Looking for a small group lesson plan template for Kindergarten, first, or second grade? In this post, I’ll share my favorite template for small group instruction (for free!), plus explain how I decide what to include in my lessons.

Let’s dive in!

What Should I Include In My Small Group Lessons?

Small group lessons are a high-value time of the school day in the primary classroom. Small group is an opportunity to work with students closely. We can see what students are struggling with and where they’re excelling. 

Plus, small group provides us with an opportunity to give our students instruction that’s best suited to their specific needs. If students have skill gaps, we can address them during small group. Or if they’re advanced and ready to learn more challenging concepts, we can incorporate this into our small group lessons. So we want to use these precious moments in small group as efficiently as possible! 

With limited time for our small group lessons, we need to target the skills and activities that students most need our close guidance with. For example, it’s much easier to support a few students in reading a decodable text when they’re sitting at our small group table than it is to try and support many students as the entire class reads the decodable text. Or if students are really struggling with a particular skill or concept, it’s easier to provide a higher level of support when we’re working with them in small group.

We also need to ask ourselves, “Which literacy skills most need to be differentiated for this group of students?” For example, perhaps your students have a big range of needs when it comes to learning sound-spelling patterns (phonics). So you decide to spend some of your small group lesson time working on phonics. But maybe your students are more or less at the same level with their knowledge of high-frequency words, so you can most efficiently teach these words during your whole group lessons.

As you can see from the examples above, there’s no “one size fits all” correct answer to the question of, “What should I include in my small group lessons?”

However, I didn’t understand this when I first began teaching. Back then, I used the same lesson plan structure for every small group that I taught. 

Now that I know more, I don’t use a “one size fits all” approach to small group instruction. Instead, I ask myself these questions when lesson planning, so I can make the most of my small group instruction (note that these questions are specific to Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grade):

• Phonemic awareness – Do I have any students who are not meeting grade-level standards for phonemic awareness? Do I need to dedicate a few extra minutes to oral phonemic awareness instruction, or can I incorporate phonemic awareness into activities like decoding and segmenting to spell words?
• Phonics – How much does my teaching of phonics skills need to be differentiated? Can I do most of my instruction in a whole group setting and meet most kids’ needs – perhaps supplemented by a bit of small group instruction? Or do my students have a big range of needs, so I need to do a small amount of phonics instruction in whole group, followed by supplemental, differentiated instruction in small group? Which phonics activities are best done in a small group setting, where I can provide more support? How much will I focus on decoding vs. encoding (spelling)?
• High frequency words – If I teach high frequency words during my whole class instruction, will certain students need further practice? Are there gaps in some students’ knowledge of high frequency words that need to be addressed in small group?
• Reading fluency – Will any of my groups need to spend extra time on specific fluency-building activities? How will I incorporate activities that build fluency into my lesson plans for all groups?
• Comprehension – What level of scaffolding and support will each group need as we work on comprehension? Will I need to make significant adjustments to activities for any of my groups – such as progressing through text more slowly so we can stop and discuss more often, or incorporating more advanced comprehension work / critical thinking for a challenge?
• English proficiency – Are some of my students English language learners / multilingual learners? How can I incorporate extra oral language and vocabulary work into their small group lessons?

Based on my answers to these questions, I decide what skills and activities to incorporate into my small-group lesson plans. I also consider practicality – coming back to that question of “Which skills and activities do students most need my close guidance with?” It’s much easier to provide decoding support in a small group setting vs. trying to rush around and support all students with reading a passage in a whole group setting.

It’s certainly a lot to think about and consider, but since our small group time is so limited, it’s worth it to do this thinking work! 

Example (Completed) Small Group Lesson Plan Template

Now let’s make this more concrete with some actual example lessons. These lesson plans come from my “Small Group In A Snap!” resource, which you can get for FREE at this link!

“Small Group In A Snap” contains a free sample of the lesson plans that my Kindergarten Literacy Club and 1st and 2nd Grade Literacy Club members receive every single month.

Planning for small groups is 10 times easier when you’re a Literacy Club member, because we give you so much to start with – new small group lesson plans each month, plus printables to set up an organized small groups binder!

Let’s dig into these example lessons, starting with the Kindergarten example. This lesson is designed for students who have learned to decode CVC words, but are not particularly fluent with them yet. They’re reading a simple decodable text, answering comprehension questions, and doing some accompanying activities (phonemic awareness and word work, in this case). Not all activities are typically used in a single lesson; they are spread out over a couple of days.

This is just one example; you’d want to make adjustments for your particular group of students. Again, you can get this exact lesson (plus the decodable) for FREE at this link – and if you want lessons like these every month, become a member of the Kindergarten Literacy Club the next time doors to the membership open!

Now let’s look at an example that could be used with first grade or below-level second grade. This lesson is designed for students who can decode consonant digraphs, blends, silent e words, and are beginning to decode some simpler vowel teams. Students read a decodable passage, retell, answer comprehension questions, and complete some accompanying activities. Most teachers use the activities and small group materials over a couple of lessons (vs. trying to fit everything into one lesson).

Remember, you’ll want to adapt these lessons to meet your students’ needs! If you haven’t downloaded these free lessons yet, grab them here (the download includes the lesson plans, decodables, and printable activities – plus additional levels, beyond what was shown here)!

Free Small Group Lesson Plan Template for Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd Grade

Now that we’ve discussed what you might include in a lesson, let’s talk about the free small group lesson plan templates I have for you!

You’ll notice that these templates are fairly open-ended. The reason for this is everything we discussed above. What you include in a lesson may be different from group to group. Your small group lessons may also be a bit different from year to year.

Included in this free download are editable planning templates for:

• Pre-reading learners (who are not yet reading and are still mastering alphabet letters)
• Learners working on CVC words (who aren’t quite yet ready for complete decodable texts)
• Readers (who are working with decodable text or grade level text)

You can print and write into these lesson plan templates (try downloading as a PDF first), or use the editable features to type directly into them, using Google Slides!

Grab the free small group lesson plan templates here!

Want Done-For-You Small Group Lessons?

I hope that these resources are helpful to you in planning effective small groups! However, even with a template, it can still be very time-consuming to plan your small group lessons each week.

That’s one of the reasons why I created my Kindergarten Literacy Club and First and Second Grade Literacy Clubs! Each month, we provide our members with brand new small group lesson plans and texts, plus literacy center activities (independent work for the other students, while you pull small groups). 

Members get tons of other perks, too, like monthly professional development sessions, live Q&A sessions, assessments and data sheets for organizing your small group data, and much more!

A great way to get a taste of what the small group lesson plans are like is to download the “Small Group In a Snap” freebie. You can try out the lessons with your students and get ideas for your small group lessons!

Download it for FREE here:

Happy teaching!