As students proceed through the lessons, more story groups are available for reading aloud. In the first story groups, the language is quite controlled. In later story groups, after students have mastered a large percentage of the phonics patterns of English, the language increasingly resembles the language of ordinary texts the student will see at school or in the library.

*Find the required lessons by selecting 120 Lessons from the top tab of the website.

Oral language provides a foundation for communication of ideas and intelligent conversation, and the development of other language skills. Before students achieve proficiency in reading and writing, oral language is one of the most important means of learning and of acquiring knowledge.
Things to consider when selecting words to teach:
•Teach words that are central to the concept students must learn.
•Teach only words students do not already know.
•Teach students to use context clues, when available.
•Teach only a few words at a time so meaning is retained.
•Relate new words to previously learned words.
•Provide multiple exposures to words.

The work that teachers do varies greatly, but they are connected by their belief the power of talk. During the year these teachers supported oral language in their own way. This projected used an appreciative inquiry model to support and capture the widely divergent strategies, learnings, and support teacher's individual needs while supporting oral language development in the classroom.

Hopefully you can find some oral language activities in this handout that you can use in your classroom. Thank you for working to support the oral language abilities of the students on Saskatchewan’s Hutterite Colonies!

Oral language forms the basis of all reading and writing.
Here are some ideas of how to teach oral language skills in your classroom.

Orange Shirt Day activities for K-Grade 3This activity pack is ready to use in any primary classroom and ideal to use with children from Grade 1 up to Grade 3 to support important conversations around Orange Shirt Day. It includes a PowerPoint, fact files, art activities and more! 

The following files contain all learning outcomes for each grade from kindergarten through grade 12 written in student-friendly I CAN statements, as well as outcomes.

This is a very useful tool for PeBL initiatives and can be used by teachers or students when designing learning activities and assignments.

Talk for Writing is an engaging teaching framework developed by Pie Corbett, supported by Julia Strong. It is powerful because it is based on the principles of how children learn. It enables children to imitate the language they need for a particular topic orally, before reading and analysing it, and then writing their own version.

Great games and activities for reading and math for kids aged 3 to 11. This site is targeted at parents and children, and can easily be used for free at home.

Phonological Awareness Screening Test (PAST)
*everything you need is provided including instructions and documents.

This website hosts a variety of resources related to the science of reading.

The following is an example from 2018-2019 of what parents can do at home to support phonological awareness with their child at home.
Each month has approximately 10 or more very short activities you can do with your child, and it includes the answers you should expect from your child.

If parents did these 5 simple things they would greatly improve their child's readiness for school and reading. These suggestions come from a former Reading Recovery Teacher and a mother of a very early reader.

These free lessons are designed to help teachers, parents, guardians, and tutors support children with phonemic awareness over the summer.

What an amazing way to fill some gaps or get a jump on the year ahead! There are 6 weeks of lessons.

There are lessons to be downloaded (you will need to sign up - it's free!), video lessons to support you and even a letter to send to parents to explain the program and how they can use it at home.

This is really great!

This could be helpful if you are required to wear a mask and still teach letter sounds...

a: a-a-a (open mouth wide as if to take a bite of an apple) b – (make a short, strong b with lips) c - (make sharp click at back of throat) Same as k d – (ta...

The following is a collection of phonological awareness resources teachers may find useful when setting up their early literacy programs in Kindergarten and Grade 1.

Short Video Resources for Math, Science & Net Safety

Good for early learners!

There are videos on weather and climate, early learning, math and physics.

The math resources are more middle school based.

PreK-12 Education, Early Learning and Schools

"Play. Learn. Grow. Together!" is a way to reach out to parents of newborn and Kindergarten-aged children with tips and information on how to help them learn at home.

Play. Learn. Grow. Together! debuts with a new website, interactive social media presence and series of informational videos to get parents thinking about simple and easy ways they can interact with their young child to assist in their development and education. Additional tips and videos from our team of early learning experts will be added over time, allowing Play. Learn. Grow. Together! to evolve into a long term, reliable source of early years educational advice."

What Is It?
This downloadable resource from Playworks includes 30+ games that young children can play at home to stay active and build valuable life skills. Each game comes with guidelines on recommended ages, number of people needed to play, equipment, setup/teaching time, game rules, challenge ideas, game variations, and safety considerations.