First Grade Vocabulary Curriculum YEAR-LONG BUNDLE

This YEAR-LONG Vocabulary Curriculum BUNDLE for first-grade includes 32 weeks of vocabulary instruction, lesson plans, activities, discussions, word play games, digital and printable books, passages, vocabulary puzzles, writing response printables for vocabulary and word application, word guides for the teacher, and assessments! The year-long curriculum will expose your students to a wide variety of Tier 2 vocabulary words in order to help them build skills for oral language, writing, reading, and real-world experiences. Each lesson can be completed within twenty minutes, and offers the teacher flexibility and differentiation along the way!

Your students will build essential skills in the areas of:

• writing

• reading

• oral language skills for discussions, conversations, and speaking in complete sentences

• real-world experiences and connections to books and passages

• Tier 2 vocabulary skills and essential understandings for Tier 2 words with multiple meanings, synonyms, antonyms, how to use words correctly within context, and more!

This Vocabulary Curriculum for First Grade is a Year-Long Bundle and includes FOUR sets. Each set contains eight weeks of instruction.

Vocabulary Curriculum for First Grade SET 1

Vocabulary Curriculum for First Grade SET 2

Vocabulary Curriculum for First Grade SET 3

Vocabulary Curriculum for First Grade SET 4

Five detailed and descriptive “Master Lesson Plans” are used each week to help you facilitate the vocabulary instruction and activities. In addition, an At-A-Glance Weekly Guide and a Teacher Word Guide are included each week. These pages will give you a quick glimpse of your weekly words, your day-to-day activities, and important vocabulary information such as kid-friendly definitions, example sentences, synonyms, antonyms, and multiple meanings (when applicable).

Is this curriculum based in research?

YES! A four-page Research and Rationale guide is included in the resource and in the free preview file for your convenience. A complete list of vocabulary research citations has also been included so that you can see what I read and used in my own vocabulary research.

“What is the weekly vocabulary routine?”

Day 1: Introduction You will introduce a very short reading passage to your students. The passage is set up as a “cloze text.” After completing a quick word prediction activity, you will share the week’s new focus words with your students. Then, the students will help you place the week’s focus words into the context of the story. Detailed and descriptive “Teacher Discussion Questions” are included for Day 1. These discussion questions help you explain each word’s meaning and its relation to the text. It also includes prompts and word play games that help students connect the vocabulary to their own lives. I recommend writing the short passage on sentence strips and placing them on a pocket chart. This helps the students interact directly with the text and physically manipulate the word cards. If you prefer not to do so, a projectable page is provided for you. Beginning in Set 2, student copies of the passages are provided for students to write in the focus words during the mini-lesson. The choice is yours, as this program can be as flexible as you would like!

Day 2: Story Time Your students will gather to listen to a short read-aloud booklet that puts the focus words into a new context and situation. The book is provided in a digital format so that you can project it onto your screen for the class to follow along. (Printable versions are included, too. Digital booklets open on any device that has Microsoft PowerPoint installed on it.) Seeing and hearing the words in a new situation and scenario helps the students to make connections between the words and better understand each word’s meaning (and multiple meaning, if applicable). Once again, detailed teacher language and discussion questions are provided. After the read-aloud, your students will complete a quick mini-book that they will illustrate in order to connect the words to their own lives. Beginning in Set 3, two differentiated mini books are included for each week with a writing option.

Day 3: Connections It’s synonym and antonym day! Today, you and your students will complete one of two activities. You can choose to revisit the story from Day 1 and replace the week’s focus words with synonyms and antonyms. Or, you can complete a synonym and antonym word sort together using the word cards. Your students will be exposed to MANY wonderful Tier 2 words through these activities!

Day 4: Word Play A word play menu is included within each set. This menu contains different hands-on activities to help your students “play” with and use the words they are learning. Each set will add new word play activities! The following word play activities are included:

•Word Drama - Students will participate in a game in which they will act out the meaning of various words.

•Word Colors - Students will color a crayon template based on the color he or she thinks represents or describes the meaning of each week's focus words.

•Word Emojis - Students will hold up an emoji stick to show and explain how each word makes the student feel.

•Word Theater - Students will orally create a story or “play” that uses the week’s focus words, synonyms, and/or antonyms using character sticks with a partner or a small group.

•Word Chat - Students will assign each focus word to a picture card that they think best represents the word’s meaning.

