Literacy Classroom Must-Haves
If you’re an educator in language arts or reading, you’ll want to check out these standout resources! I’m always excited to find practical and budget-friendly tools that enhance learning and foster a love of reading. Plus, they help streamline your workload and save time—an added perk! The suggestions listed below accomplish all of this. I hope you find them as valuable as I do!
Transparent Sticky Notes
These clear sticky notes allow students to annotate directly in their textbooks. They're ideal for marking up texts, conducting close readings, and more.
Finger Highlighters
Reading guide strips are a simple but effective tool that can enhance reading skills and make the reading experience more manageable and enjoyable for students.
Wooden Card Holder
All Orton Gillingham structured literacy lessons start with drill cards. This wooden card holder is perfect for blending drills during small group instruction.
Handwriting Lines roller
This roller creates precise, straight lines quickly and effortlessly. It is ideal for primary teachers to use in teaching their children how to write. It produces clear, neat lines that roll on smoothly, transforming blank paper into lined practice sheets for proper penmanship.
Dry erase boards
Small dry-erase boards can offer several benefits in a reading class, enhancing both teaching and learning experiences. They foster a more interactive and responsive learning atmosphere. Students can provide immediate feedback, which allows teachers to assess student understanding quickly.
Label Maker
This mini label maker uses thermal technology and works with continuous and pre-cut labels. The free app lets you easily create custom labels. Choose from a library of free templates and icons, or design your own! Perfect for organizing your classroom!
Whisper Phones
Whisper phones can help children improve their reading comprehension and fluency by allowing them to hear themselves read without worrying about others hearing them. They are also a great tool for improving phonological awareness.
Dry Erase Pockets
These dry erase pockets enable you to utilize class sets of texts for close reading effectively! By transforming the text into a reusable surface, students can make annotations while keeping the original text clean and available for subsequent readers. This method is especially effective for small group instruction or when different class periods are studying the same text.
magnetic dry erase markers
When using clear dry erase pockets for reading instruction, you'll likely need additional dry erase markers. Consider choosing marker sets with various colors to implement color-coding strategies with your students.
magnetic sentence strips
These reusable classroom learning tools offer ample blank writing space, making them ideal for spelling, penmanship, and various other activities for teachers and students. Great for Orton Gillingham lessons, and they even come in bright colors too!
Magnetic Dry erase holder
These are perfect for storing all of your dry-erase materials! Compatible with whiteboards, dry-erase boards, and metal cabinets, these organizers are ideal for storing dry-erase markers, pens, pencils, markers, erasers, rulers, and so much more.
Zipper Pouches
Elevate book preservation with these clear zipper pouches! They’re perfectly sized for storing and transporting independent reading books, and they’re also spacious enough to accommodate a reading log or writing journal. Additionally, they offer a convenient way to keep all individual reading supplies—or any other classroom materials—organized in one place.
Mesh Plastic canvas
It’s a fantastic multi-sensory tool! Students can place a sheet of paper over the canvas and trace the word with a crayon. Once the paper is lifted, the letters will be raised. Students can then trace the raised letters with their fingers while pronouncing them, helping them read the entire word (for example, “a” “n” “d” spells “and”).
One Minute Reading Timers
These one-minute reading timers are ideal for fluency practice. Students pair up to perform a one-minute reading exercise, with one student reading while the other monitors the time and notes any fluency errors, such as pronunciation, missed words, or grammar issues. After the minute is up, they calculate the words per minute and then switch roles. With consistent practice, students will begin to look forward to their fluency sessions.
mini flashlights
Flashlight reading is an engaging way to spark students' enthusiasm for reading. It can serve as a class reward or a refreshing change during reading time. Enhance the experience by adding some ambiance—try hanging battery-operated multi-colored string lights or projecting a cozy fireplace onto the classroom wall. For an extra touch, consider adding the soothing sound of falling rain to create a truly immersive experience!
post-It Tabs
These tabs are ideal for fostering metacognitive skills during reading, particularly when writing in the text isn't an option. Each color-coded tab can signify a different type of metacognitive reflection. For instance, students might use one color to highlight sections of text they find confusing and another to indicate parts they particularly liked. With consistent practice, students will become adept at this process, eventually allowing you to reduce the level of support provided.
Multi-colored highlighters
Using multi-colored highlighters can greatly enhance reading and writing instruction. By employing color-coding, you can effectively support students as they learn reading comprehension strategies.
Custom classroom library stamp
Quickly label all your classroom library books with this customizable self-inking stamp. With a variety of sizes and colors to choose from, you can select the one that best fits your style!
Bookshelves
These three-tiered bookshelves would be perfect for the classroom needing extra storage space. They are budget-friendly, come in many colors, and can be configured several different ways.
Paint Tray Palettes
These are perfect for your multi-sensory structured literacy lessons. These can be used as hands-on tools for speech-to-print activities such as mapping morphemes and graphemes. Students can use playdough, mini poppers, or cubes to represent the sounds they hear in words.
Magnetic Spice storage rack
These exceptionally durable shelves adhere to any magnetic surface, making showcasing books and classroom materials simple. Each shelf is designed with extra depth and strength, ensuring even heavy items remain securely in place during your lessons. Bonus: they have hooks for hanging items!
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