Dog Lessons

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Dogs Are Useful Worksheets

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Below are free downloadable documents to help your student or child learn more about dogs.

This unit begins with a simple text about how people use dogs in daily life. The short passage discusses five different types of dogs including: police dogs, service dogs, herding dogs, sled dogs, show dogs and pet dogs. For each dog, it explains how those dogs help people. The text repeats high frequency words but also introduces some new vocabulary. The passage uses words with the -ful ending. These words are further supported with the -ful suffix worksheet. This text is a good read for a well-read kindergarten student or a first grader. If your student it not able to read it on their own, it can make for a fun reading activity to do together.

To accompany the Dogs Are Useful text is an activity about suffixes. This unit focuses on two commonly used suffixes. The first is -ful. For this activity, discuss with the students the meaning of the suffix -ful. Then practice making the suffix. The first part of the worksheet is an interactive, scripted exercise that you can complete with your student. After this guided practice, you can release them to try it on their own. Part 2 of the worksheet is meant to be completed independently.

After students have thoroughly grasped how to add the suffix -ful to a word, they can practice identifying words with the suffix and using them in sentences.

Summarizing is an important part of reading and helps students to better understand what they read by taking time to reflect on it. The way a reader approaches a nonfiction summary can be different from a fiction summary. Below is a worksheet to help students practice with summarizing a nonfiction text. This worksheet also discusses topic, main idea, and key details.

To finish off the activites with this text, there is a comparing worksheet. Students are prompted to compare sled dog and a show dog. They can discuss how each dog is useful. For comparing, it is best for them to find a similarity first and then compare what is different about that similarity. For example, Both dogs are useful. Sled dogs help people move in snow. Show dogs help people win prizes. This way of comparing helps the comparision to have more meaning and will help them as future learners.

Bird Body Parts

Below are free downloadable documents to help your student or child learn evem more about dogs.

The second text for this unit is a fiction text about a dog that misses her owner. There are many potential uses for this text including teaching about personification, inferencing, and problem/solution. The worksheets for this story are focused on teaching the -ed suffix, sequencing, and fiction summaries. This text is a good read for a well-read kindergarten student or a first grader. If your student it not able to read it on their own, it can make a for a fun reading activity to do together.

After students read about Daisy's day, they can reinforce their understanding of sequence by completing the following worksheet. Students should cut out the photos on the bottom and paste them in the order they happened in the story. An average level student should be able to complete this without looking back at the original photos. However, if a student needs extra help, they should be allowed to look back at the story. You might also try cutting up the original story and removing the photos. Give the child the paragraphs and have them match a photo to each paragraph. An advanced student might enjoy the extra challenge of captioning each photo.

To accompany A Dog's Day text is an activity about suffixes. This unit focuses on two commonly used suffixes. The second is -ed. For this activity, discuss with the students the meaning of the suffix -ed. Then practice making the suffix. The first part of the worksheet is an interactive, scripted exercise that you can complete with your student. After this guided practice, you can release them to try it on their own. Part 2 of the worksheet is meant to be completed independently.

After students have thoroughly grasped how to add the suffix -ed to a word, they can practice identifying words with the suffix and using them in sentences.

Summarizing is an important part of reading and helps students to better understand what they read by taking time to reflect on it. The way a reader approaches a fiction summary can be different from a nonfiction summary. Below is a worksheet to help students practice with summarizing a fiction text. This worksheet also discusses main character, problem and solution.

If your learner is a writer, there is also a nice writing worksheet for them. This was left without a prompt so that it can more easily fit a variety of lesson focuses, learning levels, and ages. Some possible prompts for your young writer are:

1. Have you ever had a dog help you or seen a dog help someone else? Write about how the dog was useful.

2. Do you have a pet dog? Do you know someone who has a pet dog? What is the pet dog like?

3. Color the picture of the dog. Explain why you chose those colors.

A Dog's Day Text

Dog Sequence

Making the Suffix -ed

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Making the Suffix -ed

Fiction Summary

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Bird Writing

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Dog Vocabulary

Vocab Cards

Vocabulary is an important part of building literacy and understanding. For this unit, there are eight key vocabulary words designed to help students to better understand the vocabulary used in each story. Each of these vocabulary words are used multiple times in the unit in order to reinforce them.

