Inside: Find out how to teach parts of speech so that kids remember what they have learned! I’m sharing my favorite ideas and activities.
You’ve talked about pronouns for several weeks.
You’ve given homework and review.
You’re in the middle of your pronoun assessment and a student raises their hand and asks “What’s a pronoun?”
Are you kidding me!?!!!?
One year I decided to try something different.
Pull It All Together With Visuals
I’m a person that likes to see how the small pieces fit into the big picture. I think that’s helpful for kids, too. This visual aid (just made from cardstock and black string) helps kids start to build a schema about parts of speech. I refer to it during lessons and it’s really helpful for kids during independent work.
Kids can also fill in their own web. I have this as the first page of their grammar workbooks. Each time I introduce a new part of speech, they fill in a new section of the web. When you have an extra 5 minutes, have kids see how much of the web they can create all on their own on a blank piece of paper.
How To Teach Parts of Speech With Songs!
Stupid songs are wonderful memory tools! : ) (Yes, I said “stupid”!) I haven’t created a song for all the parts of speech but here are the ones I have so far (stay tuned for more later):
A song about nouns, sung to the tune of The Battle Hymn of the Republic:
Using any kind of marker makes things instantly more interesting for kids. Have kids highlight the nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc. that they see in a sentence.
There’s something about seeing parts of speech in the context of a sentence that helps kids see the function of the word.
After trying this activity as a class a couple of times, it’s so easy to throw in a center with some highlighting markers. (Notice that the colors I used on this activity match up with the colors I used on my parts of speech web above, kids find this helpful.)
Make Connections to Reading and Writing
Parts of speech is one of those skills where kids may ask, “When are we ever going to use this?”
And that’s a fair question!
You might also be thinking, Wait, why do they have to know this stuff?
Here’s why:
Instead of looking at a sentence and saying, “Something’s wrong here. There’s not anything happening,” it’s helpful to know, “This sentence needs a verb.”
Instead of noticing, “This poem isn’t very good. It’s hard to imagine the topic,” you can nail it down to: “This poem needs more adjectives.”
When you know about the parts of speech, you have a more sophisticated way of understanding and talking about language.
Connect parts of speech to reading and writing instruction.
It might sound like this:
What adjectives would you use to describe the character?
How could pronouns be used to help this writing sound smoother?
How does the verb this author chose add to the meaning of the paragraph?
Include a couple of adverbs in your poem to help the reader make a mental image.
All of your sentences are short. Is there anywhere you could add a conjunction for some variety?
Each sentence needs both a noun and a verb to make sense.
Several Teaching Approaches for the Win!
When considering how to teach parts of speech, skill worksheets will probably not cut it. To reach all students, approach the topic with a variety of formats including:
Hannah Braun is a former teacher with 8 years of experience in the classroom and a master's degree in early childhood education. She designs engaging, organized classroom resources for 1st-3rd grade teachers.
Hannah Braun is a former teacher with 8 years of experience in the classroom and a master's degree in early childhood education. She designs engaging, organized classroom resources for 1st-3rd grade teachers.
2 Comments
Hi Hanna,
I hope you don”t mind if I borrow your “making part of speech stick” photo for my presentation for COLL100 at American Public University. I will include the URL as well give you, Hanna Braun,credit. As well as add this into my resources APA style format.
Lorena,
Absolutely! Thanks for including the URL and good luck with your presentation.
Hi Hanna,
I hope you don”t mind if I borrow your “making part of speech stick” photo for my presentation for COLL100 at American Public University. I will include the URL as well give you, Hanna Braun,credit. As well as add this into my resources APA style format.
Lorena,
Absolutely! Thanks for including the URL and good luck with your presentation.