Sentence Sequencing:
What is it?
An activity/game that allows children to practice combining nouns, verbs,
adjectives, etc to make a sentence.
"Helpers" is the term I am using to describe articles, conjunctions,
punctuation and the passive verb "was". It is the last template in the set
-- you may want to print two of these helpers templates so you have extras.
Nouns - I've provided 8 nouns. If your children really enjoy
these games/activites, that may not be enough. Provide them with some
blank cards and clipart or magazine pictures and let them create some additional
noun cards.
Verbs - I've provided 6 verbs. It's hard to show verbs as
images, but I hope I've done ok. I colored the background of the verb
cards to help distinguish them.
You have a choice between past tense and present tense verbs. I would
print one or the other, not both since the images are the same for both
templates.
Colors - 6 color cards are provided. If you chose the B&W
templates, you'll need to color in these cards. You can create additional
color cards on your own if you want extras. You can also create your own
additional adjective cards (fat, thin, tall, short, etc) using drawings,
coloring books, clipart, magazines, etc.
Emotions - I've provided 4 emotions cards. Again, it's a bit
tough to show these as images, but I think they turned out ok.
NOTE: This page is fairly long -- the templates are all the way at the
bottom.
Activity Suggestions
1. Free Play
- arrange the cards into piles (the verbs have a colored background to make
it a tad easier for the kids to sort things)
- allow the children to create their own sentences using the cards.
- If you pre-sort the cards for them it makes it simpler. You may not want
to provide them with all the sets at once. Here are some set ideas.
- three piles: helpers, nouns and emotions
Example sentence: The boy was happy.
- four piles: helpers, nouns, verbs and nouns
Example sentence: The boy ate the apple.
- five piles: helpers, nouns, verbs, colors and nouns.
Example sentence: The boy ate a red apple.
- six piles: helpers, emotions, nouns, verbs, colors and nouns.
Example sentence: The happy boy ate a red apple.
- Get silly! It's fun to create silly sentences (like "The angry boy
ate a green monster.") Encouraging the children to create silly sentences can
help keep them involved and motivated in this activity.
- ADDITIONAL ACTIVITY: Have the child spend some time creating their
favorite sentence.
- Once the sentence is completed, encourage them to write (or dictate,
depending on their skill level) a short story to go with the sentence.
- With young children, 3 sentences is a great story length. It helps
reinforce the fact that a story has a BEGINNING, a MIDDLE and an END.
- Let them illustrate their story (draw pictures).
- Talk about the roles of the author and the illustrator of a story.
2. Memory (Guided) Play
- In this activity, we'll use sight (showing), sound (reading) and
repetition (memory) to reinforce sentence structure.
- arrange the cards into piles (the verbs have a colored background to make
it a tad easier for the kids to sort things) If you pre-sort the cards for
them it makes it simpler. You may not want to provide them with all the sets
at once. Here are some set ideas.
- three piles: helpers, nouns and emotions
Example sentence: The boy was happy.
- four piles: helpers, nouns, verbs and nouns
Example sentence: The boy ate the apple.
- five piles: helpers, nouns, verbs, colors and nouns.
Example sentence: The boy ate a red apple.
- six piles: helpers, emotions, nouns, verbs, colors and nouns.
Example sentence: The happy boy ate a red apple.
- Create a sentence, show it to the child and read it aloud twice.
- Now put one of the cards back in the appropriate (noun, verb, emotion,
color) pile
(you may want to mix up the pile and then set some or all the pile out so the
child can see their options, like so:
Now have the child chose the correct card from memory to replicate the
sentence you showed them.
- When the child has mastered replacing a single card, try removing two of
the cards (maybe kissed and dinosaur in our example above). Then remove
three, etc. Progressively make the sentences longer until they are
successfully replicating complex sentences -- For example, "The happy dinosaur
and the green monster ate a red apple."
- Eventually you can move away from showing them the sentence. You can just
READ the sentence to them and have them replicate it.
- Don't forget to throw in some silly sentences to keep the children's
energy level up!
Template Instructions
Flash card type templates. You can use these in a variety of activities
(see activity suggestions above).
- Print out the template of choice.
- Colour pieces, as necessary.
- OPTIONAL: Glue to a thin piece of cardboard (ex: old cereal boxes) and
let dry (you can also laminate or cover with clear contact paper to make them
last longer)
- Cut out the cards. This step may require adult assistance.
- Close the template window after printing to return to this screen.
- Set page margins to zero if you have trouble fitting the template on one
page (FILE, PAGE SETUP or FILE, PRINTER SETUP in most browsers).
2 MORE NOUNS + 4 EMOTIONS (color)
or (B&W)
6 VERBS (past tense) (color)
or (B&W)
6 VERBS (present tense) (color)
or (B&W)
(I would only print one of
the verb templates as the images are the same)
6 ADJECTIVES - colors (color)
or (B&W)
6 HELPERS (color)
or (B&W)
more sentence sequencing cards that compliment the above set:
Farm theme
Word
Families (phonics) theme
