Past projects 3
Phonics Foundations for Life Long Readers
Funded Nov 29, 2022The students and I are so thankful for the opportunity to use Heggerty and UFLI!
Heggerty has been a boost to my students early literacy skills. It keeps students engaged with breaking up words using multiple hand motions, such as the rollercoaster going to the top of the hill to hear different vowel sounds, our hand choppers to break apart a word, and our punch it out motion to hear ending sounds. Students love doing our "listening games" and have become adept at substituting beginning, middle and ending sounds verbally. For example - say "tell" change /t/ to /sh/and the word is "shell" or say "bike" change /k/ to /t/ and the word is, "bite" Students also can add or delete sounds from a word.
All of our Heggerty phonemic awareness has made implementing UFLI so much more powerful. UFLI has many resources that align with our current word study program. Students have been able to feel very successful using the phonics and reading portions of UFLI. They love to read and illustrate the decodable passages for the phonics skill they are working on. Our Heggerty listening games have helped us implement word chains. With a word chain you can tackle encoding (spelling) and decoding (reading). A sample would be make the word "sing" (spelling) Change the s to r. What word is this? (reading) - "ring." We are so grateful for your donation and I look forward to using these materials with my students for many years!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Connelly
This classroom project was brought to life by an Anonymous Classroom Supporter and 8 other donors.Bodies In Motion, Minds In Motion
Funded Aug 26, 2016My students are loving our Hokki stools. The first day I showed them the stools they were so excited and couldn't wait to try them out. Each student got to have a turn during the first few weeks and never failed to remind me when their turn was. They were so excited about using them and couldn't wait until it was their turn. The word spread quickly and we let other teachers and students borrow the stools for a day or two and their classes love them, too!
I notice a big improvement in how well they are able to focus on their work when they are using them. I think they especially help during reading time. When they get stuck on a tricky word I see their bodies moving more on their seats as they figure out different strategies to try to tackle the tricky word. I think by not being stuck in one position in their seat they feel more free to keep trying different words as they move around in their Hokki stool. It has been an invaluable asset for all the students in my class. We are going to continue to use the Hokki stools and explore more ways to keep kids moving as they work! Thank you for your generosity.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Connelly
This classroom project was brought to life by Target and 2 other donors.Growing Readers: Help My First Graders Learn to Read
Funded Aug 29, 2010Thank you so much for your donation to my classroom. The students and I have been enjoying the books on families and feelings, the classroom song bank and fluency CD's since we received them.
We listen to the songs on the classroom song back during our celebrations in the classroom and while we pack up at the end of the day. The students love to sing along with their favorites and have learned some new songs too.
I read the books about families and feelings throughout the Fall. My students fell in love with Shy Charles, Sheila Rae the Brave, Sophie (from When Sophie Gets Angry), and Vashti (from The Dot). They also learned a lot about characters and were able to think deeply about how different characters react to problems. They used all the things we learned about characters and problems and solutions to create their own characters during our realistic fiction writing unit. They were also able to make great connections between character books they were reading on their own and books that I read to them. During character club time they would say things like, "This character reminds me of Shy Charles because he is nervous about going to school and doesn't want to talk to anyone." It was wonderful to hear them talk about books with such sophistication. These books have definitely made a lasting impact in my classroom and in the way my students talk about books.
My favorite part of the project has been the enthusiasm for the listening center. I always had a listening center in my classroom, but it only had about 5 books to read along with. The listening center is now a big part of our reading time. The students have a schedule where they go once a week with their partner and get a new text to listen to and read along with every time. If I forget to send the students who are going that day right away they will wait about 2 minutes before eagerly coming over to remind me that's it their day to visit the listening center. I always smile when they remind me because I love that they are so excited to get there and read. This project has given my students a great appreciation for listening to and reading books.
My school's budget has been cut drastically over the last few years. We didn't get any new books except the ones from our donor's choose package this year so they are very precious to our classroom. Without donors like you my students wouldn't have had these wonderful books and CD's. Thanks for making our learning exciting! ”
With gratitude,
Ms. Connelly