What to do after completing ThatKinderMama's Illustration Unit

If your students have completed my Illustration Unit, the next step is clear: it’s time to add labeling!

For the past month, your students have been practicing drawing with shapes, coloring their entire picture, and adding details. Now it’s time to help them label their drawings and begin learning sentence structure. Kindergarteners need explicit instruction. Not "go off and write."

My Labeling Unit guides students to:

• Listen to the sounds they hear and label their pictures phonetically

• Practice writing simple sentences using their labels and sentence stems

• Continue the same drawing and coloring process they loved in the Illustration Unit

By adding labeling as the next step, students build skills and confidence before moving on to writing full stories independently. Starting slow at the beginning of the year means they will progress faster and more confidently later on.

The lessons are hands-on and engaging! Towards the end of the unit, students draw, label, and choose a sentence stem to write a complete sentence—practicing capital letters, finger spaces, and punctuation.

Enhance your Labeling Unit with my mentor text-Labeling Our World! It models clear pictures, labels, and simple sentences, giving students an easy, visual guide as they build foundational writing skills.

Need more practice? Incorporate labeling in reading centers with my Phonics Labeling No Prep Pages or Monthly Labeling Pages.

For year-long support, check out my complete Kindergarten Writing Curriculum, trusted by over 10,000 classrooms, to help your students become confident writers all year long.

I'm working on mentor texts for ALL of my writing units! Grab my Labeling Our World here or my bundle! 

Want Amanda's coordinating mentor texts? Get them here! These are physical books and are not included in the digital download. You can absolutely teach this unit without the mentor text, but having a clear, supporting text makes introducing a new skill even easier.