In kindergarten, kids are piecing together all the words and letters they can decode in order to build stronger reading fluency. This is why their understanding of sight words, or commonly occurring words, is so important. This guided lesson familiarizes first graders with the sight words they will most frequently encounter in texts, boosting their decoding and comprehension skills.

Letter writing is a very engaging and authentic way to learn formatting, punctuation, and grammar. Students should learn the activities in this unit alongside writing letters to a friend or family member. That way, students can learn and practice the letter-writing skills and then apply them in their own letters. It would be especially rich to include their thoughts about books they are reading.