Sight Words: AND

My 5-year-old starts kindergarten in the fall. He knows several sight words, but I want to work on a few more between now and then. I decided to focus on “AND” during our preschool day.

• Read “Big and Little” by Samantha Berger and Pamela Chanko … this is a little board book we have comparing opposites. It was perfect because every page has the word “AND” and the text is very simple. You can find it used on Amazon.
  1. Introduce the book. Point to each word in the title as you read it.
  2. Ask the kids to show you which word is “AND”.
  3. Ask them how to spell “AND” (let them look at the title).

• “AND” catcher
  1. Cut a small donut from craft foam paper.
  2. Attach it to a craft stick (I used strong tape. Hot glue would work great!)
  3. Wah-lah! Your very own “AND” catcher.
  4. As you read the story, let the kids catch each “AND” word they spy.

• Post-It “AND” game … this game mixes the new sight word “and” with words the kids already know.
  1. Write “and” on several post-it notes.
  2. Write the names of people in your family, or friends in preschool.
  3. Stick the post-it notes all over the room where the kids can reach them. I let the kids do this. They stuck them on the windows and doors and mirrors and walls.
  4. Take turns finding one name and one “and”.
  5. Stick them along the wall (we stuck them to the mantel) to form a L-O-N-G sentence, starting with the name. As they add new post-its have them read the growing sentence.

• Silly Sentence game … this is a fun little game that the kids can use to create silly sentences using the word AND! Available here.
1. Beforehand, sort the pieces. I used the nouns (frog, dinosaur, fish, ball), the “the” pieces and the periods.
2. I also used the “ate” pieces, but covered the word with our new sight word “and”. I just used the sticky part of a post-it note, wrote “and” and stuck it over the word “ate” (make sense?!)
3. Show the kids how to form a simple sentence using the different pieces!
• NOTE: My 5-year-old took off and loved doing this on his own. He would READ (!) the whole sentence back to me when he finished. My 3-year-old needed a little more help, but she enjoyed it too.