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SnapWords Sight Word Cards for Right-Brained Learners

This morning, a customer shared the following: "I had to send you a quick note. I am an educator, running a private program for two students who are both right brain thinkers. We have only been using your SnapWords for the past couple of weeks and an amazing transformation has taken place! After learning that being a "right brain thinker" is an opportunity to learn in a different way, and using your program, my students have been totally inspired. It is working beyond my expectations. Not only do they look forward to our spelling but with all the words up on the wall, they have created a village of characters with the cards. Each card has its own personality based on the picture cues and they play an animated game that will only enhance their learning. I have combined your SnapWords with the Dyslexia or Being Right Brained! by MJ Turner and Karen Hope. Using 5 new words each day and the Right Brain spelling program, they are remembering the images of the words without phonetic prompting. (Which has not been effective.) These skills are transferring into their daily writing and other subject areas. I am pleased that our journey of learning has led us to you. Thank you." --Kristine

How to teach sight words using a word wall… and enhance comprehension in the process

In today's post I'll be sharing a series of activities that begin with word recognition and end with comprehension and higher order thinking. For the sake of this post, I am using 12 words, but in my classroom, the walls were full of words. We had a word wall which was arranged in ABC order in columns and then we had a wall devoted to our big words grouped by part of speech: nouns, verbs, and adjectives.

Activities

The word wall to display in your room is below. Note that as we progress through the activities, we will move from simple word recognition to more in-depth work.

    1.    Find and write. The purpose of this activity is to simply find the words accurately. In this activity, children are on the rug facing the word wall with whiteboards and markers on their laps. (I used paper and pencil only when I needed a hard copy at the end of the week to show which words each child truly recognized). Say, “Find and write the word KIND.” One clue that the children can learn to use at the beginning is listening for the initial sound in the word, which narrows the available choices down to one word in this example! If I call out a word such as BEGAN or NEVER, they will have to look past the initial sound to locate the correct word. Suggest they listen for the next consonant sound. If you say, “Find and write BEGAN,” the children will locate BEGAN and BETTER as both start with the B sound. Next, however, they would compare the G in BEGAN and the TT in BETTER with the word you called out. In this way, they can use clues to find the right word.

    2.    Rhyming words: The purpose of this activity is to get the child past just finding the word and to thinking about other characteristics. For this activity, you will say a word that rhymes with a word on the word wall and the children will need to find the correct word and write it.

          a. Find a word that rhymes with STIR (WERE)

          b. Find a word that rhymes with TEXT (NEXT)

          c. Find a word that rhymes with LETTER (BETTER)

          d. Find a word that rhymes with NOON (SOON)

          e. Find a word that rhymes with MIND (KIND, FIND)

          f. Find a word that rhymes with WONDER (UNDER)

          g. Find a word that rhymes with LEVER (NEVER)

          h. Find a word that rhymes with COUGH (OFF)

          i. Find a word that rhymes with STAR (FAR)

          j. Find a word that rhymes with ROVER (OVER)

          k. Find two words that rhyme with each other (FIND, KIND)

          l. Find four words that end exactly the same (BETTER, UNDER, NEVER, OVER)

    3.    Opposites and more: The purpose of this activity is to get the children thinking about the meanings of the words on their word wall.

          a. Find the word that is the opposite of LOSE (FIND)

          b. Find the word that is the opposite of MEAN (KIND)

          c. Find the word that is the opposite of UNDER (OVER)

          d. Find the word that is the opposite of ARE (WERE)

          e. Find the word that is the opposite of ENDED (BEGAN)

          f. Find the word that is the opposite of ALWAYS (NEVER)

          g. Find the word that is the opposite of ON (OFF)

          h. Find the word that is the opposite of NEAR (FAR)

          i. Find the word that is the opposite of WORSE (BETTER)

          j. Find the word that is the opposite of LAST (NEXT)

    4.    Use the clues: Again, this is an activity that will require the children to think of the meanings of the words. Tell the children you will provide them with clues and they will find the word that best answers the clue.

