I have observed many of your classrooms during the past few weeks and have noticed that many of you utilize word walls. Whatever grade level you teach, the use of a word wall in a classroom can be a highly effective teaching strategy that can not only improve literacy skills but also encourage active student participation. Gestures, such as pointing to key words during a lesson, offers visual reinforcement which can be very helpful for students. These word wall activities can engage students while they learn key vocabulary and sight words, whether it be learning to explain a word, comparing it to other key concepts, or learning how to spell it.
Five years ago, I decided that I was going to make the word wall a constant daily tool to utilize in my classroom instruction and for the children to use in their learning; the problem was that I was unsure of exactly how to do this. During my search for answers, I came across two PDF documents and a Promethean board activity. The one PDF document provides an explanation of what a word wall is and many activities on how to use a word wall in daily instruction for the primary grades. The second PDF does the same for the intermediate grades. The promethean activity is designed to encourage friendly competition amongst students when using the word wall. It can also be used for numerous other things, such as center work.
Below are links to all of the resources I have described above. Happy Word Walling! :)
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