For Mother’s Day, a fun story to read to your class is the book called “Five Minutes Peace“, about a mother elephant who only wants to have five minute’s of peace and quiet from her energetic children by taking a bath, (of course, her children have other plans!). The Book It opens up the conversation about how Moms need a rest sometimes (just like
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I am lucky to be part of a group of early childhood bloggers who network, share ideas and support each other online. We have banned together in our first ever “Preschool Blogger Network” blog hop – and we are excited to bring a host of ideas that you can share with your children or class for Earth Day. We decided to pair each of
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It’s no secret … I LOVE children’s literature! I love finding out about new books (and books that are new to me). One way I find out about new books is by visiting my local library. The librarian’s at my local library in South Windsor, CT are GREAT! Truly a wonderful resource! Another great way to find out about a book that you may
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The winners have been announced in our “I have a dream” CD giveaway … thanks for all who entered and shared their dreams for children! Now we want to share some additional resources that you can use in your homes and classrooms on Monday to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. First up … music you can download (for FREE!). Daria is offering her “I Have A Dream”
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During the winter months, you can teach young children about hibernation and where/how/which animals hibernate. This activity focuses on concepts of science (nature, animals) and literacy(knowledge of books and print, reading and writing, story comprehension). This also provides children with an experience to practice fine motor skills(drawing/writing). A great way to start of an activity like this is with a book! There are many great children’s books about
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The other day I read this wonderful idea in the paper in the “Ask Amy” column. It was about a literacy campaign that she launched with the Family Reading Partnership called “A Book on Every Bed.” The idea is to put a million books at the foot of a million beds for a million children on Christmas morning. What a WONDERFUL idea! It’s a
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Lots of people have heard of phonics and indeed there has been a heavy focus on them in schools for years, and then not so much of a focus as we looked at whole language approaches, and then back again to a phonics-intensive focus (don’t you just love the education pendulum?). But before phonemic awareness can develop, or at least before it can develop
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One of the most important parts of a child’s early literacy experience actually has nothing to do with books or print at all. Instead, it is all about their early language experiences centering around talk – both being talked to (not at!) and later, talking back. Researchers Betty M. Hart and Todd R. Risley focus on this idea in their book “Meaningful Differences in
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Have a fun time promoting literacy at your child care program or school by having a “Storybook Character Parade“. This is a fun opportunity to allow children to come to school in costume, and can be done at any time of the year. Beforehand, talk to the children about some of their favorite books and characters. Ask them why a certain character is a
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The following post is from Colleen Brunetti … our Early Literacy Expert. She will be doing a series of posts on early literacy for preschoolers. Since this ties in so nicely with our recent Book Study Blog party of the book “Literacy Beginnings” (Fountas & Pinnell, 2011), I’ll interject a couple of quotes from the book along the way! –Laura Choosing high quality children’s literature is an important part
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