          a. This word means “Not under something.” (OVER)

          b. This word means “It’s not as bad as it used to be!” (BETTER)

          c. This word means “They used to be.” (WERE)

          d. This word means “Not on.” (UNDER)

          e. This word is what you do when you lose something. (FIND)

          f. This word means it will not happen ever. (NEVER)

          g. This word means, “One more, and then me!” (NEXT)

          h. This word means, “Something is on top of me, so I am…” (UNDER)

          i. This word means, “To start something.”(BEGIN)

          j. This word means, “Not near.” (FAR)

 

The activities we've talked about above are examples of some of the types of activities found in The Reading Teacher's Encyclopedia. This resource on CD includes many writing activities and other games for different levels of learning.

Why SnapWords sight word cards are so great for visual and kinesthetic learners

A customer recently shared the following about using SnapWords with visual and kinesthetic learners: "I just wanted to let you know that I think SnapWords are a great product. I am currently working towards my masters in special education and I am a 1st grade learning support teacher. I used SnapWords as an intervention for a student with a learning disability in the area of reading. When I tested him on 60 words, he was able to only read 15 in 12 minutes. I have introduced 30 SnapWords to him so far and when I tested him on 30 words (wo/ the visual), he was able to read 28/30. He told me that when he reads the words, he now can see the picture in his mind and it helps him to remember it. Thank you for creating such a great product that appeals to the visual and kinesthetic learner!"

We're so happy that this customer shared her experience with the cards. Her comment explains so well what happens when children have images to help them bridge the gap from not reading... to reading!

 

 

How to Teach SnapWords (Sight Words with Pictures) to Your Child

A question we are asked a lot is, "So now that I have the SnapWords cards, what do I do next? How do I use them to teach my child his sight words?" Here are some tips for making your sight word time fun, low key, and without any pressure. The approach is to enjoy looking at the words together. You can be confident that your child WILL learn and will learn easily, so your own confidence in him will fuel his success. This is critical.

Some key points:

• When you introduce the words, always TELL her what the word says instead of making her guess. This is critical because if she is looking at a picture and says the wrong word, that wrong word will be stuck in her head.
• Don’t go through the whole stack at one sitting, but rather, choose a small group of words (see this suggested sequence of words to follow). 
• With each word you read, refer to the back of the card with her to read the sentence to her and do the body motion together. She will see the word embedded in the image, hear herself saying it, do a body motion that reflects the meaning of the word, and finally use it in a sentence so she will think about what the word means. This is complete and truly multisensory learning.
• When you have talked about the pictures on your group of words, go through the cards another time, this time asking her if she remembers each word.
• Those sight words that she remembers, applaud, and lay to one side – these are her friends. Those sight words that she doesn’t know instantly, keep in your hand. Make a game out of “making friends” out of the words.
• Once she can whip unhesitatingly through the 10-12 cards you are working with, tell her there is a new game. This time, you are going to look at the backs of the cards to see if she can read the words without the pictures. Again, you are looking for cards/words that are her new friends – ones she can read instantly.
• Don’t rush, no pressure. Her progress will speed up the more you work on this together.
• Play the games in the booklet of activities that comes with any order of 607, 306 or 301 SnapWords cards or that's available for free on our website.  
• Try to pay close attention to her attention span. If she is starting to seem bored or like she’s had enough, stop immediately and leave it for another time. SHORT lesson time is better.

These are just a few basic tips for using the SnapWords™ sight word cards. What games or activities have you done with them?

Another Milestone for Child1st’s SnapWords™ (sight word picture cards)

We’ve recently published dozens of new SnapWords™ to add to our bestselling 306 Teaching Cards and 306 Pocket Chart Cards sets. Previously we had List A, List B, List C, List D, List E, and Numbers & Colors; to those lists we’ve added List F, List G, Nouns List 1, Nouns List 2, and Verbs for a new total of 607 SnapWords™!

Where did we get the words to stylize?

Back in 2000, I started illustrating the 220 Dolch high frequency words. These were the words that teachers in my area were required to teach, the words that were "pushed" in my graduate reading classes as we learned to teach and remediate reading. I made the first version of Dolch SnapWords™ quickly each night so they would be ready to use with my students the next day. They were useful and helped children learn, but the designs were nothing to write about in an excited letter to your mother.

