Do you have a first grader? Here are some simple and easy reading activities to help with comprehension at home!
This post is sponsored by Welch’s® Fruit Snacks. all opinions and content are my own.
Our big boy is going into the first grade. He’s a little book worm and loves to read everything! One of the things we try to focus on at home is helping him to grow his passion for reading.
First grade focuses on reading comprehension, so I put together a list of simple reading activities for first graders to practice at home.
Snack Time
Whether it’s during our afternoon snack time, enjoying our favorite Welch’s® Fruit ‘n YogurtTM Snacks or before bedtime, incorporating these reading activities helps to put a fun twist on storytime.
Welch’s Fruit ‘n Yogurt Snacks are made with real fruit, surrounded in creamy yogurt and are A’s go-to snack these days. I love that we’re able to spend a little one-on-one time while enjoying my favorite pastime together.

Here are some reading activities for first graders practice at home:
Story Book Activities
Nonsense Book
Helping your first grader write and create their own nonsense book is a fun way to explore their imagination while cultivating their reading skills. A loves to create silly, made up stories about out of this world creatures and their fantasy world adventures. Sometimes, he just likes to make story books about goofy things he and his brothers enjoy doing together.
Story book activities are my go-to because all you need is your writing instrument of choice and construction paper. I also love that A spends a good chunk of time engulfed in the activity.
Story Sequencing
Story sequencing is like using match cards with words. I like to create our own and let A come up with different sentences and stories from his imagination. He likes to set up the cards and mix them up throughout our afternoon snack time, enjoying his favorite Welch’s Fruit ‘n Yogurt Snacks while doing so. The best part for me is getting to spend some quality time helping to enrich his mind, but laughing and enjoying it together, too.
Build a Story Card Game
This is like story sequencing, but more of a game where we mix up our word cards and create matches out of similar characters, places, verbs, etc.

Reading Comprehension Activities
Character Traits Recognition
This is a simple activity that can be done using any book with pictures. After A reads his book, we go through the pages and identify different characters and details that we didn’t pay attention to visually while reading the story.
This activity helps first graders to associate their story with the characters in the book and helps them to comprehend character and story development.


Who, What, When, Where, How?
Whether it’s his favorite show or book, this is an activity that we like to play in Q&A form. I’ll ask questions about different aspects and he’ll answer with the theme of the story or plotline. He usually ends up coming up with different scenarios and conclusions even when we’re talking about the same book.
It’s a really easy way to get first graders to think in multi-dimensional thoughts about their favorite books and characters.

What are some of your favorite reading activities to practice with your first grader?
Don’t forget to pick up some Welch’s Fruit ‘n Yogurt Snacks for reading activities with your first grader! They come in a variety of different flavors including strawberry and blueberry, our two favorites.
Pin It!
