Engaging Treasure Themed Activities for ELA

Treasure-Themed Activities for ELA and pirate day activities: Check out these FUN and engaging treasure-themed activities for ELA that will make your students happy and make the teachers jump for joy because of skill-building fun. Get ready for some learning FUN. I plan to use many of these ideas to start the school year assessments and small groups with. These were a teacher’s request because so many of you loved our Treasure Chest Math Activities.

Treasure Themed Activities for ELA Start With This

These small $1 Treasure Chests were at the Target Dollar Spot and started it all. They are pretty good quality for just $1 and I knew I could use them again and again.

Matching Letters and Sounds

One of our biggest tasks in Kindergarten is to teach letters and sounds. This is a skill we teach all year long. Here is a fun treasure chest ELA activity to teach, review, and interact with. You can choose the letters and sounds that have already been taught or you can work on tricky sounds that are confusing to learners.

To play, students lay out the treasure chest pieces that contain the initial sound picture. Students pull the uppercase and lowercase letters out of the treasure chest and match them to the correct mat.

Treasure Map Letters

I am obsessed with these treasure maps for letter recognition. You get 6 maps so you can use this in small groups or individual centers. (You can grab black and white versions as well.) First, students grab a mat.

Next, you can choose your skill level for the class or even differentiate per group. You can choose to mix and match uppercase letters, lowercase letters, or sounds. To play, a student chooses a treasure from the chest and finds the match on the mat. After the learner finds the letter on the map, they can mark it with a dry-erase marker or an X we provide. Each map has the letters in different locations, so students can play this again with a different mat to continue to review letters and sounds.

And remember, you have three treasure chest ELA activity options for this activity. One set contains capital letters. The other contains lowercase letters. Finally, you have a treasure chest option with sounds.

All the Sorts

A critical skill for Kindergarteners is sorting. It is a great way to tell who really understands a concept and who does not. I always say, doing a sort on paper is a way to help learners sort their minds. These sorts are great for sorting minds and come in a variety of skills.

The first type of sort is for letters and numbers. This is a sort we would do fairly early in the school year. I always smile when we do initial assessments and hear the little “l” read as the number “1.” I always teach that we read letters and count numbers.

An additional way to sort could be letters and words. Once my learners master numbers and letters, this is a great sort to work on. Letters can be put together in specific order to make words.

Next, check out this harder sorting option. This is super tricky but so important for little learners. This sort is for letters, words, and sentences. Remember your groups can all be working on different skills as well, so even if this challenging sorting option doesn’t work for everyone, it may work for one group.

Treasure Chest ELA Activities for CVC Words

One learner is rocking and rolling on letters and sounds, it makes sense to use letters to build words, which is exactly what our next treasure-themed ELA activity is. This one is simple, fill in the middle sound. It sounds easy, but Kindergarten teachers know what a challenging task this is for little learners.

You have a few learning options for this activity. First, you can look at the picture and tap it out. When you know the correct middle sound, simply slide it into the correct treasure chest. Another learning idea would be to laminate the pieces first, then have the learner write in the middle sound before placing it inside the correct treasure chest.

I can see a small group of learners playing to learn small group with this activity for sure.

CVC Word Matching

This activity would make an excellent independent activity. As the teacher, I prepped the treasure boxes ahead of time. Students take out their vowel pieces and pictures.

Next, they match the picture to the correct CVC word. You could increase the challenge by mixing up two vowel sound images if you desire as well. This would be a feat for short /e/ and short /i/ words but still so much fun!

Rhyming Treasure Chests

Rhyming is another one of those skills that we teach and review, teach and review, and over and over again throughout the school year. These treasure chest rhyming cards are a fun way to view this skill. You can print out the paper option or you can print out the option that uses the plastic treasure boxes as well to create a sort.

Honestly, I am not sure which option I love more! I am just obsessed with these treasure-themed activities. What do you think?

Grab this activity pack here