Banana Split Words

Two posts in the same day?? There may be a blog post law about this somewhere...But I'm going to go with it anyways. Forgive me! ha

When I was off last week for snow days I got to thinking about ways to improve my kids sight word and reading fluency. I still have some sweeties who try to sound out sight words. I decided that I wanted to start sending home Fry word lists in their SAFARI books as something extra they can practice and study in their spare time at home. {they already have word lists they practice each week with their reading story} I started thinking of ways of how to track their progress and what would be a fun incentive for them learning the Fry words.....enter "Banana Split Words!" I immediately began working on a fun pack to use with my class called "Banana Split Words."

This pack was created to help improve my first grade students sight word and reading fluency through the use of Edward B. Fry’s Instant words {Fry Words}. This pack includes the first 600 Fry words. I have broken the first 600 words down into 30 lists of 20 words. All of my students will start out with list 1. Students will let me know when they are ready to be assessed on a list and I will give those as time permits. Students will work at their own pace for this project. They will not get a new list until they have fully mastered the list they are working on. As a fun incentive for learning the words and to reward students for their hard work I have named the Fry Words “Banana Split Words.” We will track our progress and at the end of the year we will celebrate by having a banana split party. I have included two different ways to track student progress. The first way is by building a banana split. Students will start with a bowl. Each time they master a set of “Banana Split Words” you will add an ingredient to their banana split. Depending on the goal you set for your class may depend on how many banana splits they actually build. You could set a class goal each grading period, twice a year, or once at the end of the year. You can set the goal {number of lists/words they master} depending on their ability and grade level. This pack includes the first 600 Fry Words but depending on the grade and age group will be a deciding factor in the goal you set for your class. Once you have set their goal, students will begin practicing their words at their own pace at home. When students meet the goal then they will participate in the banana split party. Or you could also let everyone participate in the banana split party to celebrate everyone’s progress. Up to you! For the second way of tracking student progress I have included monkey and banana patterns. Each student will start with a monkey. When they master a list of “Banana Split Words” they will receive a banana above their monkey. For this way of tracking you can set a goal for the number of bananas they should have. For this way you can also set a goal each grading period, twice a year, or by the end of the year. You will also celebrate by having a banana split party.

There is a note to parents explaining “Banana Split Words”, 30 word lists, 30 assessments, banana split ingredient images to make a bulletin board tracking display, monkey and banana images to make a bulletin board tracking display, tracking display examples, certificate of completion, a banana split party donation note to parents, and thank you notes or parents.

This is my display....that I seriously whipped up mega quick! I have a jungle/monkey theme in my classroom this year so I decided to use some monkeys and bananas {from creative teaching press} that I already had on hand that were already cut and laminated. I went crazy buying monkey and jungle stuff this summer.. so needless to say I have a lot of extra on hand that was begging to be used! haha My classroom is tiny and display space is very limited. I had to use this board behind my desk to display our monkeys. Normally, I would have put the monkeys at the bottom...but due to my desk covering up part of the bottom of the board I put the monkeys at the top. I haven't sent any lists home yet, so that's why there is not any bananas yet. I plan on sending list 1 home with my kiddos next week.

 

 I will put this somewhere next year....but for the sake of not having to rearrange my other boards at this point in the year I went with the one board that was somewhat vacant...it will have to do! haha 

Here is a preview of the display ideas that are included in this pack. The pack has images included to create these displays.

Banana Split images for this document are from Dancing Crayon Designs.

Monkey images for this document are from Creative Clips.

Here is a preview of the word lists and assessments.

You can check this pack out here! 

A banana split sounds yum right about now...a trip to Dairy Queen might just be on the agenda tonight! ;)