Reading Activities for Kids

Find and Tally Sight Words Activity

April 28, 2022 By Terri Thompson

Since my youngest daughter is heading into first grade in the fall, we’ve been focusing a lot on ways to learn sight words.

She’s got a great handle on some, but as you know, there are many to learn.

We’re trying to keep up the practice over the summer, but I definitely want to keep things simple.

That’s where this fun Find and Tally Sight Words activity comes in. It’s easy to prep. Simple to do. And, it’s fun.

Learn sight words with this fun reading game that adds a little math in with your reading practice with this Find and Tally Sight Words activity.

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How to set up your Find and Tally Sight Words activity

This activity was so easy to set up.

I started by making a list of sight words that my daughter needs to learn. I chose only six because I didn’t want her to be overwhelmed by too many.

Next, I made it into a pretty chart to make the activity all the more appealing. But, this is not at all necessary, you can just grab some paper and jot down a few sight words leaving room for your sight words.

Now it’s time to tally sight words!

Now, it’s time for the fun. Let’s practice our sight words!

Give your child the chart and a book. They need to go through the book and make a tally mark each time they find one of the words.

It can be slow going and they may not get through the whole book. We didn’t. Our focus was on sight word identification and not reading, so we just did a few pages. We’ll read the book together later.

At the end, add up the tally marks. Which word did you find the most often? The least?

Learn sight words with this fun reading game that adds a little math in with your reading practice. Sight Word Tallies is easy to set up and fun to play for your beginning readers.

Can I give you a quick word of advice?

I made the mistake of not comparing my list of sight words to the book when I did this with my oldest. Oops. It was a lesson in frustration. Page after page and no sight word in sight.

Take the time to make sure the sight words are actually in the book you’re using. The activity is so much more fun when you can actually find the words!

I loved this sight word activity because it was easy to prep and fun to do. Plus, it added in a bit of sneaky math practice with the tally marks.

We’ll do this fun Find and Tally Sight Words activity over and over again for a fun way to practice our sight words.

Choose a great book for this activity:

We found success using a book that my child was already familiar with. I’d suggest you turn to your own library of books for inspiration.

You’ll want a book with several instances of the sight words you’re working on. Do check to make sure the sight words you need are in the book!

Here are some great options:

Panda Reading Pointer Craft

April 25, 2022 By Terri Thompson

A reading pointer is a great tool for beginning readers. It helps them track the words on a page and trains the eyes to follow along.

You can grab any sort of reading pointer, but if you’ve got a kid that loves animals, they’re going to definitely love this fun panda reading pointer.

Use a craft stick to make this simple panda reading pointer for kids. It's a fun tool for beginning readers and animal lovers!

Also, CraftProjectIdeas.com sent me some of the supplies used on this project. All ideas are my own.

Supplies needed for your panda reading pointer

Jumbo craft stick
White craft paint
Black craft paint
Black felt
Glue
Small googly eyes

How to make your panda bear reading pointer

First, paint the entire front and back of your craft stick with white paint. Allow it to dry completely.

While your paint is drying, cut two small circles from your black felt to use as your ears.

Once your white paint is dry, add your details with the black craft paint. Add two ovals for the eyes and a small circles underneath for the nose. Draw your simple mouth details. Finally, add two half circles under your face for your paws. Let all your black paint dry.

If you need something to do while your waiting for paint to dry, read a great book about pandas! Goldy Luck and the Three Pandas by Natasha Yim is a fun choice. It’s a Chinese American retelling of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

After your paint is dry, glue your felt ears to the back of the top of your craft stick.

Attach your googly eyes on your eye ovals. I found that using self-sticking googly eyes made this step really easy!

Once your glue is dry, your reading pointer is ready to use! Let this cute panda help your child practice reading.

Make this simple panda bear reading pointer for your beginning readers.

Yield: 1 Reading Pointer

Panda Reading Pointer

Make this simple panda reading pointer out of a craft stick. It's a great tool for your beginning reader.

