Word cards, picture cards—y’all have ’em, right? You may use the cards in pocket charts, at centers, and on word walls and with large groups, small groups, and individual students. And you may think the ways in which you use these cards to reinforce skills are the same ways other teachers use these cards. But wait! I’m thinking this is not the case. In fact, I’m willing to claim teachers everywhere are using word cards and picture cards in different ways. Of course, I need some proof…and I have a plan! 🙂
Share your best ideas for using word cards and picture cards on this post and three things will happen. One, your name will be entered in a drawing to receive the book of your choice from The Mailbox. Two, each idea you submit will be evaluated for purchase by an editor from The Mailbox (Cha-ching! A purchased idea earns $20 in The Mailbox bucks!) Three, you’ll prove my claim!
Bring on the ideas!
Diane
PS: Submit your ideas before midnight ET Thursday, February 28!
Congratulations to Lisa! She’s the winner of our giveaway!
I use my “Word Wall Words” or as we call them “Trick Words” as a pass to move to the next activity or into the classroom. I have put all these words on a flip-index card notebook. When it is time to move I show the words I want my students to know, they must read the word before they can move on. If a child get stuck or pronounce a word incorrect I move to another child and come back. The notebook allows me to flash cards I want individual students to know. The students like the challenge.
I extended a Mailbox idea to use with sight words.
Who let the word out (originally who let the letter out)
We sing who let the letter out and I show a sight word for example he the boys stomp their feet. When its she the girls wave their hands up in the air. Each word we give a motion too and the kids love it.
I use my students’ name cards as “exit” cards for my preschoolers. When we are transitioning from one center to another or moving from our classroom to the gym, I put out a name cards on the floor(if the children are seated in a circle on the floor) or under the document camera so the name is projected on the wall (if the children are seated at tables). Then the “exit ticket” for each child to leave the group or activity is to quietly watch for their name to appear. For really young preschoolers, you could use pictures of each child. It helps the little ones to move orderly, increase their attention span, and wait quietly for their turn.
I also use this with picture or letter cards and the children have to give the initial sound for the picture or tell a rhyming word for the picture or whatever skill we are working on.
I use them for review of the story before an assessment and when we have aread a few stories, we use the pictures to write a new story!
You’re right, there are so many different ways to use picture cards! One of the ways I like to use them is as story starters. Kids draw a certain number of cards (4-5 works well for the kindergarten age group) and have the kids write or tell a story that includes each of the objects on the cards.
We also use pure picture cards (without words or letters on them) for alphabet sorts and beginning sound identification. For alphabet sorts, a child gets a variety of picture cards beginning with one or two letters (e.g. “a” and “b” words), a basket for each of the letters, and a number of pictures with other (e.g. non “a” or “b” words. The child sorts the cards into words that begin with “a”, words that begin with “b”, and words that begin with neither “a” nor “b”.
One of my favourite activities with picture cards is more of a creative thinking exercise. Shuffle the cards, and have a child turn over two or three. Then challenge her to come up with things the objects shown on the cards have in common (e.g. they are all things you can find in the grocery store, or they are all two syllable words), and ways they are different (for example, they each have a different beginning sound). There is no write or wrong answer, and it’s fascinating to see the different connections that can be made.
I use sight word cards to play Concentration. I use the Dolch words from http://www.theschoolbell.com and cut/paste them to index cards. The students flip the cards over to try and make a match.
My school system uses Intensive Phonics so I write words on index cards and laminate them. Students practice “marking” the words. To hold them accountable, I make them write their name on the back of the card and then I check their work at a later time.
I also use picture cards for my ELL learners. I have noticed that these students often struggle with knowing the English name for items (pig, mug, couch, etc.) so I use the cards for them to practice naming objects.
I have used word cards to help support and inspire students when they are writing a story. Words are spread out for students to select to use while writing. This way, students are getting exposure to many common words. By using the word cards, they will be able to spell the words correctly while writing. Therefore, they are spending their time creating/writing the story instead of struggling with correcting spelling errors.
I put seasonal words on my word wall on die cut papers of that season or holiday. For example fall words may be on pumpkin shaped paper. After that holiday or season is over, we would generate words for the next one on an appropriately shaped paper. It really helped with their writing and the words were easier for them to find than on a word bank.
I’m an Autism teacher & I make my own & use flash cards for so many things:
1- spelling words (Dolch words)
2- individual letters to spell spelling words
3- addition & subtraction cards
4- individual numbers to pick 2 cards and add and subtract the 2 numbers.
5- I made emotion cards by cutting pictures out of magazines/internet and my students had to match the pictures to the proper word card. Ex. A crying child picture would match to the word; sad.
There’s so much you can do with flash cards.
I use word cards for many, many things. Spelling words, vocabulary words, vowel patterns, games, math facts, centers. Could not teach without them.
In our preschool, we like to surround the children with examples of literacy. We laminate nouns on cards and attach them around the classroom for incidental sight reading, e.g. “sink”, “table”. We also make cards for our monthly word bulletin board and hang descriptive words on it, “wet”, “icy”, “cold”, “snowy”. We also make cards with the children’s names for them to use for check-in charts for our center times, and play a game of “Mixed-up names” on our circle carpet. This helps all the children to begin to recognize all their classmate’s names. We’ve made matching games with word and picture cards for the children to use during center times, which give the children experience with making associations, beginning letter sounds, number concepts, and similarities and differences. We save and cut up lots of old magazines, and have created picture and word cards for several learning games in our science area, e.g. sort the animals by how they move, what is on their bodies(fur, feather, scales) or where they live. We also use picture cards for a large, felt Venn diagram the children use to sort pictures based on various characteristics. We also write out a question of the day on word cards and the children place their name cards in “yes” or “no” slots.
Students often have difficulty deciding what to write about. I like to use picture cards to give my students ideas. By studying a picture, students can write a story about what he or she thinks is happening or just use it as a springboard to get started. It’s interesting to see how students see the same picture in different ways.
I use them for vocabulary assessment. I also, post them on my word wall. I teach Early Childhood Special Education and most of my students are speech delayed so we use the picture cards for small groups and introducing and reviewing a theme. I love my picture cards! I am always buying new ones, since I’m can’t draw and who has time to color anyway.
We use them for vocabulary hopscotch. We place the word cards on a giant hopscotch playmat in the classroom and then play away. The kids have to answer questions and then they get to take a turn. they love it.
Writing prompts for ESL. Students love them!
I use words cards for many things as well. My word wall is the main thing, however, I use verb word cards to play charades when I am teaching verbs. I use adjective word cards to play my own version of “Fun-glish.” I also use them to display my spelling words and play numerous spelling activities, including but not limited to…exercising by spelling our words each morning, Battleship Spelling, Word-up Heads-up Seven-up, Word Snowball Fight, Silent Spelling (using both word cards & several stacks of abc cards), Donut Box Spelling…the list goes on and on!!