELP CHILDREN LEARN ABOUT ADJECTIVES. USE WITH YOUR WHOLE CLASS OR FOR INDEPENDENT WRITING CENTRES.

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PICK A PARTNER - RHYMING WORD PACK

provide more practice of phonological awareness skills while choosing your next partner.

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PICK A PARTNER - COMPOUND WORD PACK

such a fun hands-on way to learn about compound words - all while organising your class into pairs.

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PICK A PARTNER - BEGINNING SOUNDS

an easy way of pairing students while also allowing practice producing and recognising sounds.

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PICK A PARTNER - 2D SHAPE + 3D OBJECTS

learn to recognise 2d shape and 3D objects from real life examples while picking your partner in class.

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PICK A PARTNER - TELLING TIME PACK

learning to tell time is tricky so provide another way for your class to practice with these cards.

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HOW DO IMPLEMENT 'PICTURE BOOK OF THE WEEK' IN MY CLASSROOM?

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