reading
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Encouraging Preschoolers to Read Aloud
One of my favorite things to do with preschoolers is to have them read to me, and by read I mean look at the illustrations in a book and make up the story to go with them. It's fun to see which part of the story they remember, and what kinds of things they come up with to fill in the gaps. I also love to see how they interpret the illustrations. I've noticed that toddlers and young preschoolers are happy to read to me, but as those same children get older, they become more reluctant. They understand that the words have meaning, and they know that they can't read those…
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Conversations with Preschoolers about Current Events
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Tips for reading wordless books
Some of my favorite books to read have no words, on the other hand, some of my least favorite books to read have no words. The illustrations in a wordless book make all of the difference, and my personal comfort level with the book helps too. If I know that I’m going to read a book with no words to the class, there are a couple of things that I like to do to prepare; Flip through the book and familiarize myself with it. I pay attention to the sequence of events, the characters, and the ending. This way, I will be able to use my verbal and nonverbal communication…
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Conversations with Preschoolers about Current Events
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Dealing with difficult behaviors during read alouds
Preschoolers are smart! They know that when you are sitting in front of the group reading a story, you are less likely to stop what you’re doing to address their ridiculous behavior. Every group usually has at least one who will take advantage of this, and that can make any teacher dread read alouds. I’ve been there. You desperately want to ignore the behavior, you try, but it gets worse and then the other children are beginning to notice, and all of a sudden no one is paying attention to the story anymore. So I thought I’d share some behavior management ideas that have worked for me, hopefully these will…
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Read Alouds that keep them interested
I have always loved to read stories to children, I can capture their attention and keep it for twenty minutes or more just by using a few very easy strategies. These strategies have nothing to do with cute props, or even the story itself, they are all about how I read the book. Know the story – I don’t just mean “oh yeah, I’ve read that book before” it is so helpful to know the story inside and out. You want to know what is on the next page before you turn to it. It’s also helpful to be familiar with the rhythm of the story, this will carry the…
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Conversations with Preschoolers about Current Events
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Preschool Activities that Promote Fluency
It’s Wednesday, and here at Preschool Ponderings, that means time to focus on the standards. Every Wednesday I choose an Early Learning Standard and share a number of activities that can be aligned with that particular standard. Remember, the Standards that I use every day, and am most comfortable with are Ohio’s Early Learning Development Standards – you can review them here, however I’ve found that even if your State’s standards differ, many of these activities can still be aligned similarly. I’ve rounded up some great ideas today! Domain: Language and LiteracyStrand: ReadingTopic: FluencyIn preschool, fluency means that children use intonation and phrasing when they participate in shared reading, chants, rhymes,…
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Preschool activities that encourage reading comprehension
It’s Wednesday, and here at Preschool Ponderings, that means time to focus on the standards. Every Wednesday I choose an Early Learning Standard and share a number of activities that can be aligned with that particular standard. Remember, the Standards that I use every day, and am most comfortable with are Ohio’s Early Learning Development Standards – you can review them here, however I’ve found that even if your State’s standards differ, many of these activities can still be aligned similarly. I’ve rounded up some great ideas today! Domain: Language and LiteracyStrand: ReadingTopic: Reading ComprehensionThis standard covers skills such as being able to answer questions about a selection that has been…
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Why is Early literacy important?
Happy Week of the young Child! Each year I make sure to spend one day celebrating Early Literacy, because it is so important to children’s academic success. You hear it all the time – Early Literacy is important, we need to read to young children, children should be exposed to the written word. We all know what we are supposed to do, but more importantly, do we understand why? We all want our students, and our own children to succeed academically, but what does this have to do with reading to them when they are babies? A lot actually. 1. From a social perspective, taking the time to read to…
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How to host a great slumber party
Maybe you have spring break coming up and you’re looking for something to do with your kids at home, or maybe you just need a fun day at school to shake your class out of their winter blues. Either way, a daytime slumber party is a lot of fun and really easy to pull off without a ton of prep work. Use these suggestions as a guide for your slumber party. Stay in Your Pajamas all day! This is the best way to start the day, getting to keep your comfy pjs on really sets the mood for a fun, carefree day. Why not?! Set a few ground rules (only…
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Motivating Young Readers
My students are participating in the summer reading program at our local library and they absolutely love tracking the number of books that they’ve read. They are constantly asking to read books (I know, awesome!) and I am happy to oblige. I know that this is something I want to continue throughout the school year. For the library’s program my kiddos have to write down the title of each book that they read – which really means I have to write down the title of each book that they read. This doesn’t sound so bad, until I think about the fact that my 12 students are each reading at least…
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End of the year skills post #2
Yesterday I introduced you to one of my favorite products for helping my kiddos jump into reading – something that they are very excited about right now! Today I want to share one of my newest products, that my students are loving. These are my CVC Word Family Ring Books. They are very similar to the paint chips, but each word family is on it’s own ring, helping to manage the chaos of all those letter cards. These are also color coded, to help make sure that the correct beginning letters stay with the intended word family. I do this to make sure that students can be successful – they…
