Teaching Homophones

This week I had a lot of success teaching homophones! 

I've always been interested in grammar.  I feel like it's one of those subjects that can be so dry, but does not have to be.  And honestly, I don't take it too seriously.  If I had to rank order reading, math, and proper grammar, it's going to come last.  Maybe that's why when I teach it, it always needs to be quick, relevant, and/or fun. 

I started out by researching homophone anchor charts on Pinterest, and I was not disappointed! 

  

Next, I took a long look at our word wall.  Because we use both Journeys and Fundations, I decided it would work better to just create  a custom version of a free homophone sort that I found on Teacher's Pay Teachers for free.

It was at this point that something clicked for me.  Previously I had been wondering exactly what a first grader needs to know about homophones.  Since I taught about homophones in fourth grade, it seemed odd that kids this young are also learning them.  Once I looked at the sorting page I realized the level of understanding I was aiming for.  Kids don't need to choose the correct spelling of the homophone to use in a sentence like they do in fourth.  They simply need to be able to read both words (often sight words that have been taught previously this year) and recognize a match.  Of course, for some first graders are ready to move on to the next concept, but not necessarily the whole class. 

So our first activity was to play a little game I called, "I've got your back."

1. Write 4 pairs of homophones on sticky notes.  Then make a second and even third set, depending on how many students you have. 
2. Mix them up, post them, and read the first word.  "There."  I can find the word "Their."  Stick it beside the first.  Call students up to match the words similarly.
3. Call up 8 volunteers to participate, and the rest of the class gets to be "spectators." 
4. Stand behind the volunteers.  Make a spectacle of holding up a word over the first kid's head so the spectators can see, but the volunteers can't.  Stick it on the volunteer's back.  Do the same for the rest of the kids. 
5. Tell the kids they are not allowed to LOOK at their back, but they can ask other students what it says.  They should also read names on the backs of the other kids when they ask.  When they find their "match" of a word that sounds just like their own word, they go to a designated side.
6. When all partners have found each other, ask them to read their words to sum up. 

After this activity they were quite ready to do the word sort!

Later in the week I did a follow up activity.  They had a good sense of what homophones were, but I wanted a hook to keep the idea fun so it stuck with them.  I found a cute homophones VeggieTales clip on YouTube that was less than 3 minutes long.  I showed it on my new (less than one month) iPad/projector.  We had to play it through twice because it was clear the first time that speakers were needed (luckily it only took me the 2 minutes and 10 seconds for the first run through to finish to untangle the ones on my desktop). 

I had let the kids know, "This video goes very fast (although it's also repetitive).  So it would be hard to learn EVERY new homophone.  But if you each remember ONE PAIR, we can make a list together at the end.  Hopefully that way we can get them all."   

As they took turns telling me the pairs, that's when I introduced the idea of spelling each differently depending on the meaning.  A child would say "read" or "red," and I'd ask, "Which one?"  They would say "the color" and I would write "red."  I'd ask, "What does the other 'read' mean," and they'd answer, "Like when you've read a book."  I stuck with modeling (waiting to hear the definition in order to write the correct spelling for the meaning) in order to introduce the concept, as opposed to having them master it and apply it independently.  Readers, do any of you disagree?  Is there anyone out there who teaches first grade who holds their first graders accountable for spelling a certain number of homophones correctly in the right context?  If so, can you share any tricks?

The unplanned happy ending to my week on homophones was that my principal walked in during the song (for the second run through, fortunately!!!) enjoyed the tune, and praised me for learning/applying the new expensive technology quickly!  Plus the fact that they kids were so into it that they were still singing it at lunch.  One of my precocious (and favorite) boys told me, "Ugh, it's stuck in my head!"  I told him, "Good, that was my goal."  

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