Central Elementary

 September Literacy News 

What is Reading Intervention?
Reading intervention is extra instruction provided for children who scored below the expected level on the Measures of Academic Progress for Primary Grades (MPG) assessment. It is delivered in a small group session lasting 30 minutes at least 3 times a week. The lessons focus on basic reading skills your child needs in order to be a successful reader.

Research indicates that reading fluently and accurately leads to better comprehension of the text.
 
How Can Parents Help?

• You can help your student by helping them learn the sight words that his teacher sends home. Most of these words cannot be sounded out and must be memorized. The goal is to read them correctly, "in a flash".
• It is also very important to read to and/or with your child EVERYDAY!! The amount of reading a child does each day is critical to their success. The vocabulary a child hears and comes to understand from books is 3 times as sophisticated as the language of even the most educated speakers.
• Help your child to think about what he is reading by talking about the pictures, predicting what will happen next, and relating what he has read to something in his own life.

 October Literacy News 

Listening actively to stories being read aloud is a key to understanding what's happening in the story.

Try these tips to build listening skills:

1. Ask your child to read and retell small parts of the story to you. Or, ask questions while you read. ("Why do you think he did that?" "Does that make you think of something you've done?")
2. After you've read a story together two or three times, skip a word or two. Ask your child to fill in the missing word or words.  Hint:  This works especially well with rhyming stories.

 Children 's oral language is developed by  ongoing conversations with adults. These conversations can also help increase your child's interest in reading. You can help build this interest by reading aloud with  your child for  15 to 20 minutes each day.

Here are some hints to help you make this time more beneficial:

1. Remove distractions. Make your reading spot as quiet as possible so your child can focus on the story. (Turn off the TV and ignore the phone to avoid being interrupted.) 
2. Get confortable. Offer your child soft mats or pillows to sit on. Give her a blanket to snuggle up in on cold days, or sit outside where there is a cool breeze when it's warm. Have  a snack or drink available before you start.
3. Encourage your child to participate . If there is repetition in the story, have your child  repeat the key phrases with you. Take turns saying the lines in a different voice (try being more dramatic or using a silly  voice. )  Stop occasionally and ask if he can predict what will happen next in the story.
4. Keep it appropriate. If your child has trouble following the language or plot of the story; it may be too difficult for him. Look for books that are closer to his reading level. (Ask his teacher for suggestions).

 
There are so many books--how do you choose which ones to read with your child?

1. Pick books that you and your child will enjoy reading. It's hard to show enthusiasm if you don't like the story!
2. Match the length of the story with your child's attention span. Consider two shorter stories instead of one long one.
3. Don't worry if the book is an old one.  A story is new if your child hasn't heard it.
4. If your child doesn't like the book you picked, stop reading it. Don't spoil the fun of reading together.

 November Literacy News 

Tips for Reading Aloud
Rhyming activities help your child to pay attention to the sounds in words. Reading books with rhyming words, singing songs or playing games with rhyming words, can be a fun activity that can lead to recognizing the patterns in words.

Some ideas to increase rhyming ability in your child are:

1. When reading or singing a rhyme with or to your child, stop before a rhyming word and encourage your child to fill in the blank. Be sure to give praise when the correct word is produced and help when necessary.
2. Around the house, point to objects and say their names, for example, clock. Then ask your child to say as many words as she can that rhyme with the name. Other easily rhymed words are ball, bed, rug, sink, and toy. Let your child use some silly, or nonsense words as well: toy--hoy, boy, woy, loy, doy, etc.
3. Say three words such as go, dog, and frog, and ask your child which words sound almost the same (rhyme). Vary the placement of the word that doesn't rhyme with the other two.
4. If your child has an easy-to-rhyme name, ask her to say words that rhyme with it: Jill--bill, mill, fill, hill.
5. Read and recite Mother Goose rhymes. After they become familiar, you start the rhyme and let your child finish it.
6. If a computer is available, encourage your child to use it to play rhyming games. Some good sites are:

• Earobics
• Sesame Street
• Enchanted Learning

Tips for Before, During, and After Reading

• Before reading, good readers think about what they already know about a subject they are getting ready to read about. They also determine a purpose for reading and when they read the information they are seeking, they recognize it and can remember it later.
• During reading, good readers can decode words and pay attention to the meaning of what they read at the same time. They know that accurate meaning comes through interpreting "chunks" of words together. Good readers know when they are not understanding what they read and have several "fix-up" strategies to use: they re-read, ask questions, slow down, or think about what makes sense in the story.
• After reading, good readers can identify important ideas from their reading. They also understand how the pieces of information fit together, and they want to read more.

 
From the US Department of Education; Helping Your Child Become a Reader; 2002.

 December Literacy News 

Books make great Christmas presents! Young children especially like to read non-fiction books that include photographs of real objects, animals, or places. Over 80% of what we read and write on a daily basis is non-fiction. These books help readers build background knowledge in a wide variety of areas. Reading about the real world helps students to make more connections between books and their world.
 
