What are Literacy Centers?

A literacy center is designed as a place where students complete independent activities during the guided reading period. Children are given specific tasks to perform in the centers. These tasks are not skill sheet tasks, but tasks that lead children to explore and practice the concepts taught in classroom lessons and experienced in guided reading lessons, shared reading experiences, or writing experiences. The centers will require mini-lessons where the teacher demonstrates the process, providing brief purposeful skill introduction or reinforcement.

Teaching Methods

• Dr. Seuss Library. Each school received a collection of Dr. Seuss Stories on CD-ROM. Use these stories in literacy centers.
• Nursery Rhyme books to read. (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Three dimensional objects to act out. Example: pumpkin, man, and woman puppets for "Peter Pumkin Eater." (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Flannel board or magnetic characters. (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Word strips to place in order using pocket charts. (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Nursery rhyme puzzles (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Nursery rhymes on chart paper with various activities for students to interact with the chart. Find the same work (can use sight words), match the rhyming words, place pictures on correct lines, where are the capital letters, find the punctuation marks, and the list can go on. (submitted by Lynne Labrum-Riverside)
• Learning laces-You will need shoe laces with the alphabet printed on them. Have the students form the letters using the shoelaces. They can check the formation by look on the shoelaces for the letter. (taken from Mailbox, Arnerta Terry, submitted by Veda Burgoyne-Riverside)
• Alphabet Books--I put out a can with small cards that have letters on them. I then put out a stack of alphabet books next to the can. They pull a letter out of the can and then find the letter in the alphabet books. (submitted by Misty Hall-Bluffdale)
• Alphabet Soup--Print "alphabet soup" on a pot. Stock the pot with a spoon, paper, pencils and crayons in a center. Students spoon out a letter, write the letter on a piece of paper and then draw a picture of something that begins with that letter. If there are more than one set of letters in the pot, students may spoon out more letters and try to make words out of the letters. Lists of words or a word wall could give them help. (submitted by Anne Rideout-Sandy Rideout)
• Sequencing Stories: The students use illustrations from a familiar text and arrange in order on a clothesline. Submitted by Kathleen Day, Riverside Elementary.
• Use the box cubes you can buy at a packing store. Cover the boxes with contact paper so you can write on them or tape things to them without ruining them. If you are working on a word family, this is an idea that might provide a fun review. Have one cube with the words the and a written on them to fill up each side. Have another cube with the word family words you are working on. Have a student roll the dice and read the words. You can do it as a group or go around the group and give everyone a turn. This could later be put in a center with several cubes of word families. Submitted by Vicki Houmand-Midvalley Elementary.
• Write a dozen hig-frequency Words on oaktag strips. Laminate them and place them in a manila envelope. The children can take a closer look at the high-frequency word of their choice by:
  
  1.Finding the word in big books, poems or around the room.
  2. Rainbow writing...writing the word in colored writing.
  3. Using a second set of words and matching them.
  4. Writing them on a white board.
  5. Making them with letter tiles.
  6. Making them with wikki sticks.
  7. Forming the word using magnetic letters.
  
• Make 26 Teddy Bears, holding hearts, out of light brown cardstock. On each heart is a picture that begins with one of the letters of the alphabet. On the foot of the bear is a piece of velcro. Also, 26 smaller hearts are made from cardstock, each having a letter of the alphabet on it. The children put the letter heart on the velcro of the Teddy Bear that has the picture beginning with the correct letter. Then the children hang them on a clothesline in alphabetical order. Submitted by Mary Anne Moon-Lone Peak Elementary
• Place a supply of white paper plates at your writing center. Also put out food books such as Eating the Alphabet or put foods on your word wall. Tell the class you will be going on an imaginary picnic, and each child needs to bring something that starts with the same letter as his or her name. Invite the students to write and draw on the paper plate with they will bring to the picnic. Display the completed picnic. Display the completed picnic plates on bulletin board or compile them into a class book with a loose leaf ring. Submitted by Janice Robinson-Sprucewood Elementary.
  

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