It is good to use multiple parts of our brain when learning new vocabulary, so one of the vocabulary activities includes writing the vocabulary word and having the student draw a picture to help them remember what it means. Make sure the student is generating their own picture, not copying one.

Some other vocabulary activites include:

1. Hide the word: For this activity, print the vocabulary cards and hide the picture/definition part around the room. Then hold up a word, have kid hunt around the room to find the matching definition. For large classes, break the group into two groups and have them send just one or two at a time to do the searching. Kids of all ages love this game.

2. Read and race: For this activity, have the words on one end of a hallway or if the weather is nice you can do this outside. Have two kids prepare to race (can be done with one kid running trying to beat their previous time), hold up a definition card. The student reads the card and runs to go find the match.

3. Pictionary: For this activity, shuffle the word cards. Have students draw to explain the meaning and others can guess what card it is.

For more vocabulary ideas, read my blog entry all about engaging vocabulary activities.

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Dog Spelling

All Dog Spelling Pages

Spelling and phonics are an important part of balanced literacy. This unit focuses on dogs, so students are reading the word dog frequently. As they read, they may have noticed the short o sound in dog. These spelling activities will focus on the -og spelling pattern. For most students who are able to read this story independently, this should be a good list for them.

For some students, you might want to just focus on words with an initial letter sound of D, or you might want to try this alternative spelling list: dog, log, hog, bog, jog, fog, frog, smog, clog, blog

For students needing an extra challenge you might want to introduce the word canine and try this list: Canine, whine, shine, shin, fine, fin, spine, spin, twine, twin.

More advanced students might be able to spell the vocabulary words or can work on a more difficult spelling pattern.

For students needing a different spelling list, here is a blank version of the same activities.

The first spelling practice activity is a simple one, just write each word three times each. Make sure students are saying the word as they write and trying to write it without looking. One thing they can do is say the word, spell the word, cover the word, then try to write it. There are many fun activities you can do to make this more physical and interactive. For this worksheet, students just need to write the words three times each. They can do that with pens, markers, gel glitter, whatever they like.

The next activity incorporates drawing into the phonics practice. Students should hide their spelling words in a picture they drew. They can then have another person try to find the words. This does have them only writing the word one time, but requires more of a focus on each letter since they have to think about the shape of the letters when hiding them in the drawing.

The third activity is called Rainbow Write, students can practice again with repeatedly writing the words but should use different colors. The instructions say to write each word in three different colors. This means write the word in green, then write it in organge, then write it in pink, or whatever the chosen colors are. However, I allow students to do this activity in a variety of ways. Some want to write each letter a different color, some want to stick with one color for a word and then switch colors for the next word, the important thing here is that they read the word as they do it and practice spelling it.

The fourth activity is what I call Fancy Spelling. They can make their spelling words with creative lettering. This can include cursive for the less artistic kids. Some might chose to make block letters or bubble letters. But some kids really enjoy this and make each word it's own special design. While the latter is preferable, I accept any of them so long as they are focusing on the shapes of the letters. If a students just writes their normal writing for this, I would return it because for this activity I am looking for them to really focus on the letters in the word.

The final spelling activity helps to reinforce the spelling pattern by having students focus on the consonants and vowels that make the word. Learners should write vowels in blue and consonants in red. I usually accept any colors and just have students make me a key. The important thing with this activity is that kids are focusing on the relationship between the consonants and vowels in the words.

These activities were chosen because they help students practice in different ways with the words. Some are focused on rote memorization, while others help students visualize the letters in the word and make connections. However, if these don't work for your learner, there are many other ways to reinforce phonics patterns in students.

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