Teaching the four types of sentences is a key component in developing young writers. If you’re working with lower elementary students, you might be reviewing command, statement, exclamation, and question. Upper elementary students might be diving into the fancier terms: interrogative, declarative, exclamatory, imperative.
Regardless of which wording you choose to review, having students understand the difference amongst these four sentences is so important. Students will develop an understanding of sentence purpose— does this sentence give an order? Does it ask a question or express excitement? Once students have developed that understanding of sentence types, they’ll become more fluent readers and writers.
Looking to dive into sentences with your elementary students, but don’t know where to start? Here are some fun, hands-on ideas to teach the four types of sentences. These activities are designed to be used during whole-group OR small-group time. All the resources below are part of the Types of Sentences Activity Pack.
FREE Types of Sentences Interactive Notebook
Grab these free interactive notebook pages to review the four types of sentences.
Introduce the Four Types of Sentences
First, start by introducing the four types of sentences. You might want to introduce one every other day of the week. Review examples of what these sentences would look like in writing and when spoken. Search through different types of texts to identify the sentences. Then, discuss the punctuation mark associated with that specific type of sentence.
Your students will benefit from having a reference with these examples. Therefore, interactive notebook pages are a great reference tool for students. They can easily access the definition of the sentence type, examples, and punctuation marks. Interactive notes encourage students to be a part of the note-taking process, while giving them a tool they can use time and time again.
Types of Sentences Activities
Review the four types of sentences while making grammar fun and exciting for students! These types of sentences activities are perfect for 2nd-3rd grade students.
Use Interactive Notebook Pages to Introduce the Types of Sentences
Students can reference these interactive notebook pages throughout the school year whenever they need to refresh on the types of sentences. Students can fill in each page using their own examples and definitions.
Compare the Different Types of Sentences with a Sort Activity
Once your students have a basic understanding of the four different types of sentences, they can work on comparing the sentences. A sorting activity is a fun, hands-on way to expose students to sentences. Students will read different sentences and decide what kind of sentence each one is. Is it a statement, command, exclamation, or a question? Then, they will decide which punctuation mark best fits each sentence.
Apply the Four Types of Sentences
Students can identify the types of sentences and understand that each one serves a different purpose. Now, students are ready to apply what they’ve learned. This fun game can be used during an literacy center or during your small group station. Students will read each card and decide what kind of sentence it is, come up with their own sentence, or determine the correct punctuation mark. If they answer correctly, they roll the die and move down the game board.
Do you want to learn about planning and organizing centers? Check out this blog post.
Types of Sentences Review Craft
Even after teaching the types of sentences, we often catch our students missing question marks and exclamation marks. That’s why reviewing the sentences throughout the school year is important. This popcorn craft activity is a fun way to review commands, statements, exclamations, and questions. It can also be used as a review right before an assessment.
Assessment & Worksheets
These printable sentence worksheets can be used to review the sentence types and punctuation marks. They are perfect for independent activities or assessment.
Paperless Ideas to Review the Four Types of Sentences
Here are some paperless ideas for teaching and reviewing the types of sentences.
Sentence Charades: Students can work in small groups to plan and act out any scene they’d like without talking. The audience members must provide four sentences to describe the scene.
For example:
Small Group: Students act out decorating a Christmas tree and drinking hot chocolate.
Audience: Statement: “I am decorating the Christmas tree”
Command: “Bring me the Christmas lights.”
Question: “Where are the ornaments?”
Exclamation: “I just love Christmas!”
Four Sentences, Four Corners: Place four corners around the room using the signs ‘Statement’, ‘Command’, ‘Exclamation’, ‘Question’. Call out random sentences and have students walk to the correct corner to represent the sentence.
Alternate idea: Once students are in the corner, pick on a corner and ask them to give you a sentence about a specific topic.
For Example: “Question corner, give me an interrogative sentence about Christmas.”
Check out these writing resources:
How to Get Reluctant Readers Excited About Reading!
Activities to Teach Text-Based Writing
FREE Fall Activities for Upper Elementary
How to Use Interactive Notebooks in the Classroom
These are great ideas for teaching students about the different types of sentences! I have been struggling with finding a hands on way to teach my students, but this will be perfect. I love the popcorn example as well as the punctuation sort. My students would also love to play charades with this topic. We have been playing charades everyday during our mask breaks at school. The students love to act out and guess things. I can even incorporate this into our scheduled break times. Thank you so much for sharing these ideas!