Develop a tool box of lessons on each one of the strategies.

Write up one lesson(in more detail than this) you

liked from the book to go with each strategy. Make this useful for you! Which ones will you actually want to
use in your classroom. For ex. Phonemic Awareness: Rhyming: Rhyming jar Isolating and identifying: Hot
Seat, blending: Body Blending, segmenting: Egg-Cited about phomemes, manipulating: Say it again. You
would do this for each one Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary, and Comprehension. This will
be your last assignment for the class. Please email me this final project before Dec. 10th. Or upload your
assignment.

nealj@greenecountycsd.net

Pull together the ones you think you will use in your classroom.

Phonemic Awareness: Rhyming, isolating and identifying, blending, segmenting, manipulating

Phonics: Synthesizing, Analyzing, contextualizing, patterning, spelling, and recognizing
-Fluency: Phrasing, Assisted Reading, Expressing, Pacing, Wide Reading, Accuracy
Vocabulary: Association, contextualizing, categorizing, visual imaging, analyzing, word awareness, wide
reading, referencing
Comprehension: Previewing, Activating prior knowledge, Predicating, questioning, visualizing, inferring,
drawing conclusions, summarizing, determining importance, and synthesizing.

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 Tool Box of Resources
Creating Strategic Readers
Valerie Ellery

Phonemic Awareness: Pg. 3-4

Musical Rhymes (pg. 36) Pg. 3
Hot Seat (pg. 43) Pg. 3
Syllable Giving (pg. 48) Pg. 3
Silly Segmenting (pg. 52) Pg. 3
Say it Again (pg. 57) Pg. 4

Phonics: Pg. 5-6

Stretch It (pg. 66) Pg. 5
Star Search (pg. 69) Pg. 5
Predict/Preview/Polish/Produce (pg. 74) Pg. 5
Vowel Pattern Jingles (pg. 81) Pg. 5
Creating Words (pg. 89) Pg. 6
High-Frequency Words (pg. 92) Pg. 6

Fluency: Pg. 7-8

Eye-Voice Span (pg. 99) Pg. 7
Echo Reading (pg. 105) Pg. 7
Listen to Me (pg. 108) (Baggie Books) Pg. 7
ABC Punctuation Style (pg. 113) Pg. 7
Beam Reading (pg. 121) (Use during guided reading) Pg. 7
Selecting Just Right Books (pg. 125) Pg. 8
Letter Recognition (pg. 92) Pg. 8

Vocabulary: Pg. 9-10

Move to the Meaning (pg. 133) Pg. 9
What do you mean? (pg. 140) Pg. 9
Picture and Word Sorts (pg. 145) Pg. 9
Museum Walk (pg. 150) Pg. 9
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Playing with Plurals (pg. 154) Pg. 9
Word Jars (pg. 158) Pg. 10
Author Study (pg. 163) Pg. 10
Glossary Use (pg. 167) Pg. 10

Comprehension: Pg. 11-12

Book Introduction (pg. 175) Pg.11
Connect and Reflect (pg. 178) Pg.11
Story Impression (pg. 185) Pg. 11
Ripple Effect (pg. 188) Pg. 11
Wordless Picture Books (pg. 194) Pg. 12
Interpreting Text (pg. 199) Pg. 12
Somebody/Wanted/But/So (pg. 206) Pg. 12
Picture This (pg. 209) Pg. 12
Creating a Play (pg. 213) Pg. 12

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 Tool Box of Resources
Phonemic Awareness:
Rhyming:
Musical Rhymes (pg. 36)
Materials: Rhyming Picture Cards, CD music
Procedure: Make a large circle on the floor with the picture cards. Have students stand behind the picture cards.
Begin playing the music and students begin walking around the circle. When the music stops, teacher will call out a
word and the students will look at the picture they are standing behind to see if it rhymes with the stated word.
The student with the rhyming picture jumps to the middle of the circle and says the two rhyming words. Students
will put their thumbs up/down if the students rhyme is correct or incorrect.

