Do you remember the game from the eighties, with the frog leaping across traffic, trying not to get smushed?
Maybe I’m just showing my age, but still, I find the game Frogger a great analogy for the next reading strategy.
You see much like that little frog, our young readers are trying to successfully make it to the end of a sentence, and will perhaps encounter many unknown words in their path.
These words can be barriers in their mission to to get to the end of the sentence, or they can be stepping stones. The difference lies in this strategy.
Who is Skippy Frog?
Skippy Frog is a reading strategy that teaches young readers to skip the tricky word, read to the end of the sentence, and then come back and try it again.
I purposefully wait to introduce this strategy until they’ve learned many others because students have a tendency to over-use this strategy. I don’t want them to become too dependent on it.
It is important to impress upon young readers that they need to exhaust other strategies before skipping a word. Otherwise, you may find your child electing to skip over trying to decode first. However, this strategy, is just as useful as the rest, as long as it isn’t abused.
You can grab my Skippy Frog poster here or by clicking on the image below.
Why is it important?
Skippy Frog encourages readers to rely on context clues when attempting to decode a word. Often children will get stuck on a word. Most often they will attempt to sound it out over and over again, even when they cannot make sense of it.
Context clues also play a role in comprehension. They help students infer the meaning of a text. Learning to use them to help decode unknown words also helps students understand how to apply them to comprehend more complex text later on.
How to introduce it
One of the most important things to me is that students make real word connections to these strategies. There is no better way to establish a connection than by adding a physical component to it. Movement has been associated with stronger connections. So in order to foster this we actually take turns skipping over words in real sentences.
I write huge words on construction paper and line them up in a sentence. I put a star post it note above one of the sentences so that students know which one to skip. They take turns actually hopping over the word as they read. “Frog hops” are optional, but many students elect to do it this way.
In this example I’m using the sentence “I saw a giraffe at the zoo.” and having my daughter hop over giraffe. We read to giraffe, skip it and then start over. Before starting over, we discuss how the word zoo gives us context clues to figure out what kind of animal it is. For example, we know it’s unlikely to see a cow or other farm animal at the zoo, so it helps us narrow it down to zoo animals that start with g.
Though this activity is silly and usually ends in a classroom erupting with giggles, it is important because it helps students to build a concrete connection to this word.
We then practice with much smaller sentences written on a white board. For the purposes of emphasizing the use of context clues I begin this with no picture clues. I don’t want the students to overly rely on the pictures. However, after some practice, we add back in the picture component and discuss how we can combine Skippy Frog with Eagle Eye and Lips the Fish to build a very strong combination strategy.
How to practice it
As always you can find lots of resources for Skippy Frog on Pinterest. However, I have a few I created that I have found to be really fun and keep beginning readers engaged.
- Skip it Quick On a white board, write a series of sentences that have words covered by sticky notes. Set a timer for a minute or so and then let your child see how quickly they can decode the words that are covered by the sticky notes. As they build confidence you can encourage them to beat their time by setting the timer for lesser increments.If you don’t want to add the timed component, you can always do the t-chart at the bottom and just keep score. Each time your child gets a hidden word correct, they score a point. Each time they do not, you score a point.
- Frog Libs Similar to mad libs this game has unknown words that are left out and have to be determined by context clues. I recommend starting with familiar stories like fairy tales. These will be aneasy way to help build confidence with your young reader as they already have a lot of background information about the story.As you read, work with your child to fill in the blanks and then re-read the story to make sense and correct any places where the word that was filled it doesn’t fit.
- Leveled Books Pretty much any leveled books will work with this strategy as long as your child is working at a level that challenges them. As they read, they will naturally come to unknown words. Encourage them to skip it.
You can also print out frog pictures and stuck them to popsicle sticks to give them a tactile connection to this strategy. As they come to the word, they can physically skip it with their Popsicle stick.
- Guess the Covered Word This is another strategy where you can play the game guess the covered word. This is similar to Frog Libs, except the word is covered instead of left blank. Additionally, it can be done with just independent sentences instead of having to follow a story structure.
I created this freebie to give you an idea. You will need to cover the words that are blacked out in the picture with a sticky note. This is just a preview of what’s to come! I’m working on a big reading strategies pack that’s going to have all the work done for you!! For now enjoy this freebie by clicking on the image below or downloading here.
- Read Aloud Practice
Strategy practice for Skippy Frog can easily be incorporated into your daily read alouds. You can do it whenever you read a book. For example, before your bedtime story, prep a book by adding sticky notes to words throughout the book. As you are reading and come to a word that is covered skip it and come back to it.
Model using context clues, beginning sounds and picture clues to help you determine the word. As your child becomes more confident with this strategy, let them take the lead and decode the unknown word independently.
Recommended Books
Below are some of my favorite books to use while teaching this strategy. Don’t forget to check out Amazon’s used books. You can sometimes score some awesome deals that way.
For your convenience, this post contains affiliate links. If you purchase from these links I may make a small commission at no cost to you.
If you’ve missed any of the previous strategies, you can find them here. Be sure to stay tuned tomorrow for the next strategy. And don’t forget, through June 14th, we have an amazing giveaway going on. You could win an Amazon gift card for $150! Be sure to check out the details here.
And don’t forget to follow me on Pinterest, where I’m pinning all kinds of great ideas for instruction!
