Twist on Words

Teaching grade 1, it's important to have a phonics program put in place. These kids need to know what letters make what sounds. It's easy when it's simple sounds that are produced by just one letter, but it can be a bit more difficult for them when you're putting together several letters to make blends.

I ordered story books that focused on different blends so that the story had more words that contains the blend in question.

I read a story that focused on the "st" blend. It had words such as string, store, stall.

At the end of the story, there's a riddle section where the kids need to answer the riddle by using the words that were highlighted in the story.

The last riddle was:

What you would call someone who was bothering you.

The answer was "pest".

When I called on one of my students, she looked as though she had the word on the tip of her tongue but it wasn't coming out. Finally she shouted out, "pissed!"

I immediately started to smile (I couldn't keep a straight face).

"No, you mean PEST."

"Oh yeah, that's it ... pest, pest."

What I wanted to say was, "No sweetie. PISSED is what you become when someone bothers you. PEST is a name for a person who bothers you."

That totally made my day. I'm usually embarassed by kids who say inappropriate things because they don't know better, but that one just made my day.