Isolating and Identifying Phonemes:

Hot Seat (pg. 43)
Materials: Hula Hoops, 3 cards with 1 letter (B,M,E)
Procedure: Line up 3 hula hoops in the front of the classroom. Place the letter card in front of each hula hoop.
Explain to students these are the hot hoops. Students will take turns listening to a word given by the teacher and
standing in the correct hula hoop for the given sound. Example: The word is cat. Stand in the hula hoop where
you hear the /t/ sound in cat. Student would stand in the last hula hoop for the ending sound. Repeat with other
words.

Blending Phonemes:
Syllable Giving (pg. 48)
Materials: Wrapped box with rock inside
Procedure: Have students sit in a circle. Give student the wrapped box. Say I will give you a clue as to what is
inside the box. Then, pronounce the name of an object syllable by syllable. Example: /Vi/ /de/ /o/ Shake the box
once as you say each syllable and blend the syllables together to make a word. When the student correctly blends
together the syllables, he or she becomes the next one to present the gift to another student.

Segmenting Phonemes
Silly Segmenting (pg. 52)
Materials: Clay
Procedure: Give each student a small ball of clay to make a snake. Teacher will say a word and student is to
separate their snake into a corresponding number of segments representing each sound in the word. How many
sounds do you hear in the word? Have students point to each section of their snakes and say the sounds
separately.

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Manipulating Phonemes
Say it Again (pg. 57)
Materials: None
Procedure: Say a word and have students repeat the word, adding and deleting sounds to begin creating new
words. Example: Say the word cat. Change the /c/ to /b/. What is the new word? Yes, bat. Continue with
changing different sounds to make new words. Optional: Record the newly created words on a chart so students
can see how they changed the sounds.

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Phonics:
Synthesizing
Stretch It (pg. 66)
Materials: Elastic strip with dry-erase paper squares stapled, dry-erase marker
Procedure: Think of a word to stretch out and spell. Using a dry-erase marker, write the letters of a word on
the squares. Each square should represent the letter(s) associated with the individual sound in the word. How
many sounds do you hear in the word ______? Have students stretch the elastic word and then slowly bring the
word back together while merging the sounds. When you stretch the word, what is happening? Continue to
repeat with different words.

Analyzing
Star Search (pg. 69)
Materials: Name Cards for each student, or, use big ABC cards
Procedure: Cut apart the letters on a name card and pass the letters out to select students. Have these
students come to the front of the group, holding up the letters. Have students line up and spell the name. Put
letters/name into a cheer: Give me a ____. . Whats that spell? Move to the letters by crouching low to the
ground and slowly rising to the end of the name.

Contextualizing
Predict/Preview/Polish/Produce (pg. 74)
Materials: Text, Highlighting Tape or sticky notes
Procedure: Read a selection from the text and omit words by covering them with a sticky note or highlighting
tape, saying the word blank for each omitted word. Predict Have students turn and talk with a partner about
what they predict the words are that are omitted. Teacher may chart some responses. Preview Preview the
first letter of the omitted word by pulling back the sticky note or tape exposing only the first letter, cover the
ending letters or vowels. What would make sense here and match the beginning letter of this covered word?
Polish Have students polish their predictions by checking their previous predictions for the omitted word with the
preview you have just given them. After seeing the beginning letter, what word would best make sense and look
right? Produce Reveal the other letters to produce the omitted word

Patterning
Vowel Pattern Jingles (pg. 81)
Closed Vowel Pattern: A word or syllable that contains only 1 vowel and is followed by 1 or more consonants (e.g.
cat, went, lunch) One lonely vowel squished in the middle says its special sound just a little
Open Vowel Pattern: Has one vowel at the end of the word that says its letter name to represent the long vowel
sound (e.g. we, no, fly) If one vowel at the end is free, it pops way up and says its name to me
Silent e Pattern: Words or syllables that end in e. These words contain 1 consonant before the final e and 1 vowel
before that consonant. The vowel sound says its name to represent the long vowel sound (e.g. take, rope, bike)
When the e is at the end, the sound is gone; it makes the other vowel in the word say its name long

