Patricia M. Cunningham - Dorothy P. Hall

Making Words Fourth Grade: 50 Hands-On Lessons for Teaching Prefixes, Suffixes, and Roots, 1/e

Based on the best-selling book Phonics They Use: Words for Reading and Writing, this new grade level series offers a fresh pairing of lessons and activities for kindergarten through fifth grade. In Making Words Fourth Grade, Pat and Dottie introduce teachers to 50 Making Words lessons that cover key literacy skills included in most fourth-grade curricula. The activities progress through a systematic process that includes ample practice manipulating letters to make words, sorting words, and using prefixes, suffixes, and roots to explore patterns in related or rhyming words-skills all fourth-grade readers need. Each lesson includes 15-20 words including a secret word that can be made with all the letters. After students gain experience working with prefixes, suffixes and roots, all lessons include a transfer step to help them apply what they learn to the spelling of new words.

"I love the fact that [this book] builds on root words, prefixes, and suffixes. If students can learn this, they will be better spellers and better readers ... this word work will help them decipher vocabulary words too!" -Cheryl Dick, Nixa School District, Nixa, Missouri

"I enjoy teaching Making Words lessons almost as much as my children love participating in them!" -Amy Martindale Kelly, Grantham School, Goldsboro, North Carolina

Patricia M. Cunningham is the author of Beyond Retelling, Classrooms That Work, Schools That Work, and Phonics They Use, all published by Allyn & Bacon, as well as a professor of education at Wake Forest University. She has over 30 years of experience in various elementary grades and with remedial reading and has served as a curriculum coordinator and director of reading. Pat promotes literacy for all children through her Four Blocks(R) workshops and staff development sessions with educators.

Dorothy P. Hall is the co-developer of the Four Blocks(R) framework and the director of the Four Blocks(R) Center at Wake Forest University. A former elementary teacher and education professor, she also presents workshops around the country on Four Blocks(R), Building Blocks, guided reading strategies, and phonics instruction.

An active and innovative approach to making words that teachers and their students have grown to love is finally here!

Based on its highly successful parent text, Phonics They Use, this new grade-level series Making Words offers teachers a fresh multi-level activity and lesson series written for the kindergarten through fifth grade classroom. Pat Cunningham and Dottie Hall present classroom teachers with effective tools for strengthening phonics and spelling skills that encourage students to move beyond learning and into a world of word discovery. Each research-based volume includes a wealth of friendly, hands-on, manipulative activities that guide teachers in teaching the development of words--from phonemic awareness to spelling.

In Making Words Fourth Grade, Pat and Dottie introduce fourth grade teachers to 50 lessons that teach all the prefixes, suffixes, and root skills included in most fourth grade curriculums. Each Making Words activity leads children through a systematic and sequential spelling curriculum. All lessons include practice with prefixes and suffixes as children stretch out words they are making and blend the letters to make new words. Because teaching children letter-sound relationships is easier than teaching children to actually use these letter-sound relationships, all lessons include a transfer step in which children apply the sounds they are learning to spelling new words.

Making Words Fourth Grade is the best resource you can have on hand for motivating your students to learn words!

• Features 50 fun and interactive lessons for building decoding and spelling skills.
• Presents a concise method for involving students in the process of identifying common contractions and compound words and more complex vowel patterns within words.
• Promotes student awareness of similarities in words that helps develop writing skills.
• Includes reproducible take-home record sheets to help students build their vocabularies.