Back to Basics

While on winter break, I began doing some private literacy tutoring. I had just one problem: all of the tools that I depend on when I tutor were at school. At first, I didn't think we would be able to make any progress because lessons might not be as fun. However, I soon found that stripping away layers and layers of unnecessary activities, games, and crafts might actually work better in the long run.

Over the course of five weeks, we were able to make around a grade level of progress, so I thought the method I used would be worth sharing.

During this tutoring, I used two tools: a language tool kit, which includes a deck of sound cards, and the book Phonics at Your Fingertips. We would review sounds with the tool kit and cover a few new concepts in the book each lesson. For each concept, I would have my learner read a list of words and then I would dictate another list to him. 

I'm planning on retraining all of our tutors with this method. Though it may not be as effective for every student, the results show that it's worth trying.

Teaching Historical Fiction: It's Not as Bad as it Seems

The months of November and December yield countless times to dust off your history books and delve into some more truth-grounded material. Not sound fun for you? That's okay. Most people share your attitude.

Luckily for us who have a hard time teaching historical fiction, Scholastic has put together a great list full of reasons that motivate us to get on our game and teach it anyway. The article, titled "Why and How I Teach Historical Fiction", is great!

Want more help? Scholastic has you covered on that one, too. They have a whole page of articles, games, and resources for teachers wanting to work on their historical fiction skills. Visit Historical Fiction Genre Study to see them all.

Feel like testing the waters on your own? My advice to you is to make it fun! No student can resist learning about the Mayflower Compact by drawing up a "compact" of their own, and who wouldn't want to learn about Veteran's Day by talking to local veterans? By tying activities into your reading, you're making it a great learning experience for your kids. It alway helps to pick a great book, too!

Flocabulary: A Great Tool for Tutors

I was searching for a good vocabulary list recently, when I stumbled across Flocabulary. This is such a cool concept. The method uses hip hop to teach vocabulary lessons, which surprised me when it actually worked!

This site is definitely worth checking out. If you don't feel like paying for it, you can always get a free subscription or just use their vocabulary lists for lessons. I've found that the list is very complete and perfect for those learners who want to polish up their vocab!

Either way, this site is definitely worth checking out!

Journaling: A Great Tutoring Tool

I always tell tutors to write duing their lessons. It's perfect reinforcing vocabulary, teaching new concepts, setting up for your next lesson, and so much more! But they always ask me how to go about it. My answer: Journaling! Here are a few tips to getting your journaling underway:

1. Go to Walmart just before school and stock up on a few composition notebooks. Composition notebooks are the BEST choice for journaling. Loose-leaf papers gets lost and torn, and it's too much worry to let your learner bring their own.

2. Plan it out. It's sometimes a good idea to wing it, but journaling takes structure, especially if your learner isn't used to writing. You can make your prompt about what you're learning, something they like, or something you'd like to know about them. Anything works as long as they're writing!

3. Take a good look at what they've written. You can find tons of material for lessons in this. What do you notice? Look for: fragmented sentences, misplaced puncuation, misspelled words, and poor vocabulary. You can use journals to teach these concepts, then use it to reinforce them.

4. Build. At this point, you should be able to make all kinds of lessons from the journal. You can do free-writing, more complex prompts, and much more!

At first, working with a journal seems like a big task, but once you see how much you can do with it you'll realize its worth. If you get stuck, go online for journal prompts. One book that I love is Unjournaling (check it out!).

Keep Track of What You Read

When I was in high school, a favorite teacher told me about a website where you could create your own "bookself" of all the books you have read. Of course, I immediatly created one, and I've been using the site ever since.

Shelfari lets you create your own shelf and then update books as you read. I think this would be a great way to incorporate technology into your tutoring sessions. I'm always telling tutors to keep track of the books read in their sessions, but this would be a way to allow your learner to update every book!

So here's my idea: introduce Shelfari to your learner as a fun way to keep track of what they're reading. Make your own page as an example. Encourage your learner to read at home and then share their page at every session. Once a certain number of books have been read, offer prizes.

There are far simpler ways to do this, like book charts and stickers. However, if you have a learner who is interested in technology, you can't go wrong asking them to create their own page online.

Flowers Activity: More on Nouns and Verbs

I was getting ready for my lesson today and hit a wall. I just couldn't figure out a fun activity to review nouns and verbs. Every single site I went to offered a worksheet, and I really didn't want to do a worksheet to review.

So I decided that, since flowers are starting to bloom, we would do a noun and verb activity with flowers. Here's what I did:

1) I cut out two yellow circles about the size of the bottom of a cup. On these, I wrote "noun" and "verb". These are the centers of my flowers.

2) I cut petals out of pink and orange paper. I didn't do any particular size on these, just what looks good. However, I did cut them all the same size. You will need eight pink and eight orange for each flower.

3) On each of the petals, I wrote a noun or a verb. Remember, each flower should have eight petals.

4) Using a medium-sized white board (you can use whatever you have around, walls would work fine!), I taped the flower centers to the board. On one side of the board, I mixed the petals up and taped them in no particular order.

5) I introduced the activity and gave my learner five minutes to complete it independently. When she asked, I helped her with more difficult words.

I used this as a review, but it could easily be used during the initial lesson. If you're teaching a boy who isn't interested in flowers, you could change the theme. For example, a noun and a verb cloud with nouns and verbs written on raindrops. You can also change it to fit whatever topic you're teaching.

I think this activity worked well becuase it not only showed me what we needed to continue working on, but it also worked as an assessment without any anxiety. I would definitely recommend trying it!

A Fun Way to Teach Parts of Speech

Just a  few weeks ago I started teaching parts of speech to my learner. At first, it was extremely difficult because I wasn't sure how to get her to connect what I was teaching to the words she reads, but then I remembered this goofy looking set of books we had in our tutoring center. They turned out to be a fantastic resource.

The Words are CATegorical book set by Brian P. Cleary is a great way to teach parts of speech becuase they use rhymes and silly illustrations to rienforce their concepts. The books are fun to read and easy to pay attention to, so your learner will have no problem listening. You can purchase the books online at Really Good Stuff.

For more great ways to teach parts of speech, check out websites like Teachnology and ABC Teach. You can also use online games like this snake-themed game on 4Kids. If you want to keep it simple, games like Simon Says seem to do the trick. Remember, keeping your lessons fun will make learning more enjoyable!