Reminder to Parents:

• Students will be starting middle-of-the-year benchmark testing the week of December 7th. Please talk to your child about the importance of doing their best and listening carefully to the directions during the tests.
• On testing days, be sure your child has had enough sleep, eaten a nutritious breakfast, and arrives at school on time and in a pleasant mood. This will help set the stage for him to do his best on the assessments.

 January Literacy News 

A new semester is starting soon. Make it successful by preparing your child to be ready, have a routine, and take responsibility.

Help your child go to school ready to learn every day by:

1. Speaking positively to your child about school and the teachers. Your attitude toward learning will send a powerful message.
2. Seeing that your child gets at least eight hours of sleep and a nutritious breakfast so he'll feel rested and alert.

 
Develop simple routines for stress-free mornings by:

1. Picking out clothes and packing her lunch in the evening. Put everything needed for school in a special place so she can "grab it and go" quickly.
2. Together creating a regular morning routine. For instance, your child gets dressed and makes her bed before she sits down to eat breakfast.

Teach responsibility and help your child get organized by:

1. Having a special place in his back pack for permission slips and notes from the teacher.
2. Putting his name on his belongings, including his coat, hat, mittens, backpack, and lunchbox. This helps avoid confusion when someone else has the same item.

Adapted from Home & School Connection  Newsletter; 2005; Resources for Educators, a division of Aspen Publishers, Inc.
 
 
Checklist for Parents of First Graders

• My child reads first grade books aloud, and can tell when she cannot understand what she is reading.
• My child reads and understands simple written instructions.
• My child uses what he already knows to enrich what he is reading.
• My child predicts what will happen next in a story.
• My child asks questions (how, why, what if?) about books she is reading and can describe what she has learned from a book.
• My child uses invented spelling in his writing , but also understands that there is a correct  way to spell words and spells high frequency words correctly when writing.
• My child uses simple punctuation marks and capital letters, appropriately.
• My child uses language with more control, speaks in complete sentences, and uses more formal language at school than at home and with friends.
• My child is curious about words and uses new words when he speaks and writes.
• My child is beginning to see that some words mean the same thing (synonyms) and some mean the opposite (antonyms).
• My child is learning that words play different roles in sentences--that nouns name things and verbs show action, for example.

 
Adapted from A Child Becomes a Reader: Get a copy at NIFL

 February Literacy News 

Early Efforts to Write
Much of a child's success as a writer is a product of early writing experiences. Parents, as children's first teachers, play an important role in the development of young writers.

Writing and reading go hand in hand. As your child is learning one, he is learning the other. You can do certain things to make sure that he gets every opportunity to practice both. For example, giving your child crayons and paper when he is a preschooler, and encouraging him to draw and scribble will help develop the muscle control needed for writing as he gets older. These first scribblings and drawings are his first writing.

In kindergarten, children learn how to hold a pencil, that sentences begin with a capital letter, that you need spaces between words, and much more. For now, it's just important that he tries to write and sound out letters and share his thoughts.

Writing alphabet letters helps your child learn about their different sounds. His very early learning about letters and sounds gives him ideas about how to begin spelling words. When he begins writing words, don't worry that he doesn't spell them correctly. Instead, praise him for his efforts. In fact, if you look closely, you'll see that he's made a pretty good try at spelling a word for the first time. Later on, with help from teachers (and you), he will learn the right way to spell words. For the moment, however, he has taken a great step toward being a writer.

First Graders can be held accountable for correctly spelling words that have been on their spelling tests or on high frequency word lists that have been sent home by their teachers.

Adapted from: Helping Your Child Become a Reader; U.S. Department of Education, 2002.

Real Writing
Let your child see you write often. You are a model and a teacher. What you do is as important as what you say. Have children see you writing notes to friends, shopping lists and phone messages. When you make changes in what you write, it confirms for the child that revision is a natural part of writing.

When  your child becomes more skilled at representing sounds with letters, try to find real reasons for your child to write. Writing is hard work for young children. As time goes on, children will strive to make their messages clearer by adopting standard form and formats (letters, spelling, etc). It takes many years to learn how to write what you want to say and spell it correctly. Give him the encouragement he needs to continue to put his thoughts on paper by being a willing listener when he reads what he has written.

• Be alert for occasions when your child can be involved in writing. For example, you can suggest your child :
• write a thank you note for a present he received
• add notes at the end of parents' letters or emails
• label or write a sentence or two about what is happening in pictures in a photo album      
• make lists--grocery lists, presents he wants, favorite books/songs/movies
• make entries on a family message board or in a message notebook where  family members tell     each other jokes, say thanks (or I'm sorry), or just write encouraging words like "Have a great day"
• make his own books so he can write stories to share with family and friends (be sure to allow room on each page for his illustrations)

 March Literacy News 

What Is Reading Fluency?
Reading fluency is the ability to read a text accurately and quickly. Children are becoming fluent readers when they can automatically and rapidly decode and understand the meaning of individual words. Fluent readers read fairly effortlessly, group words into meaningful phrases, and read with expression.

