Dr. Evelyn Backa, School Psychologist
Here are a few fun ideas to promote early reading skills in your home! Trace and say letters - Have your child use a finger to trace a letter while saying the letter's sound. Do this on paper, in sand, or on a plate of sugar. Read it and experience it - Connect what your child reads with what happens in life. If reading a book about animals, relate it to your last trip to the zoo. Once is not enough - Encourage your child to re-read favorite books and poems. Re-reading helps kids read more quickly and accurately. Dig deeper into the story - Ask your child questions about the story you've just read. Say something like, “Why do you think Clifford did that?” Play with words and syllables – Clap out the words in a phrase or sentence (e.g., Parent: “Clap one time for each word you hear in this sentence, “My house is big.” Child: Claps four times while repeating “My-house-is-big.”). Once you have mastered sentences, try syllables! (e.g., Parent: “Clap one time for each syllable in your name.” Child: “Ben-ja-min” while clapping three times). Reference: www.ReadingRockets.org www.readingresource.net Dr. Evelyn Backa, School Psychologist
Encouraging and fostering reading skills in the early grades is one of the most important things we can do to support a child’s later academic success. Parents play a crucial role in helping their child become a strong, confident reader. Here are a few fun ideas to promote early reading skills in your home! Kindergarten: • Say silly tongue twisters - Sing songs, read rhyming books, and say silly tongue twisters. These help kids become sensitive to the sounds in words. • Play sound games - Practice blending sounds into words. Ask, “Can you guess what this word is? M – o – p.” Hold each sound longer than normal. • Read it again and again - Go ahead and read your child’s favorite book for the 100th time! As you read, pause and ask your child about what is going on in the book. First Grade: • Don’t leave home without it - Bring along a book or magazine any time your child has to wait, such as at a doctor’s office. Always try to fit in reading! • Play word games - Use plastic letters or letter cards to make a simple consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) word (e.g., mat). Have your child sound out the word. Then have your child sound out the new word as you change one letter. For example, change mat to fat to sat; sat to sag to sap; and sap to sip. • I read to you, you read to me - Take turns reading aloud at bedtime. Kids enjoy this special time with their parents. Second Grade: • Be your child’s #1 fan - Ask your child to read aloud what he or she has written for school. Be an enthusiastic listener. • One more time with feeling - When your child has sounded out an unfamiliar word, have him or her re-read that sentence. Often, kids are so busy figuring out a word they lose the meaning of what they’ve just read. • Point out the relationship between words - Explain how related words have similar spellings and meanings. Show how a word like knowledge, for example, relates to a word like know. Reference: www.ReadingRockets.org We are very excited that LWE is implementing a new writing program in grades K-5. Teachers are using the Lucy Calkins' Units of Study program. During their writing block, teachers use lessons from the program that follow the format below.
Below is more information on the Units of Study from http://www.heinemann.com/unitsofstudy/writing/default.aspx. "Built on the best practices and proven frameworks developed over decades of work in thousands of classrooms across the country and around the world, the Units of Study for Teaching Writing, K–8, offer grade-by-grade plans for teaching state-of-the-art writing workshops that help students meet and exceed rigorous global standards. The Units of Study in Opinion/Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing, K–8 will:
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