NOUNS Primary Grammar Unit 1 - FREE ACTIVITIES
PRIMARY GRAMMAR: UNIT 1
Is it really necessary to teach primary students grammar?
Without a doubt, my answer is YES. Teaching young children the way our language works is incredibly important.
This will help them be better readers and better writers, because they understand the basic foundation of sentences.
Most kids can tell you that a noun is a person, place or thing. But do they understand what a noun actually is and can they identify nouns in a sentence?
That is what is really important, and I could never find materials that taught grammar in way that really stuck with my children.
I have designed this unit to be perfect for kindergarten-second grade students. I am so excited to share this conceptual way of teaching grammar, and I’m also sharing so many free activities you can print right here on this blog post.
Let’s get started!
I start by introducing nouns, and I tell them nouns can be a person, place, thing or animal. For now, animals gets their own category and this is very helpful for children.
I show them the anchor charts, and they also get their own to write on and color. Sorting real life picture cards is super helpful for students.
The cards have different headings. I start by sorting the pictures into each category.
Then once we complete this, I tell them I will quiz them. They love to see if I can trick them by showing them things that aren’t nouns.
These basic worksheets are the perfect way to familiarize kids with nouns.
You can make a packet for each child of the printable activities from the unit, or you can just pass them out during each daily lesson.
I have also labeled each printable with an activity/lesson number if you wish to follow the order I use.
This is a great video to help introduce nouns.
Two differentiated versions are included so you can have students trace the nouns or write them on the line on their own.
We do so many fun activities to practice finding nouns and identifying what kind of noun it is - a person, place, thing or animal.
We starting with sorting pictures, and then once they have the hang of these, we move on to sorting words.
Each lesson progresses slightly in difficulty and I slowly pull the scaffolding away.
After the first couple of lessons, students have a good grasp on what a noun is, and how to categorize them.
This lays the foundation for the upcoming lessons of identifying nouns in a sentence.
I start with very simple sentences. They have had enough practice finding nouns in pictures and sorting nouns, they can usually do this page with a little help.
I do the first one as a guided lesson, and then they try the second one on their own.
Now, we have enough background knowledge and we are ready to play this adorable game - nouns around the house!
Kids love this game and make so many connections. Nouns are not some abstract thing - nouns are ALL AROUND US!
We do two rooms a day over the next three days. I have found that short bursts of practice, over a longer period of time, will yield much better results with young children.
So we take our time with this game, and they love it! Soon they will be telling you nouns they see all the time.
The recording sheets coordinate perfectly with the adorable colorful posters.
Note: I created this activity so you don’t actually have to use the colorful pages if you don’t wish to use a lot of color ink. All the rooms are labeled with nouns on the black and white recording pages as well, so that is all students need to complete the activity.
Children write the six nouns that are labeled in each room on the coordinating spots on their recording pages. Then, they get to add one more additional noun they see in the room on their own.
I love this activity or so many reasons, and it takes us 2-3 days to do all six rooms. I then have them find nouns all around the classroom and they can write lists and sort the words into noun categories.
A fun bonus activity is included so students can walk around their house with a clipboard and write the nouns found in their living room, bathroom, kitchen, laundry room, bedroom and yard.
They absolutely love doing this “noun scavenger hunt”.
We are ready to move on, and in the next three lessons we are learning all about articles.
What are articles? We call them flags.
I tell my kids that they are little flags that say, “Heads up! A noun is coming soon!”
I came up with this idea when I was teaching 5th grade. They could not ever remember how to find articles, nouns, adjectives, subject/predicates in a sentence, so I had to come up with fun little ways for them to remember.
For now, I use simple sentences so the article comes directly before a noun. I am teaching my students to disect sentences, and it is not overwhelming. I want them to start recognizing basic sentence patterns…. even in the primary grades!
I have them draw little flags above the articles, and then they underline the nouns that comes next.
This works so well, and they quickly catch onto the pattern.
We spend a couple days on activities with articles, and then next we tackle proper nouns.
We love to talk in “proper voices”and I use the words “special and specific” when talking about proper names. I tell them the word girl can mean any girl, but Sarah is a special and specific girl so we capitalize her name.
Use the kids’ names in your class and they will be captivated. They cannot wit to hear who’s name you’ll use next.
I do a mini lesson whole group each day using people, places and things the kids know, and then we do one activity page each day.
After proper nouns, we learn all about pronouns. I use a ton of examples when introducing pronouns, using the kids names usually.
That is always a great trip for keeping children engaged - make it fun and personal for them. Use their names, their interests, and examples specific to them. Grammar can be FUN!
These worksheets help kids get the hang of pronouns super quick. The one they seem to have the toughest time with is “it” since it doesn’t refer to a person. You can do these whole group, in small groups, partners or see how they do on their own.
Here is a mini lesson on video reviewing nouns, proper nouns and then goes in depth about pronouns.
I suggest pausing and discussing throughout the video to explain, clarify and give examples.
You know how much we love our phonics quilts, so of course we have to do grammar quilts too!
Included in the unit is a pronoun quilt and a basic noun quilt. They know the expectations, so students can get right to work on these. They also make the perfect literacy center.
We are getting close to the end of our unit about nouns, and we are about to go back to nouns around the house!
These mats are different than the first game we play with nouns around the house. These rooms have nothing labeled in them.
We are playing a new game!
I absolutely love this game because children have to really think, which nouns belong in which room, and based on the picture, which person goes in which room?
Then they can fill out the recording sheet connecting the person, place and thing(s) that belong together.
They must draw conclusions, make connections and practice their higher level thinking skills.
I would suggest laminating all the mats and pieces, but you don’t have to. Then once they have sorted all the pieces, they fill out the recording page. All of the pieces have the words spelled, so students can complete this on their own.
This is such a fun activity to wrap up the unit. I love being able to practice grammar in such a fun, hands-on way. This will really help the information stick at a conceptual level. How are sentences structured? How do I find the noun in a sentence?
I also include many review/additional activities that can be sprinkled I throughout the unit.
I label the activities with a lesson number, as well as a guide that shows you which activities I use in each lesson, but you can use the activities in any order that you wish.
WATCH THIS QUICK VIDEO TO SEE HOW FUN AND EASY GRAMMAR CAN BE!
Here are my unit overview plans (they are included in the download) but you do not have to follow them.
This is unit 1 in my primary grammar series, and all the units build on each other.
Now that we know so much about nouns, we will be tackling adjectives next (coming soon!)
READY TO GET STARTED WITH NOUNS?
“This is perfect to teach nouns to young learners. All the pictures makes it easy for students to understand what a Noun is. I can't wait for the rest of the grammar to be available.”
“This unit was fantastic! It's well-organized and contains everything I need to teach my kinders all about nouns. Thank you!”
“LOVED IT...LOVED IT ...LOVED IT...”
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