Why Is Fluency Important?
Fluent readers are able to focus their attention on understanding what they are reading so they are better able to interpret and make connections among the ideas presented. Their reading sounds natural, as if they are talking to someone.

Non-fluent readers must focus their attention on decoding and understanding the meaning of individual words which leaves little attention free for understanding the meaning of the text as a whole. Their reading is choppy and halting.

Non-fluent readers read slowly, and so cannot keep the thread of what they are reading in their memories. This means they usually have to read the text several times to understand it.

Adapted from Put Reading First, US Dept of Educ; 2001
 
Fluency Activities
Fluency develops gradually over time and with practice. You can help your child become a more fluent reader by:

1. Reading aloud often, modeling fluent reading.
2. Reading a sentence aloud and inviting your child to read the same sentence "echoing" your reading.
3. Helping your child read new words and talking about their meanings.
4. Have your child repeatedly read short passages aloud while you time him with a stopwatch. Graph the results to show him how much faster he gets each time.
5. Let your child use a tape recorder to practice reading aloud. Then listen to himself to see if he read fluently.

Pre-K students can practice saying the letters of the alphabet (in and out of order) quickly and accurately.Try this same activity with numbers (from 1-10) or pictures of common objects (clothes, toys, furniture, food, etc).

Kindergartners can practice saying the letters of the alphabet and numbers (from 0-100) out of order quickly and accurately. Take a three or four-letter word and have your child sound it out without stopping, stretching out the sounds and blending one sound into the next (sssuuunnn, sun). When that becomes easy, take a simple sentence  ( I can see the fox. I like to run. The cup is red. ), write it on a strip of paper and cut the words apart. Have your child arrange the words in the correct order and read the sentence. See if she can read it without pausing.

First graders should be reading common phrases , such as:  one more time, all day long, the two of us, as big as, from here to there, a long way, where are you, any old time, right now, come here, thank you, we want to, put it there, move over, it turned out, between the lines, in the beginning, along the way, and once upon a time. You can write the phrases on strips of paper and have your child practice reading them without pausing between the words of each phrase.

 April Literacy News 

Why Is Vocabulary Important?
Vocabulary means the words students must know to communicate effectively by knowing what words mean and how to use them. Knowing the meanings of words is key to understanding what is read. There are two types of vocabulary:

1. Oral vocabulary--the words recognized in speech.
2. Print vocabulary--the words recognized when reading or writing.

Building vocabulary skills improves reading comprehension and reading fluency. Without building a large vocabulary, students cannot read successfully.
 
Vocabulary Building At Home
Building vocabulary is far more than memorizing words. Ideally, children should be brought up in a rich language environment which is word-conscious. Children take up attitudes and learn from their parents, so building vocabulary starts as a family affair. Children are greatly influenced by the amount of conversation, by the nature of the conversation (and the vocabulary used), and the "word awareness" of the family. There are a great number of families where vocabulary word games are played with the children as an ongoing way to build vocabulary skills.

How Learning Vocabulary Happens
Learning new vocabulary happens in a number of ways. It may involve:

1. Using clues to figure out the meaning of an unknown word. (For example, in the sentence "Mike felt excited because he couldn't wait to go camping", figuring out what "excited" means by finding the clue "couldn't wait").
2. Creating a mental image of what a new word means. Example: Egregious--imagine making a bad mistake, one so bad, rotten eggs are being thrown and an egg reaches us.
3. Thinking about the different parts of a new word (for example, dividing "newspaper" into "news" and "paper").
4. Figuring out how to connect new words to the words a child already knows. Using words he understands to explain new words.
5. Frequently using the new words learned in speech or writing.
6. The best method for building vocabulary is to read about a wide variety of topics.

 
Ways to Help Improve Your Child's Vocabulary

1. Teach your child 1 new word every day. Make it a goal!
2. Talk together. Words come more easily to children when they hear them spoken aloud. Avoid a lot of "baby talk".
3. Point out any new words when you read aloud with your child. Help your child figure out the definitions of new words.
4. Teach your child how to use a dictionary.
5. Break up new words together. When your child finds a new word, help him to take a guess at how to say it.
6. Once your child learns a new word, encourage her to use it often when speaking or writing. Have a Word of the Week--ask your child to find one word each week that's new to her. Post the word on the refrigerator, and challenge her to use it as often as possible during the week. Keep a tally of how many times she can use the new words.
7. Play with words. Play Scrabble or Boggle, and do crossword puzzles. These and other word games are available for the computer also. A good site is www.funbrain.com 
8. Encourage your child to explore new subjects and interests. This can expose him to new ideas--and new words.

 
Vocabulary Research
Students who read just under 5 minutes per week outside of school will read only 21,000 words in a year.
Students who read nearly 10 minutes per day will read 622,000 words in a year.
Students who read 15 minutes per day will read 1,146,000 words in a year.
Students who read over an hour a day will read more than 4, 258,000 words in a year.

What a difference reading a few extra minutes every day makes!

• May News Article.pdf