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2 Vowel Pattern (Vowel Digraphs and Vowel Diphthongs): Vowel digraph are knowns as the double vowel talkers;
they are syllables containing 2 adjacent vowels in which the first vowel is long (e.g. play, tree, seat) When 2
vowels go walking, the first one does the talking and says its name Vowel diphthongs are syllables that contain 2
adjacent vowels in which the vowels say neither their long nor their short sounds but instead make a whine sound
(e.g. drew, book, boy). Sometimes when 2 vowels are together they make a whine sound, like when you fall down
and want to be found- ow, aw, oy, and boo-hoo
Bossy R Pattern: A word or syllable containing 1 vowel followed by the letter r (e.g. star, girl, water) When the
vowel is followed by the letter r, the vowel has to let the r be the star
Consonant + le Pattern: Occurs in 2 syllable words, has a consonant immediately before an ending le (e.g. whistle,
apple, purple) The le grabs the consonant right before it, and it makes a clean syllable break to form the split

Spelling
Creating Words (pg. 89)
Materials: popcorn words, whiteboard/marker
Procedure: Present a popcorn word to the class but in a scrambled form. Give students a few minutes to write
what word they think it is on their whiteboard.

Recognizing
High-Frequency Words (pg. 92)
Materials: popcorn words, highlighters, highlighting tape, pipe cleaners, magnetic letters, dry-erase board/markers
Procedure:
Word Walls- See under spelling strategy (pg. 86)
Highlighting- Have students use highlighters, highlighting tape, pipe cleaners, or any other tool to highlight the
popcorn words in the text they are reading.
Make and Break- Have students use magnetic letters to make a word, scramble it up, and remake it.
Word Games- Have students use the words to play bingo and hangman.
Writing and Reading- Give students many opportunities to use these words in their writing and to recognize them
in their reading.

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Fluency:
Phrasing
Eye-Voice Span (pg. 99)
Materials: text passage,
Procedure:
With the class, begin to read aloud a passage on the Mimio. Just before finishing reading a sentence, cover up the
sentence. Where are your eyes looking to next? Have students demonstrate how they can still say the next
few words from the passage right after the text is removed. Discuss why this happens (i.e. because of the
distance, students eyes were ahead of their voices) Try to push your eyes forward ahead of your voice

Assisted Reading
Echo Reading (pg. 105)
Materials: text
Procedure:
Ask a fluent reader to model reading a sentence. Students reread the modeled sentence, striving to repeat
exactly how the fluent reader modeled it. This technique may be done one on one, small group, or whole group.
How does imitating what I read help you?

Rereading
Listen to Me (pg. 108) (Baggie Books)
Materials: text
Procedure:
Have students select books at their independent reading level to read aloud to others. Have student practice
reading aloud to several listening buddies. Listening buddies practice their active listening strategies by leaning in
toward the reader, keeping their eyes on the reader, and waiting until the reader is finished before speaking.
After a student has had several practice reads with a book, send the book home with the student to read to
others. The other listeners should sign a reading log and provide positive feedback on the students reading. Place
the books being used in the students independent reading basket for them to return to during independent
reading time. What happens each time you read the text again?

Expressing
ABC Punctuation Style (pg. 113)
Materials: Sentence Strips
Procedure:
Create ABC punctuation sentences by grouping letters from the alphabet on sentence strips or others means to
display for all to see. Have students read them with expression with the proper punctuation (e.g., abc. de! fgh?
ijk? lmn. op! qrs. tuv? wx! yz. )

Pacing
Beam Reading (pg. 121) (Use during guided reading)
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Materials: text, small flashlight
Procedure:
Display the text for all students to see. Use a flashlight to shine a light on the words as the students read aloud.
Move the light along the words at a steady pace. Try to keep up with the light to increase your reading rate.
Encourage students to follow along with the light as they read aloud. The rate at which you shine the light on the
words should increase with each rereading of the text selected. Have students practice this with partners, taking
turns using the light and practicing keeping the pace of the light. Is it easy or difficult for you to keep up with
the pace being modeled?

