Teaching students to read is never an easy task! There are so many components and steps to the reading process that it can feel pretty overwhelming to take on. Once you move past letter sounds and CVC, words it becomes a whole new ball game. This is when you introduce blends: one of the most fundamental early reading skills. And where do we start with blends? Well, we start at the very beginning (a very good place to start). Though this might seem intimidating, I promise you that you can help all of your students succeed when learning to read by using anchor charts to teach beginning blends!
Before jumping straight into teaching reading. Let’s start with the basics of interactive anchor charts as these will be your key to success!
Interactive Anchor Charts
We have all seen traditional anchor charts, and I am sure you use them regularly in your classroom.
They are great visual reminders to help our students remember what we are learning about. I absolutely love that they serve as easy-to-use references when students are working on the concept I’m are teaching!
However, there is one easy way to take anchors to the next level: make them interactive!
What is an Interactive Anchor Chart?
Traditional anchor charts are made before or after the lesson and hung up by the teacher for students to reference. Interactive anchor charts, on the other hand, involve students in the anchor chart-making process.
This can either be by starting with a blank chart where students help you completely create it during the lesson, a partially complete chart that students contribute to in order to finish it, or an anchor chart that students interact with throughout the lesson versus just sitting, listening, and looking.
My personal preference is starting with a blank chart or creating charts that students can actively use to practice the concept.
Starting with a blank chart allows students to take the most ownership over the concept while creating charts that students can actively use helps not only visual learners but kinesthetic learners as well!
Interactive anchor chart benefits
I could go on for days about the benefits of interactive anchor charts! They are a staple in almost all of my lessons, especially my reading lessons. Here’s some of the reasons why interactive anchor charts are a staple in my classroom:
- Students are able to provide more detail about what they learned.
- They feel a sense of ownership over their learning.
- Students are more likely to reference the anchor chart down the road.
- You are able to include more learning styles than when showing/explaining a traditional anchor chart.
- Students don’t just repeat the information off of the chart. They use it in practice!
Now that I hopefully have you on board with interactive anchor charts, let’s jump into teaching blends.
Teaching Beginning Blends
What is a beginning blend?
A blend can be described as two or more consonants that appear next to each other in a word. Unlike digraph and vowel combinations where two letters make one sound, each of the letters in a blend keeps its sound but we say the two sounds very close together. Blends are key for students to learn how to decode more complex words beyond three letters.
Blends can occur at the beginning, middle, or end of a word. I like to start my reading instruction with beginning blends because they are so easy for students to find and say since they are right at the beginning of the word.
Beginning blends come in all different kinds of combinations. Common examples include: dr, tr, pr, bl, cl, fl, sm, sc, sw. These are commonly referred to in groups called R Blends, L Blends and S Blends.
That’s why it is so important for our students to have a solid foundation with blends before progressing their reading instruction. Here is where interactive anchor charts come into play!
Using Interactive Anchor Charts to Teach Beginning Blends
There are so many beginning blends that one interactive anchor chart cannot possibly cover them all! So, I create anchor charts with my students for each of the common consonant beginning blends such as R blends, S blends, and L blends. Each anchor chart gives my students unique and targeted practice for that type of beginning blend.
Creating the Anchor Chart
When creating these anchor charts, I simply start out with the title at the top. For example: R Blends / S Blends / L Blends. After explaining what a blend is, it’s time to dig into specific blends. I always start by letting my students know that never every consonant can be a blend. We make a list of the consonants that blend with we pull out our target sound.
One of the things that makes these interactive anchor charts so helpful for the students is the visuals. I like to put students into partners or small groups and let each group make one of the visuals for our chart. Once everyone is done we come back together and I let each group present their creation to the class. As they add it to the anchor chart we discuss the sound the blend makes and the word that the letter represents. Then we say the word a few times really focusing on the blend sound.
Once all of the blend sounds have made it to the anchor chart we do a quick review of all the sounds. This gives us a great opportunity to practice those blends one more time.
Adding More Words
The next step in the anchor chart process is adding a variety of words with the target blend sound. I often do this over a couple of days. Sometimes I hold up the picture and word cards during our lesson and other times I hide them around the room and have students find them. Either way, the goal is for all those words to make it to the anchor chart.
We review each card making a point to find the blend in the word and practice reading it. Then we add it to the anchor chart. I like to have students sort these words into an area with all the other words with the same blend. As we read through the words, hearing the repetitive sound really helps to solidify it in their minds.
Using the Anchor Chart
The fun doesn’t stop there though! Later in the week I introduce the “magic wand.” The magic wand has the main consonant of the blend we are focusing on attached to it. So, if we are learning about R blends, the wand has the letter R attached to it.
Students take turns using the wand at the anchor chart. They place the wand next to the consonants we have put on the chart and practice saying the blend sound. If they get stuck the visuals we created work as a scaffold to help remind them of the word that uses the blend.
Throughout the week we also take time to read through all the picture and word cards we added to the anchor chart. Not only does this help with reading, but it also helps with vocabulary building too!
After we are done with one blend, the anchor chart gets hung in the room as a visual reminder of what we have learned.
For these anchor charts, I post them low enough so students can still reach them. My goal with these charts is to have them not only serve as a reminder of the concept, but also to be an active teaching tool. I’ve even been known to add a “Read the Room” center to our center rotations so students can interact with the anchor charts independently.
Grab Your Beginning Blends Anchor Charts
Teaching with interactive anchor charts has made such a difference in my classroom. I’ve seen an increase in student engagement and involvement in lessons, less behavior issues during teaching time, and an overall increase in learning and recall of skills. If you’d like to see one or more of these things then I suggest giving interactive anchor charts a try in your classroom.
These Beginning Blends interactive charts include everything you need to recreate these with your students. I even give my recommendation of what color paper to copy each page on. I want to make it easy on you and helpful for your students. You can find all the blends interactive anchor chart kits in the Emily Education store.
Save These Beginning Blends Anchor Chart Ideas!
Pin this to your favorite classroom Pinterest board so you can quickly and easily come back when you need more tips and ideas for teaching beginning blends in your classroom.
