Get the most out of reading aloud!

I firmly believe that the single most important thing you can do to help your child became a reader is to read to them daily.

While teaching Pre-K for many years I learned a thing or two about getting the most out of reading aloud to children and I thought I would share those ideas and concepts that will no doubt set the foundation for important literacy skills.

Before Reading The Story:

• Introduce the book- read the title

• Read the author and illustrator- Explain that the author is the person who wrote the words and the illustrator is the person who drew the pictures.  This teaches them that books have different parts. Someone created those pictures and wrote those words therefore words and pictures have meaning. 

• Make predictions! Preschool age children LOVE this! What do you think the story is about? By doing this you are encouraging them to think about the content of the story and to predict by looking at the illustrations, tying back to pictures have meaning.

During The Story:

• Point out unfamiliar words. i.e frustrated- What do you think that means? You can even make a vocabulary journals of new words and add those words to the journal. 

• Allow time to look and talk about the pictures. An early pre-reading skill is telling the story through pictures, so encourage this!!  Pictures are just as important as text. 

• Talk about the characters and events in the story. Ask open-ended questions (questions that will provoke thought not just yes or no questions). i.e. How do you think that made him feel? 

• When possible connect story events to their lives. Remember when we went on a train? 

After The Story: 

• Recall- Go back to those predictions in the beginning and ask about the events.  i.e. What happened to the alligator? Why was there paint all over? 

• Occasionally have your child retell the story to you in their own words. This is an excellent way to improve comprehension!!  

Most of all Have fun together!!  Snuggle!  Get cozy!  Enjoy these intimate moments of sharing a good book!!    

Fun With Name Bags

Here's a way to incorporate letters and spelling in a fun relatable way for your child!

Materials needed: -Paper towel/toilet paper rolls
                               -Sandwich bags
                               -3x5 (or smaller) pictures of each family member and/or friends
                               -Thick black marker
                               -Scissors

I started off by cutting the paper towel rolls into about 2 inch circles.  I then wrote one letter on each circle spelling the name of each member.



Mallory helped put each picture in a bag. (Great one to one correspondence activity as well!) To start we included our immediate family and grandparents. Obviously you can do it any way you'd like and add pets, schoolmates, friends etc.





I chose to include uppercase letters only because it tends to be easier for younger children to learn uppercase first but there's different theories on this so again tailor it to your child's level and certainly for older children it makes sense to include both lowercase and uppercase.



The was a big hit and Mallory had fun spelling each family member's name. She would ask me what letter comes next and I showed her how the letters go from left to right.



Done!


*I am a firm believer that young children learn to write by being exposed to lots of FUN hands on writing experiences that are meaningful to their lives.  An example of this occurred during our little activity.

While we were putting together the family word bags Mallory saw that I was writing words on the tubes and wanted to do it as well! She wanted to model the writing she saw me doing and her writing had a purpose!  So much more powerful than sitting down with a worksheet!

She said "Mommy I'm making M's!"