Wide Reading
Selecting Just Right Books (pg. 125)
Materials: Variety of leveled texts, three chairs of different sizes, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, anchor chart
Procedure:
Demonstrate how to choose a just-right book, and discuss the value of independently reading a book that fits the
reader. For example, have students read a page from a text and note each time they have difficulty with a word
by raising a finger. If early in the reading students have up 5 fingers, they should stop reading because the text
is not at the independent level. Read aloud Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Line up 3 chairs: one too small, one
too big, and one just right for students. Select 3 books for the demonstration: one too easy, one too hard, and
one just right for the student. How do you know if a book is just right for you? After modeling how to select a
book that is the right match, make class made anchor chart describing what type of book is just right (e.g. your
reading rate is just right, you can read most of the words, you can get the meaning from the story)

Accuracy
Letter Recognition (Pg. 92)
Materials: uppercase and lowercase letters, pictures relating to letters
Procedure:
Letter Matching- Have students match uppercase letters with corresponding lowercase letters, or letter-to-
letter match-up.
Letter Sorting- Ask students to classify letters according to various attributes. How would you sort these
letters?
Letter Art- Have students make a design with a specific letter

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Vocabulary:
Associating
Move to the Meaning (pg. 133)
Materials: Text, music instruments, items related to content, music
Procedure: Pass out musical instruments and have students create movement and music to associate to selected
words (i.e., emotion words such as excited and scared or weather words such as thunder or rain) Ask students to
share their musical creation of their word and to describe why they chose the instrument, tune, and rhythm for
their word.

Contextualizing
What do you mean? (pg. 140)
Materials: Words with multiple meanings
Procedure: Select words with multiple meanings to demonstrate how words can be used in different contexts that
change the meaning of a word. Show students a word and ask them to tell a partner what they think the word
means. Read the word in a sentence from a selected text and have students discuss with their partners whether
their predicted meaning for the word was correct. Show the context that surrounded the unknown word to
reveal its meaning. Give each pair of students one word to use in two different sentences. Share examples with
the class.

Categorizing
Picture and Word Sorts (pg. 145)
Materials: Picture cards
Procedure: Choose 15-20 picture cards. Have students work in pairs or a small group to discuss the features of
each word. Have students put the words into different categories by their similarities or differences.
Categories may include colors, action words, or simple nouns. You may determine the categories in advance ( a
closed sort) or the students may discuss the common features of the words and then determine for themselves
how to categorize them (open sort). Check with a partner to see if you both agree with the categories. After
all pictures have been sorted, have a class discussion to allow students to justify their sorting criteria. What
features do these words have in common?

Visual Imaging
Museum Walk (pg. 150)
Materials: clay
Procedure: Give each student a ball of clay and introduce a new vocabulary word. Have students form a visual
image of what the word means to them out of clay. Display the images around the room, and have the students
do a word museum walk to view the visual forms of the word. Try to look at all the clay forms and create a
definition of the word ______. Why did you choose the way you did to represent the word ______?

Analyzing
Playing with Plurals (pg. 154)
Materials: various items for demonstrating the (more than) plural concept
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Procedure: Display a tray of cookies and have the students describe what you have in your hand. Go around the
room and ask the students if they would like a cookie or cookies. I will listen to the end of your word to
determine what to give you. Discuss with students how listening to the ending of their word would help me
determine the amount to give. Hold up items and have the students decide if the corresponding word is singular or
plural (e.g. a ball or balls). Chart responses on whiteboard and highlight the letter s.

Word Awareness
Word Jars (pg. 158)
Materials: Jar
Procedure: As students come to a new, unfamiliar word, add it to the word jar. Encourage students to select a
word from the word jar that they would like to use throughout the week in their conversations or writing.

Wide Reading
Author Study (pg. 163)
Materials: Multiple texts from the same author
Procedure: Have students read several books by a particular author. During this author study, have students look
for keywords the author uses frequently in his or her writing. What pattern do you notice the author using for
his or her word choice? What are some of the vocabulary words the author uses that are interesting to you?

Referencing
Glossary Use (pg. 167)
Materials: Texts with glossaries, supplies such as markers and crayons for creating illustrated glossary
Procedure: Work with students to select several words from an informational text and look up their definitions in
the books glossary. Make students aware that nonfiction books often have glossaries of the terms used
throughout the text, and that words that appear in the glossary are often boldfaced or italicized in the running
text. How do you use the glossary to help you understand the meaning of a word? After reading the definition,
have students retell the definition to a partner and point out where that chosen word is in the text. Students
could also create an illustrated glossary.