Over time, as I worked with other children and came across more words that children struggled with, I added more words. I loved the Fountas & Pinnell lists of words, so I began to add their 100 Most Frequently Recurring words. Of course some of these overlapped with the 220 Dolch words, but I did add those that didn’t overlap.

Next, customers would write to request specific words their district required, or words their children just couldn’t seem to learn and remember. This is how the words “friend," "surely," "great," "giant,” and some of their friends were added a few years ago.

Then we had requests from specific larger districts for particular words, some taken from Dolch and some from Fry. So when all this new information came in, we decided to just buckle down and design ALL the rest of the words that would comprise not only the 220 Dolch words, but the 500 Frequently Recurring words from Fountas & Pinnell and Fry’s list of 300 sight words! So no matter what list your district requires you use, no matter if you are a homeschooling parent or a parent wanting to boost your child’s repertoire of sight words, you can now confidently reach for a set of 607 SnapWords™ Teaching Cards, or 607 SnapWords™ Pocket Chart Cards knowing that once your child or your students have mastered all 607 words, they will be able to read anything you throw at them!

What comes after learning Sight Words?

I hear this question a LOT. My answer is always two-fold:

    1.    Use The Illustrated Book of Sounds & Their Spelling Patterns. There is nothing like it for helping a child learn the structure of words, how to spell them correctly, and thus read any word, no matter how difficult. It will be one of your most effective tools! All the lessons are ready to photocopy, and all levels are spanned. One resource and you can teach anyone from K through adult! This resource covers the basics of word structure (phonics) spelling, and helps with vocabulary expansion and comprehension. WOW!

 

 

    2.    The Reading Teacher’s Encyclopedia rounds out this powerful trio of products. It is also a resource that is done for you (can you tell that I was once a harried classroom teacher?). This resource on CD covers the other components of reading: fluency, vocabulary, phonemic awareness, comprehension, and phonics – and even adds writing. All are done from the foundation of learning high frequency words… using our SnapWords™. The CD provides all the printables, plain word wall words, writing prompts, and games of all kinds that are ready to photocopy and distribute.

What is so wonderful about these three resources is that you can be assured that when you use them, you will be covering the concepts you need to cover without stress. What is even most wonderful? Your children will love learning because it will be in a language they speak already –visuals, body movements, color, humor, stories, etc. All elements that make learning fun for children!

Practice reading and storytelling with SnapWords Sight word cards

Love this recent email about how one family practiced sight words using SnapWords cards.

I absolutely LOVE Snap Words!!! They are so much fun, and my boys found a new way to learn them that they came up with all by themselves on their own time! I put a few of the stylized words on the cork board in their room just to see if this might stimulate their little minds outside of our "school" setting. I had already tucked them in for the night, and I was walking past their room I could hear them whispering and giggling! So I paused for a moment to listen....., and then I saw a light flickering followed by more laughing! So I went in to find them lying on top of their beds' shining a flashlight on the word "laugh" as they busted out laughing at me! They had been making up funny stories in this manner: one would shine the light on a word and then quickly turn it off. The other thought of a story about the word that would be added to the next word on which the light flashed. And of course they lit up the word "laugh" as I walked in, and we all had a good "laugh" as they shared their stories with me. Thank you for sparking the creative minds of my children and for a night I will never forget.

What a clever way to practice reading and storytelling! We love it!

How SnapWords (sight word picture cards) help with reading comprehension, reading, and spelling

Very often when children are learning to read, they focus so much on naming words that they don’t absorb the meaning of the words they are reading. Poor reading comprehension is a problem that plagues thousands of children. So I'd like to suggest some tools and strategies that will go a long way toward helping children improve their reading comprehension over time.

Basically when we read, we need to create a mental scene that shows the action or the content of the material we read. For me, and for other right-brained or visual learners, this mental scene is a global picture that is formed when we read. We actually see pictures in our minds and when action occurs, we see what might be called mental movies. I cannot speak for how dominant left-brained people react to print. I have heard that they think in words and I am not sure what that means nor what that looks like (please feel free to comment if you can shed light on this question).

