Making and Sharing Books

Today was "Bring Your Favorite Book to Camp Day". There was plenty of creative storytelling and illustrating as the children made books of their own. You can see how very important books are to the children and families at TBSCC by observing the comfort level and familiarity the children have with them.

Sophie Sherman illustrates her Cinderella story.

 Audrey writes her name on the author page of her book.

 Audrey shares her story, The Girl Who Was Afraid of the Dark with Rachel and Sophie.  Rachel also read, The Apple  written by Sophie.

These children share a quiet moment as Julia reads her story book to Sophie G..

 Audrey takes a few minutes at her cubby to re-read her book.

More than Muffins

The Keshet children baked pumpkin muffins today, and the baking experience revealed a growing level of awareness of how we follow a recipe. The children demonstrate that they understand that print has meaning; the words on the box, accompanied by pictures, tell us what (and how much) of other ingredients we must put into the mix. We measured one cup of milk and 1/3 cup of oil, and we counted and broke two eggs. The children counted twelve 'cups' in the muffin tin, and counted out twelve paper liners to fill them. We counted fifty strokes with the spoon, to be sure we had mixed the batter enough. These pre-reading and pre-math experiences are especially satisfying when they produce a dozen delicious muffins for snack!

Telling a Story of a Painting

When Madison called me over to take her painting off of the easel, I was very intrigued by her artwork. When I asked her what it was, she told me that it was "everyone eating breakfast." She then went through each smaller circle around the large circle and told me who it was and what they were eating. i carefully took notes on the painting as she told me so that we had a beautiful photo and captions to go along with it. While I was pleasantly surprised by this nice interaction we were having, I was also thinking about how this is a form of pre-reading. Being able to narrate a picture that a child creates is one of the first steps towards reading!

-Alison and Sauci

The Art of Pre-Reading

Leo came in on Friday very excited to show Sauci and me two books that he had brought from home. He bounded into the classroom telling us that he brought in two books that he could read and wanted to read to us! As we settled into our morning routine, Leo pulled out his book and started reading to me. And lo and behold, he knew each word! I was watching him amazed with myself wondering how I didn't know that he could read before. As I kept watching him, I saw Leo turning away from the book, but continuing to read. And then it clicked. He had memorized the book!

Leo is in the wonderful stage called pre-reading. He has found books that he really likes and connects with, and most likely asks to hear them over and over. He has read them so much that he started picking up on more than just the story, but also how many words are on each page, and how to match up the pictures with the words. While Leo may not be reading the words right off of the page, he is reading. He has learned the flow of a book, when it is appropriate for punctuation, and when to turn the page in the story.

Leo is very proud of himself, and he should be! As you can see in the picture above, some of his classmates came over to hear the great stories that Leo was reading. Pre-reading is a normal developmental stage on the way to reading. Children watch how their parents and teachers read to them, as well as how they read to themselves, and model that behavior. This helps children create the stepping stones to reading individually!

-Alison

More phonological fun!

The children were very inspired to create their own tongue twisters and rhymes after we read: One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss. Each child had a somewhat different take on this activity but they all were experimenting with the sounds of letters. Teddy Post was the first to venture out in to tongue twister territory by saying: "ake, pake, snake, make." He followed this up with: "make, bake, lake, cake." Joshua R. and Oliver also had a lot of fun with this activity. Joshua said: "My sister is a walnut. My sister is a peanut. My mom and dad are gazillion nuts!" Hearing Teddy Post's rhymes, Joshua followed with: "Snake, bake, snake make cake." Having some fun with friend Sam's name, Joshua created: "Sam, gwam, Sam, ham." Oliver followed with: "Sam, lamb, gam, zam." Oliver also created his own rhymes like: "Funny, nutty, gunny bunny" and "Amelia, Bedelia, Delia, Amelia." Not wanting to leave his other sister out, Oliver continued by saying: "Sophia, Bophia, Nowia." After thinking out loud and telling the children that my dog's name was Jazz, Ilana volunteered: "Jazz, Paz, Taz." Nathaniel, who was obviously familiar with "real" tongue twisters, walked by saying, "She sells seashells by the seashore!" These are great activities to do with your children at home, in the car, while waiting at various places, etc.

Sight word Bingo

Many of the Kohavim children enjoyed playing this version of Bingo which required them to recognize the most commonly used words in the English language. Some of the words they definitely recognized and others they clearly sounded out. It was great to see children helping each other. There were also several children who were not playing the game but who decided on their own to make a sentence with each word that was selected. Still others were thinking of words that rhymed with the chosen words. These variations on the game were entirely created by the children themselves. We were happy to see so many children having fun while learning. They were clearly ready for this next step in their pre-reading skills.