11
Comprehension:
Previewing
Book Introduction (pg. 175)
Materials: Text
Procedure: Before reading a chosen book, discuss briefly with the students what the book is about, key concepts
in the book, and new vocabulary. Eliciting vocabulary use through discussions with students and then identifying a
few of those words directly within the text helps to implant the words in students minds. Have students preview
some of the pictures in the book as a source of information. Perhaps the pictures will provide clues about
Encourage students to think aloud, describing their reactions to the illustrations and the text. What does the text
seem to be about?

Activating and Building Background Knowledge

Connect and Reflect (pg. 178)
Materials: Text, Text-to-Self puzzle pieces
Procedure: Explain to students that a text-to-self connection is made when something in the story reminds you of
something in your life. Model for students a text-to-self connection. This reminds me of a time when. I made
a text-to-self connection in this story. Read text. After reading the text, give each student 2 puzzle pieces.
Students will illustrate or write the event from the text on one piece and what their personal connection was on
the other puzzle piece. What made the event so memorable? Share connections with other students.

Predicting
Story Impression (pg. 185)
Materials: Fiction or other story-oriented text
Procedure: Select 7 keywords that relate to significant information form the text you are about to read. Display
the chain of words in order in which they appear in the text for all students to see. These words should reflect
the following story elements: main characters, setting, problem, events, and solution. Try to imagine what is
going on in the story based off of the seven words presented. Have students work in partners or groups to
predict a story line using the words presented. Present to the class your story creation. What details or clues
from the selection did you use to make your prediction? Once all students have shared, read the story and have
students compare and contrast their stories to it.

Questioning
Ripple Effect (pg. 188)
Materials: Small bowl, colored pebbles, water, text
Procedure: Place small bowl of water in the middle of a group of students so all can see. Hold a few small colored
pebbles in your hand and demonstrate the rippling concept of when you throw a pebble into water and there is a
splash. Connect the concrete demonstration to what happens in your head as you think about a story or idea.
The pebble can represent a question that you form and toss out there. A ripple of thoughts (waves of
thinking) begins to spread and expand from the point of origin. During a read-aloud, hold some colored pebbles in
your hand and when a thought or questions occurs in your mind, stop and toss the pebble in the water. Share the
question and let the wave of thinking ripple into the conversation about the text.

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Visualizing and Sensory Imaging
Wordless Picture Books (pg. 194)
Materials: text, drawing paper
Procedure: As you read with students, discuss how to create mental pictures of it. What picture comes to mind
as I read the text, or as you read the text? Continue to read the text, not showing the picture. Ask students to
draw the picture that they created in their minds and to share their drawings with the class. Try to imagine
what the setting looks like. Re-read the text, showing the picture. Compare and contrast in comparison to what
students had drawn.

Inferring and Drawing Conclusions

Interpreting Text (pg. 199)
Materials: Text Whose Tail is This?
Procedure: Read aloud the passage, pausing after each section to ask Whats really going on? Discus with
students what you and they think is really happening in the text- to make their own interpretations.
Display a newspaper picture and ask the students to view it and determine what they would create as the heading
for the article.

Summarizing
Somebody/Wanted/But/So (pg. 206)
Materials: Paper folded into fourths
Procedure: Have students write the following headings on the four sections: Somebody, Wanted, But, So. Using a
story students have read, have students complete their individual charts by writing a statement under each
section. Somebody (identify the characters), Wanted (describe the characters goal or motivation), But
(describe a conflict that impedes the character), and So (describe the resolution of the conflict). How can you
use key ideas to condense the information in this story? Could also use hula hoops representing the four headings
and students walk through, summarizing each section.

Determining Importance
Picture This (pg. 209)
Materials: laminated photographs
Procedure: Gather several photographs to share with students. Ask students to describe what they think is
happening in the picture(s). Looking at the photograph, what might you state is the main reason this picture was
taken? Why? Write student responses directly onto pictures. Come to a consensus on the main purpose of the
picture(s).

Synthesizing
Creating a Play (pg. 213)
Materials: story props for text,
Procedure: Read aloud a story and tell students they will be acting it out. Think about how you would bring the
text to life Give students time to discuss, plan, and practice their interpretations of the text in small groups.
Discuss how their understanding of the text changed after students perform, if it has changed at all. I did not
understand it when the author said _______, but now I understand that __________.
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