Images help children improve reading comprehension

So, when teaching children who struggle with comprehension, it is really helpful to have images accompany words and sentences. The image is like a stepping-stone to creating mental images for themselves. In fact, during early learning when children are just beginning to learn words, it is critical to embed images into the words because so many young children believe their goal is to learn to say the words they see, or to sound them out. Often, no one tells them the words carry meaning! So to embed a picture from day one will help them avoid reading comprehension problems. As these children are learning their first words, talk to them about making mental images for themselves and how important this skill is.

How to teach visualization

The first step toward creating mental images is to use stylized picture words such as SnapWords™, where the images are already embedded. Have the child study the image and notice details. Next, have the child close his eyes and “see” the image with word embedded in his own imagination. The more you do this, the stronger the imagination/visualization muscle will become. And if you share with the child that visualization is a powerful learning tool, they will come to habitually practice visualization without being prompted to.

Try it yourself. Here is a word to study and then to visualize with eyes closed. How long do  you think you will remember this word and the picture? I designed this stylized word a long time ago; yet any time I think of the word “enough,” I picture these characters and I believe sincerely that they just had Thanksgiving dinner and ate too much and that the little girl is managing to vocalize the fact that she had more than enough to eat! The character playing the part of the G is content to let her speak for him, while the H character is gazing off into space in a sated euphoria.

Word pictures also help with spelling

The meaning behind this word is very clear. Point out that the two L’s are guys who are  helping the first guy pull on the rope for their team. Then, talk about the size of the first guy… the big muscley chest. Next have the child close her eyes and see the word in her imagination; doubtless she will be able to read, comprehend and know how to spell the word after doing all that.

In fact, try this. Have the child, still with her eyes closed, describe the image she sees in her mind. How many boys are pulling on the rope? Which one has a big muscle-bound chest? How many are tall and thin? When she is finished describing what she sees, have her open her eyes and write the word she saw in her mind on paper.

(Two weeks from now, check your own memory of this image, and then check the child’s memory.)

Images are worth a thousand words

It is difficult for me to when I'm learning a new concept to only have someone’s words as they speak to me. For me, images make all the difference. A confession here. I am middle aged and truly did not understand the difference between a sea and an ocean. I always assumed (because I never really thought about the difference) that they were used interchangeably and that “sea” was used in more romantic, sentimental, poetic occasions. For instance, it's used in a lullaby I heard my mother sing when I was really little, which I had the pleasure and delight of singing to my new grandson this winter.

Sweet and Low

By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Sweet and low, sweet and low,

         Wind of the western sea,

Low, low, breathe and blow,

         Wind of the western sea!

Over the rolling waters go,

Come from the dying moon, and blow,

         Blow him again to me;

While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps.

 

Sleep and rest, sleep and rest,

         Father will come to thee soon;

Rest, rest, on mother's breast,

         Father will come to thee soon;

Father will come to his babe in the nest,

Silver sails all out of the west

         Under the silver moon:

Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep.

 

This song has always captured me, and it is what I associate “sea” with… a poetic, evocative scene illustrated with vivid images in my mind.

However, I abandoned my right brained-ness long enough to consult an expert about the difference between sea and ocean, and this is what I found:

“Many people use the terms "ocean" and "sea" interchangeably when speaking about the ocean, but there is a difference between the two terms when speaking of geography (the study of the Earth's surface). Seas are smaller than oceans and are usually located where the land and ocean meet. Typically, seas are partially enclosed by land.”
Office of Coast Survey
A History of Charting America's Waters, NOAA 200th
Anniversary Web Site

This was great to learn about. So here are two stylized sight words: “ocean” and “sea.” The image for ocean conveys more the depth and vastness of the body of water, while the image for sea allows the child to see where seas might be located: on the edges of the ocean, but partially surrounded by land. In the stylized sight word for “sea,” there are three seas and each has a sailboat. In the picture, the whales will help lead into a discussion about the ocean and the huge body of water where the whales are swimming, but the seas are actually somewhat protected by land in a side or more.

