SOCIAL STUDIES
STRATEGIES
Alpha Boxes
Objective: To develop vocabulary and graphophonic understanding through
recollection and reflection of important points.
Activities: After reading a social studies passage, or following a unit of study,
students work in pairs or small groups to think of words that reflect the important
points learned. They insert the words alphabetically into the Alphaboxes on the
recording sheet. The goal is to fill in as many boxes as you can.
Students may:
Share ideas with other class members orally—discussion and justification are
critical
Use their words to create an alphabet book modeled after The Important Book
by Margaret Wise Brown.
A variation of The Important Book is to create side-by-side pages where one
page is titled The interesting thing about _____ is…, and the other page is
titled, But the important thing about _____ is…) Example: The interesting
thing about Abraham Lincoln is that he was over 6 feet tall, but the important
thing about Abraham Lincoln is that he signed the Emancipation Proclamation
which freed the slaves in America.
Use the Alphabet boxes to create a list of words for the List, Group, Label
strategy as a pre-writing activity.
Extension Idea:
Students who have watched Jeopardy on television enjoy writing questions to go
with their focus words. For example: If the students generate RAGS as a word
under R, the accompanying question might be What did
Cinderella dress in most of the time?
Adapted from: Revisit, Reflect, Retell: Strategies for Improving Reading
Comprehension by Lindy Hoyt. Heinemann, 1999.
Name: __________________________ Date: ______________________
Text or Unit of Study: __________________________________________
Alphaboxes
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
XYZ
Adapted from: Revisit, Reflect, Retell: Strategies for Improving Reading
Comprehension by Lindy Hoyt. Heinemann, 1999.