1st Grade phonics activities, centers, and lessons all aligned to Science of Reading for developing weekly routines in your classroom! One of my favorite parts of teaching 1st grade is watching my students learn to read. Seeing them go from learning letters and sounds to reading and loving full books is amazing!
We know that systematic and explicit phonics instruction in 1st grade is key to unlocking reading skills! In this post, I’ll share some of our favorite 1st grade phonics routines for centers and lessons in our classroom! You can also grab some FREE phonics activities!
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How I teach phonics in 1st grade
One of the best things that I got to do as a first year teacher was attend an Orton Gillingham training. I learned so much about how to effectively teach my students to read. My school didn’t have a phonics or reading curriculum at the time, so I used a mix of the free lesson plans the training provided along with my own activities to create weekly routines in our classroom!
Incorporating Weekly Phonics Routines into lesson planning
Implementing daily and weekly routines in your classroom is such a game changer. If you’ve been here awhile, you know that I love sharing about math center routines. The activity stays the same, but the skill changes.
The benefits of having routines in your classroom:
💗 Lesson planning is so much easier! You aren’t starting from scratch each week
💗 Students can be more successful and independent because they know what to expect and understand the procedures.
Here are a few of our favorite weekly and daily phonics routines in 1st grade:
Whole Group Phonics Routines in 1st Grade:
Each day we have about 30-45 minutes for a whole group phonics lesson. Here’s what our lessons look like:
1st Grade Phonics Routine 1: Daily Phonics Review
Each day we do 3 quick drills to review the phonemes we have already learned. I learned about these from my OG training, but there is so much info online if you want to implement them!
- Visual Drill – we go through a card deck of all the phonemes we have learned and students say the sound.
- Auditory Drill – I say a sound that we have previously learned and students write the grapheme on their dry erase board.
- Blending Drill – Using the card deck, students will blend 2-3 phonemes together
On this website you can create your own digital card decks for free!
Each of these drills is super quick! We spend about 10 min or less each day!
1st Grade Phonics Routine 2: Introducing a new Target sound
Monday: At the beginning of the week, I introduce 1-2 new target sounds. Here is our routine for learning a new phonics skill:
I introduce the sound with a phonics poster on my smart board. I also add a printable poster to our sound wall.
Then, using my document camera, we go through picture cards that contain the phoneme. Students listen for the sound and we identify the position of the sound in the word.
Next, we practice decoding a set of words with the new phoneme. I put the word cards under my document camera for students to read and blend.
I use these picture cards along with word cards every day in different ways! You can find my sets of phonics task cards here to have a set for all different phonics patterns in 1st grade!
Finally, we practice writing the phoneme and mapping words on our dry erase boards.
1st Grade Phonics Routine 3: Pocket Chart Sorting
Tuesday: After our drills, we use our phonics posters to review the sound that we introduced the day before. Sometimes, if we are learning two patterns in a week (such as SH and TH digraphs or ai and ay vowel teams) I’ll introduce the next pattern in the same way.
On Tuesdays, we always do some kind of sorting activity. I use the same picture cards or word cards from the previous day to sort by phonics pattern or word family in a pocket chart. We then read all the words together.
1st Grade Phonics Routine 4: Cut and Paste Phonics Sorts
Each week my students have a personal phonics sort. On Monday mornings after unpacking, I usually have students cut these out first thing and put them in their individual zipper pouches.
We keep these phonics sorts throughout the week and use them to practice sorting each day.
At the end of the week, students glue them into their phonics notebooks.
On Wednesdays we follow a similar routine, we practice our weekly skills with our phonics posters and practice reading and writing words with our target pattern. We also read a decodable text with our featured sound.
1st Grade Phonics Routine 5: Find my Match
On Thursdays, I like to get students up and moving to review the skill. We play some sort of collaborative game to practice decoding words. We use our same set of picture and word cards for these activities.
One of our favorites is Find My Match! I give each student either a picture or word card with our target pattern. Students walk around the classroom and look for their match. When all partners are found, students share their words and sort them on our pocket chart.
On Fridays we have our weekly brain check over our 1st grade phonics skill. This isn’t a traditional spelling test with a list of words for students to practice, but instead an assessment to see if students have mastered our phonics patterns. I randomly choose 6 word cards and have students write them on the template.
After our brain check, students glue their phonics sort into their phonics notebooks.
Using Phonics Routines During Reading Centers
That was a quick breakdown of some of our daily and weekly whole group phonics routines. I also have students practice phonics patterns during our daily reading centers. One of the centers students visit each week is Word Work. Usually students visit this center twice per week.
1st Grade Phonics Routine 6: Decode the Room
The first activity students work on when they visit the word work center is Decode the Room. This 1st grade phonics center gets students up and moving while practicing our weekly phonics patterns!
Here’s How to play:
- Print out the set of cards you would like to use.
- Tape them around the classroom.
- During centers, students will take a recording sheet and walk around the classroom looking for the phonics cards.
- They will write the word on their recording sheet.
- OPTIONAL: When they are finished they can check their answers with the answer key. If there are any that are incorrect, they can go back to that card and try again.
Students can be independent because they know the routine!
I also sometimes use our word cards or do a Sort the Room to change things up!
This activity can also be used during whole group as a weekly routine.
Once students finish this center activity, they can choose another phonics activity to work on with their reading center partner.
They can:
- Work on the pocket chart sorting activity with the weekly phonics pattern
- Play Memory Match with the picture and word matching cards
- Work on their weekly phonics sorts. I like to have students practice these in different ways. After completing a sort, they can take turns giving their partner a word and having their partner write the word on a dry erase board.
I hope this post gave you some ideas for implementing 1st grade phonics routines in your own classroom that help your students to be independent and save you time lesson planning! If you want to try out these activities in your own classroom, here is my Decode the Room Bundle!
You can implement these Science of Reading Phonics Task Cards into your weekly literacy centers and 1st grade phonics routines!
Each Phonics Pattern Includes:
⭐️ Differentiated Task Cards
4 Levels of each card:
- Word and Picture – Students read the word with picture support and write it on their recording sheet.
- Missing Target Sound – Word and picture are on the card but the target skill is missing.
- Picture only – Students will say the word and practice encoding onto their recording sheet.
- Word Cards – Students read the word on the card, find the matching picture on their recording sheet and write the word.
⭐️ Recording Sheets
⭐️ Phonics Posters and Sound Cards
⭐️ Word and Picture Matching Cards
⭐️ Cut and Paste Phonics Sorts
You can also try Decode the Room Short a set for free!
If you loved reading about our 1st grade phonics routines, you might also like reading about our daily Math Rotations!
