Learning punctuation marks at a young age equips children with fundamental skills that enhance their overall literacy and communication abilities, laying a strong foundation for future academic success. Our new materials, Punctuation Marks, are available for ages 3-6 and 6-9. Punctuation marks are usually introduced in the early elementary years. For young learners, learning the symbols of punctuation is the first learning step to learning punctuation marks. They learn to get familiar with the concept of symbols that signify an action. Next comes learning the function and use of these marks, which takes place in the early elementary years. The materials for ages 3-6 consist of 9 three-part nomenclature cards with control cards with a control chart. For this age group, we also recommend our Punctuation Wooden Board with cutouts. The materials for ages 6-9 consist of 9 six-part nomenclature cards with a control booklet and a control chart. For this age group, we created a set of Task Cards with a corresponding workbook. The task cards provide a field of practice for learners. They contain a control of errors on the back making it an independent work. In this post, you will explore the components of this series of materials that make it so effective!
Materials
- Punctuation Marks Complete Set
- Punctuation Marks
- Punctuation Marks Cloth Chart
- Punctuation Marks – Workbook
- Punctuation Marks (Task Cards)
- Punctuation Marks Nomenclature Cards (3-6) (Printed)
- Punctuation Marks Nomenclature Cards (6-9) (Printed)
- Related products: Box for the task cards, Three-Part Card Tray
Ages 3-6 – Getting Acquainted to Symbols
For young learners, it is never too early to introduce new concepts in their basic forms. This first exposure ensures that learners will not be focusing on the first layer of knowledge when studying punctuation. Removing learning the names of the symbols and their appearances will help learners feel familiar with the concepts and concentrate on higher thinking skills.
Our Punctuation Marks Wooden Board with cutouts is a fun way to introduce the symbols and invite learners to join by placing all symbols in their respective receptacles. The tactile and repetition of movement activates and reinforces muscle memory ensuring retention.
We also have available a set of three-part cards with a control chart. Initially, when working with your learners, you may show a book and say that the symbols help us pace writing and be more expressive in writing. Model the placement of control cards to the left of the mat, from top to bottom. Name all the symbols without explaining the functions. Learners can match the picture cards and label cards to their corresponding control cards. You may explain that these symbols can be found in writing.
Ages 6-9 – Working With the Rules
For elementary learners, punctuation marks sets the foundation for effective communication skills that they will need through their academic and professional career. As they learn grammatical rules, punctuation helps with further clarifying meaning in writing. Correct use of punctuation helps ensure that sentences are correctly interpreted. Therefore, it is critical that you share the purpose of using punctuation consistently and properly to your learners and recruit their interest. We created a comprehensive program to facilitate the learning, which is explained below:
Introduce the functions of punctuation marks using the Punctuation Marks (6-9) 6-part nomenclature cards. First, place the picture and label cards on a working space and read the corresponding description card. Continue with the remaining punctuation marks. Begin with the most commonly known and used: period, comma, question mark, etc…This step provides your learners with the function of each punctuation mark. Later, encourage your learners to challenge themselves to read the cloze-test cards, and match to them the corresponding label.
After working with the description for each punctuation mark using the nomenclature cards, demonstrate to your learners how to practice their knowledge using the Punctuation Marks Task Cards. Our task cards contain exercises for each punctuation mark which require learners to copy a sentence and add the punctuation mark at the appropriate place in a sentence. The sentences are simple and repetitive to ensure that learners are focusing on the format of the sentence. For instance, the task cards on hyphens request to correct a sentence by adding and/or changing the punctuation. “She’s re-reading her favorite book,” must be corrected by adding a hyphen, “She’s re-reading her favorite book.”
Finally, after having worked through the Punctuation Marks Task Cards, your learners will be delighted to work through their personalized workbook. We create a reproducible workbook that can be copied and provided to any of your learners. The workbook is a way to consolidate their knowledge and keep track of their work. They can revisit their workbook to reactivate their knowledge.
In conclusion, our program on Punctuation Marks is ideal for learners ages 3-9. It contains a variety of exercises that progressively lead to a solid acquisition of proper grammar conventions. By learning to use punctuation marks such as periods, commas, question marks, exclamation points, apostrophes, hyphens, colons, semi-colons, and quotation marks, your learners can build strong sentences that convey their ideas clearly. Punctuation not only improves the readability of their writing but also allows them to express emotions and ask questions effectively. With the foundation, they will be well on their way to becoming confident and expressive writers!
