Each Section in Word Warm-ups Live includes exercises teaching a set of similar phonics patterns. Students complete exercises in order, allowing them to build on previously-learned patterns. Note: If a student does not need to work on a specific phonics pattern, the Change Level/Section/Goal page in the Teacher Menu can be used to turn one or more exercises off.
The Introduction step:
Before working on exercises, the student learns about phonics patterns in the section on the Introduction step. The Introduction includes a general lesson about the section as a whole. A set of words and images then describe specific phonics patterns to the student.
Word List Exercises:
Most exercises in a section guide students to practice reading Word Lists aloud until they meet their Words Per Minute goal. Students always read through each list completely in Word Warm-ups Live. Students then practice spelling a set of words from the list. The Pass step for Word List exercises involves repeating the Word List with a teacher present.
Two special exercises, the Review and Challenge, include the same steps as other Word List exercises, but emphasize slightly different content:
- The Review exercise includes some words from across all the other, regular Word List exercises in the section.
- The Challenge exercise encourages students to extend their understanding of the patterns being taught, and includes new words using patterns from the section. The Challenge is always locked until students have completed all of the other exercises, including the Story.
Story Exercises:
One exercise in each section is a Story, which lets students experience phonics patterns they have learned in the context of a larger text.
Story exercises in Word Warm-ups Live are not necessarily structured to increase reading fluency, as is the case in Read Naturally Live. The student listens to an audio Read Along in order to hear the pronunciation of words correctly modeled. A Practice step then lets the student read the text aloud independently, but Practices are not timed in Word Warm-ups. Students are encouraged to read carefully in order to answer a single comprehension question in the next, Quick Quiz step.
The Pass step for Story exercises involves the teacher listening to the student read through the story text. Because student ability may vary in Word Warm-ups, the teacher is instructed to grade Story performance in terms of his or her expectations for each individual student. The teacher also reviews the student's responses from the Quick Quiz question before deciding whether the student has adequately completed the exercise.