Prep Time 5 minutes

Active Time 15 minutes

Total Time 20 minutes

Difficulty Easy

Estimated Cost Under $5 (depending on the supplies you already have on hand)

Materials

Tools

Instructions

Paint your entire craft stick with the white paint. Let dry.
While your paint dries, cut two small circles out of your black felt for your panda's ears.
Once the paint is dry, add details with your black paint. Add two ovals for your eyes and a small circle for the nose. Add a simple mouth and two half circles for your paws. Let dry.
Once your black paint is dry. Glue your two ears to the back of the craft stick at the top.
Add your two small eyes to the black ovals.

Notes

If you don't have any black felt you can use craft foam or black card stock instead.

Bats in a Cave: Bat Sight Word Game

September 14, 2020 By Terri Thompson

We’ve been practicing sight words a lot lately. Have you? They’re so crucial to reading and a good knowledge of sight words can help your kids grow into strong readers.

Since it’s always my goal to help my girls have fun while learning at home, I came up with this fun Bat Sight Word Game that gets my girls moving, learning, and having fun. (I never want to recreate school at home! Do you?)

Have some fun practicing sight words with this Bat Sight Word Game by putting all your sleeping bats in the correct place in their sight word cave.

How to make your bat sight word game

To create the game, I started out by making my bats. I wanted a bunch of sleeping bats hanging upside down so I drew a quick template on a piece of cardboard from my recycle bin. A cardboard template helps so much when you want to make several duplicate items.

The bat template was super-simple to draw and I promise you can do it even if you don’t think you have any artistic skills. Check out my template below – it’s so easy!

Start with a large teardrop shape for the body. Add a curvy triangle to the top overlapping the pointy end of the teardrop for the feet. Add a circle with a slightly pointed top for the head. Finally add two pointy ears. Cut around the outline.

Because I didn’t want to sit and cut out bats all day (and I know you don’t want to either), I folded a piece of black construction paper in half and then in thirds. I was able to trace one bat on the paper and cut out six at one time. So much easier!

I did this twice so I had 12 bats altogether. I put a piece of rolled up painter’s tape on the back of each bat.

Finally, I cut off a piece of brown wrapping paper and drew a simple cave opening.

I then wrote 12 different sight words on the paper and hung the wrapping paper on a door.

Choose your sight words

I chose words from a list of sight words my daughter’s teacher had sent home. Pick words that your child is having difficulty with or just hasn’t learned yet.

If you need some ideas, you can print off a list of all the Dolch sight words sorted by grade level here. I refer to this list all the time!

This game would also work with spelling words.

Hint: Lay the bats out on the paper before writing the words. You’ll know where you need to put each word and not have to worry about getting them too close together.

Now it’s time to play your bat sight word game!

We played two different versions of a bat sight word game with this set up.

Game 1:

Call out a sight word and have your child find the word and cover it with a bat.

When they’re done, they’ll have a cave full of sleeping bats.

Game 2:

Have your child read each word out loud then cover that word with a bat.

Both games are fun and great ways to practice a group of sight words.

Note: This post was originally published on October 15, 2015. Updated and republished on September 14, 2018.

Be sure to check out all of the great Nocturnal Animal Posts from the 2nd Grade Blogging Team!

Bat Science Experiments: Echolocation Activities from Preschool Powol Packets

Nocturnal and Diurnal Animals Sorting Activity from Look! We’re Learning!

Creating Growing Patterns with Nocturnal Animals from Life Over C’s

Nocturnal Animal Report: Hedgehogs from Crafty Kids at Home

Nocturnal Animals Writing Tray and Word List from Lemon Lime Adventures

Beginning Letter Sounds Bat Matching Activity

October 23, 2019 By Trisha

A bat themed activity is great for Halloween. You could also use it as part of a night themed unit studying nocturnal animals.

Try our beginning letter sounds bat matching activity for toddlers and preschoolers as part of your bat theme or as a stand-alone Halloween activity.

Beginning Letter Sounds Bat Matching Activity

Supplies Needed for the Bat Matching Halloween Game

Bat cutouts (or black cardstock and scissors)

Silver marker

Painter’s tape (optional)

Flashlight

How to Set Up the Beginning Letter Sounds Activity

Determine what letters you want to work on. I recommend working on just a handful of letters at a time. Choose 3-4 words for each letter. I used Halloween themed words. Here’s a list of Halloween words for inspiration. (Use this same idea with older kids for spelling or sight words.)