•Word Chant - Students will participate in a word rap to practice synonyms, antonyms, and definitions.

•Synonym Sing-along- Students practice synonyms with a fun sing-along song!

•Antonym Sing-along- Students practice antonyms with a fun sing-along song!

•Word Puzzles- Students experiment and play with synonyms by completing puzzles that provide an understanding of how words are related using meaning and context.

•Word Wonderer -In this fun game, students will guess the focus word as other students give clues, definitions, and synonyms to explain and describe the words.

•Word Artist - Students will illustrate the word before the timer runs out as their friends guess the mystery vocabulary word.

Day 5: Application Your students will complete a writing response activity. Each type of activity includes differentiated options for various levels of student writing. Each week, a writing prompt is provided that encourages students to think about the week’s words using a situation that they can apply to their lives. The students can draw their story and share what happened with the class, a partner, or a small group of students. Students are encouraged to cut and glue the word labels to their illustrations as they practice labeling their picture. You can also choose the prompt that contains primary lines. Students can draw and write their response. Beginning in Set 3, a writing-only version is also included. With each set, the degree of difficulty will slightly change according to the development of writing throughout the year. Beginning in Set 2, the teacher can also choose to complete a "Finish the Sentence" activity instead of the writing prompt activity. If you choose the "Finish the Sentence" activity, the students will finish each sentence by drawing an illustration OR using the writing version to complete each sentence. This activity helps the students apply the words in context and use the words correctly.

What else is included?

•Optional Quick Sketch Assessments are included each week. These can be used to assess your students’ understanding of the words, or, used as an additional activity.

•Label the Photograph printable – This activity is a printable version of the “Word Chat” activity and can even be used as an assessment. The students will cut, label, and glue a word to each picture that he or she believes best shows the word’s meaning.

•Word Colors- This is a word play activity that begins in Set 3. It makes for a great whole-group vocabulary discussion! Students decide which color in their crayon box best describes the meaning of each focus word. This is a challenging critical thinking activity as students work to explain and rationalize their decision for each word.

•Vocabulary Word Cards – Use the word cards on a Vocabulary Word Wall within your classroom to show off all of the great Tier 2 words you and your students are learning, or, use them in personal vocabulary notebooks.

You can use as many lessons as you want each week or as few as you would like! One of the beautiful parts of this program is the flexibility it provides. If you have a short week, you can easily pick and choose the lessons that work best for your students. It can also be as “rigid” as you would like by sticking to the detailed plan. While I cannot give an exact time frame for each lesson plan due to varied classroom structures, management, student needs, etc., you should plan on roughly 15-20 minutes a day for your vocabulary routine.

Your students will be immersed in vocabulary instruction that uses best practices and brain-based research. As teachers, we know that students who are provided with isolated vocabulary instruction often fail to retain the words, meanings, and connections to their own lives.

This YEAR-LONG vocabulary curriculum will expose your students to a wide variety of Tier 2 vocabulary words in order to help them build skills for oral language, writing, reading, and real-world experiences. This first-grade curriculum teaches vocabulary words within the context of short, kid-friendly passages and stories. Your students will always be exposed to vocabulary words that are embedded in text and real-world situations. We also know that students retain words when they have ample opportunities to use the words and apply them to their own lives. Each set focuses on rich and robust classroom conversations, word play activities, word association games, and the connections between words as your students are exposed to synonyms and antonyms on a weekly basis.

I strongly encourage you to download the free PREVIEW FILE to learn how this curriculum works and how fun and easy it is to teach! With the exception of the digital booklets, TWO SAMPLE WEEKS have been included in the preview so that you can better see the learning activities. Additional FAQs have also been included in the preview file for your convenience.

This vocabulary resource is part of a vertical curriculum for Grades K-6!

Click HERE to find the vocabulary curriculum resources for Grades 3-6

Click HERE to find the Kindergarten Curriculum

Click HERE to find the Second Grade Curriculum

I am very excited to share this vocabulary resource with you and I hope you find it to be a wonderful instructional tool for your classroom! If you have any questions regarding the curriculum, please contact me via email at christina@missdecarbo.com and I would be more than happy to help! I sincerely thank you for joining me on this vocabulary journey and I hope you and your students have so much fun with it!

Christina DeCarbo-Wagers

Miss DeCarbo, Inc.

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