Batty for Homophones!
I am required to use my district’s reading basal, which has its positives and negatives. One of the biggest negatives for me is that I get into such a routine using the resources I have made to support the basal, that lately I don’t get in themed activities. This is even harder now that my district is also strictly based on genre writing workshop.
I decided one of my goals was to slow down and hit some fun, engaging themed activities during grammar and phonics. Of course the other units I have created and use on a weekly basis are also engaging and students think they are fun, but there is always something special about a themed craft activity that incorporates a skill we are learning. The teacher in me needs this, as do my kiddos!
I started off the lesson using bats with homophones on each wing. Students were immediately all about our lesson! We went through each bat and labeled each homophone together. I kept this up throughout the week for students to refer back to. Grab the anchor chart bats at the end of the post!
After our class anchor chart, we moved into our interactive notebooks. Students recorded what a homophone is and then began working on using homophones in a sentence. 
Later in the week, students used this interactive sheet to show their understanding of homophones. Students glued the matching homophone image under the correct flap and labeled it.
Throughout the week, students practice matching up homophones using these cards. I used the cards with images to start with every group and then started to push the students who needed an extra challenge to only use the word cards. Grab the cards sat the end:)
To tie in the “theme” of the week, students then created a bat freebie by A Cupcake for a Teacher. Students picked a set of homophones to write on each wing, wrote each word in a sentence and illustrated. Grab the writing sheet at the end:)
You can grab the anchor chart bats and center cards here for free. Just so you know, I did not create any recording sheets since we used these in small groups so I could quickly assess who understood the concept and who did not.