Write your chosen letters and words on the bat cutouts. I used a combination of foam bats from Hobby Lobby and bats I cut out of cardstock. I simply traced a foam bat and cut it out. You can often find bat cutouts at Target (in the Dollar Spot) or at Michael’s as well.

I chose to write uppercase letters for my letter bats as a bonus letter matching activity. You could use lowercase letters instead.

Now you have the makings of a simple matching game.

How to Play the Beginning Letter Sounds Bat Matching Game

Place your letter bats in one location in your room. You could lay them on the floor, place them on table, or tape them to a wall. (Be sure that your tape won’t harm your wall. Painter’s tape is usually safe on most painted surfaces. Just don’t leave it on there for long periods of time. Take it down when your game is over.)

Now hide your bats around the room. I taped mine to the walls in my sort of dark hallway. You could also lay the bats on the floor or on different pieces of furniture if you don’t want to use tape.

The goal of the game is for your child to take a word bat and match its first letter to the correct letter bat.

Here’s the extra fun part. Use a flashlight. (Talk about flashlight safety with your child and how we don’t shine lights in people’s eyes – including his/her own.)

Have your child shine the flashlight on a word bat. Read the word on the bat to your child. Ask him what letter it starts with. “That’s the word ‘moon.’ What letter does moon start with? What letter do you see?”

As you’re reading the words, also practice the beginning letter sounds. Say: “B says /b/. /b/ /b/ bat. Bat starts with the letter b.”

Have your child take the word bat and place it near the matching letter bat.

It’s not important that your toddler or even preschooler reads the words. You just want him or her to work on letter sounds and associating what that first letter looks like with its letter sound. It is important for you and your child to say the letter sounds as you’re playing.

Using the flashlight helps to highlight the letters. My toddler wanted to play this game again and again just so he could go around finding the bats with the flashlight.

More Bat Themed Halloween Activities

Bats in a Cave Sight Word Game

Halloween Bat Crafts for Kids

Bat Number Treasure Hunt at Inspiration Laboratories

Halloween Black Bat Sensory Bin at Pre-K Pages

Do you want to do more activities with your family?

Join our fun Facebook community, Creative Family Fun for Busy Families, for daily activities that are great for kids and families. We’ll chat, share, and have fun. It’s a safe and private place to share ideas for family and kids activities.

I’d love for you to join me! Just click the link below, request to join, and answer the questions (they’re easy, I promise). Come join the fun! Join the Creative Family Fun for Busy Families community here.

Family Word Scramble

August 14, 2019 By Terri Thompson

If you’re looking for a fun & simple paper game to help celebrate families, just grab a copy of this Family Word Scramble.

It’s fun to solve and perfect for anyone who likes word games.

And, if you love these puzzles you can find a fun assortment of word scrambles for kids here.

Family Word Scramble

What is a word scramble?

It’s a fun puzzle game where you need to unscramble a set of letters to make a word, usually related to a theme.

The words in this word scramble game are all related to families.

Find words such as: parents, cousin, uncle, brother, sister, etc.

Can you solve them all?

Are you ready to solve the puzzles?

It’s simple. Just click on the links below to download and then print. For your convenience, I’ve also included an answer key.

Download and print your word scramble here.

Download and print your answer key here.

You are welcome to print as many copies as you need for home or classroom use only. Please do not distribute for free or pay on your own website or business. Please do not include as part of a paid product. If you would like to use this for any purpose beyond classroom or home, please contact me here.

Unscramble words related to families with this fun and simple Family Word Scramble printable for kids. Just print and enjoy!

You may also enjoy one of these word games:

School Supplies Word Scramble

DIY Sight Word Memory Game

Stacking Rhyming Words Game

Cardboard Word Puzzles at Teach Me Mommy

Fun Books About Families

Enjoy one of these fun books about families to go along with your Family Word Scramble activity. Use as either a read-aloud or an independent read.