Silent e and Scavenger Hunts

Silent e...Sneaky e...Magic e... Whatever name you use, the e at the end of words usually has an important job to do- make the vowel say its name!  

Some struggling readers have trouble with this little e.  For some reason it doesn't always stand out to them, they don't attend to it.  When we work on silent e words, I always overemphasize the sound of the vowel saying its name, so they can hear it better.  The video clip above is a cute way to show the silent e's job.  When I found it, I really liked it because it shows the e jumping over the consonant to make the vowel say its name.  Which is what I teach them in class.

The students love to draw the arrows over to the vowel.  After we talk about short vowels and long vowels and how they are visually different as well as sounding differently, we go on a scavenger hunt. 

For a scavenger hunt, I put up cvc and cvce on the board and students look for words with these patterns in their books.  It is important to not teach these skills in isolation of reading.  They need to see and practice this in real reading.  If they find a word that visually fits the pattern AND fits the sound pattern (there are rule breakers out there!), they get to write the word on the Smartboard-after reading it to me first.  We set the timer and see how many we get can.  Fun while applying what we learned!

Here is a Silent e poster if your students need a little extra help.  Sing it to the tune of "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow".  Songs always seem to help things stick for students.  

Click on the picture above if you could use this poster in your room.  It's a freebie!