After staring at this word for a few seconds, I can see how permanently the word, complete with meaning and spelling, is branded on my mind. I can image standing on the island (e) and watching the whales and feeling the salt air blowing me around a bit. I can hear sea gulls and the waves lapping.

This is a complete learning experience —far different from showing a child the word SEA and telling them a sea is a body of water on the edge of an ocean that is partially surrounded by land. That learning experience may or may not stick!

Lets band together to help our children love learning!

 

Q: Do you have any sight word worksheets or games to play to reinforce sight words?

A: In general, I am not a huge fan of “worksheets.” Having said that, however, all paper and pencil activities are not bad! Games and other such activities are wonderful for teaching and reinforcing reading concepts. Any time we can use a game to teach, the better! Part of the reason this is true is that the child will anticipate learning with interest rather than dreading it, but also if the child is playing a game or participating in an activity, she will be an active learner. She won’t have the opportunity to just sit and let others around her participate.

An amazing resource to use along with our sight word picture cards is The Reading Teacher’s Encyclopedia. We call it an encyclopedia because it is packed full of games and activities to use while you teach the sight words. Best of all, it includes all the most important elements of reading: fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, phonics, phonemic awareness, and writing. Find out more information about this resource now! 

In fact, if you use SnapWords™ (sight word picture cards), The Illustrated Book of Sounds & Their Spelling Patterns, and the Encyclopedia all together, you will be taking care of learning sight words, learning phonics and spelling, and the other elements of reading and writing, including comprehension, phonemic awareness, etc.

Finally, please take advantage of all the information, how-to’s, and activity ideas found here on our blog. Browse by topic by choosing a category from the left. And if you have specific comments or questions, leave a comment or email me at sarah(at)child-1st(dot)com. Let’s all keep on helping our children love learning!

Q: Do you have tips for teaching children who learn words but don't spell them correctly on tests or when writing?

A: I have heard this comment more times than I could possibly tell. The very best way to teach words and have that learning transfer into USE is to use the SnapWords™ (sight word picture cards) with your child. The reason is that as you show a child the card and let him really look at it, talking about the images just like you would as you read him a picture book,  his brain actually snaps a picture of the word complete with image. As you talk about what is going on, he is also associating the meaning of the word (comprehension help!) as he learns to recognize the word in print.

To transfer that to writing, I would suggest:

1. Have him look at a word and study the picture, noticing details.
2. Turn the card over for him to see the plain word.
3. Read him the sentence on the back.
4. Have him do the body motion you find on the back of the card.
5. Turn the card back over to the front and tell him you want to play a game.
6. Say, "Look at the picture again and then close your eyes."
7. "Do you see the picture in your head?"
8. Have him open his eyes and see if he can write on paper what he saw in his head.

If you do this activity on a regular basis, the child will learn to rely more and more heavily on his powerful sense of visualization.

Following is another tremendous help that I have used with students with great success; it helps with spelling words correctly in writing.

After introducing sight words a few minutes a day, consider teaching your child the construction of words using The Illustrated Book of Sounds & Their Spelling Patterns.

This book is leveled and will teach all the sound spelling from K through adult words, but it uses a fun format of cartoons and humor; children and young people love lessons in this format. If you teach the sight words and then follow the format and the sequence that is suggested in the book, you will help your child soar in reading in about 35 minutes a day!

Q: How do I teach sight words to beginners or teach reading to beginners?

A: I love this topic! New learners are right in the developmental stage in which their right hemisphere is rapidly developing. What this means for us as parents and teachers is that the most efficient way to teach sight words to beginners or to teach reading to beginners is through pictures, body movement, story, metaphor, humor, color and more! This is why Child1st exists as a company. Once we found out how effective these teaching vehicles are with beginners and with other older visual learners, we were on fire! I am passionate about catching these young learners before they experience difficulty and become discouraged.   

Read more about fun and easy ways to teach very young children.

Also check out our kit for teaching reading to K through 1st grade.