Blog #8 Beginning reading

Storybooks and language experiences help children who are just beginning to read because the more a child is read to the more language they will pick up. The same goes for how much you talk to your child. There are parents who talk to and sing to their children when they are still in their mother's womb. Some may say this practice is strange because the baby can't hear you; but in fact the baby does. Play some loud music beside a pregnant woman's stomach and watch the baby flip around and move.  There are many studies about children who were found in the wild. These children had no interactions with other humans and therefore had no idea how to formulate words.

In the words of Dr. Seuss: "The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go."

My artifact is a game that you can literally "build" on!!

Take white labels and put sight words on them. You can add pictures with words for very young readers or make longer vocabulary words for readers in higher grades. I love this idea because they can play with lego blocks as they "build" their vocabulary!

Blog # 7 Involving parents in Literacy

Ways to involve parents in literacy for young learners

• Take home Literacy bags
• 
• Write a grocery list  (with pictures if  necessary) and have your child help you shop by reading the words 
• Open court reader books sent home each night
• Book-It incentives for the kids from Pizza Hut 

Families can make it a fun night out. There child will receive a coupon for a free small pizza at pizza hut if they complete their monthly book sheet by reading 20 books in the month.

For my artifact, I have included pictures of the book it program slips and an image of bagged books that children can borrow for a day or two. It is very important to give kids incentives to read because to some kids reading can prove to be very difficult. I know my kids enjoy reading each night because I have them read a book to me and then we find a book on youtube for them to listen to.

Blog #6 Using DAP

According to the information found on  the Naeyc website http://www.naeyc.org/files/naeyc/file/Play/Questions%20about%20DAP_1.pdf

Developmentally Appropriate practices is a way of using strategies that fit the child. Children are all different and they should be treated as individuals. When a teacher plans curriculum in a developmentally appropriate way, she is matching what the child already can do to what the child will work up to doing.  Each step in development is important as well. You can not expect a baby to crawl before it can walk; it occasionally happens but not often. Teachers have to assess what a child knows so they can move forward from that point. A word of caution would be not to go too fast all at once. Children's brains are like sponges but any sponge can be worked too hard.

Sue Bredekamp has written some text books for child development. I have included a video as my artifact.  http://youtu.be/YdyGhmQiGJ8 Sue talks about DAP in the video and mentions a key point that school systems keep pushing material that was used in first or kindergarten down to preschoolers. We can not keep expecting 3 and 4 year old children to do the same course work as children in the first and second. Some children may do okay, but others will fall through the cracks. I believe it is ok to introduce some key concepts but it is not okay to assess them on these concepts that are far out of their understanding.