Month: December 2023

By Teacher Ravisara What Is Reading Comprehension?  Reading Comprehension is a child’s ability to understand and interpret what they are reading. In order to succeed with reading comprehension, children need to decode their text and make links between what they have read and what they already know.  Reading Recommendations for Kindergarten: When finding books for your children in kindergarten, it is important to have a few points in mind.  Use the five-finger rule. If your child makes five errors reading a page from a book, it is too hard for them. If they make one error, it is too easy. Four errors means the book is acceptable with help. The sweet spot for a ‘just right book’ are two or three errors per page. It is okay for children to read the same book multiple times, this helps them memorise the text, allowing them to familiarise themselves with the text which improves their reading fluency, vocabulary, and word recognition.  Play Kindergarten Reading Games: Get your child involved in hands-on activities that improve their phonemic awareness and reading comprehension skills.  Roll Word Families  Start with two blank dice. On one, write word-beginning consonant sounds, such as b, s, t, m, p, and r. On the second, write word-ending vowel-consonant sounds, such as at, op, an, in, ap and et). Ensure that the child will be able to combine the beginning and ending sounds to create consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. To play, invite your child to roll the dice and read the resulting word. Some of the combinations will be nonsense words, but that’s OK. Nonsense words still provide practice blending sounds. If desired, ask students to identify which words are real and which are nonsense. I Spy  Send children on a CVC or sight word scavenger hunt through classroom books with a simple I Spy game. Ask them to search the books for CVC or sight words, then report back on the words they find. Act Out Passages  Encourage students to act out a scene from a book they are reading. This fun, simple activity adds meaning to the words on the page and helps children focus on and visualise those meanings. Bingo  Use a preprinted sight word bingo card or fill a blank template with sight words or CVC words. Create a few different card options and give one to each student, along with marker chips. Call out the words one at a time. As students locate each word on their card, they will cover it with a marker until they have five in a row. Teach Comprehension Strategies:  When your child doesn’t understand what they are reading, make sure to instruct them to: Reread the passage, page, or paragraph Look at the images for any clues Rethink about what has happened in the previous pages or read what is going to happen next  If those tips do not work, work back to the five-finger rule to see if the book is too hard or not.  Five-finger retell After reading a book together, have your child go over five retells to have a discussion. What are 10 tips for improving reading comprehension in Kindergarten? Conclusion Overall, teaching reading is such a rewarding experience. When you hear your child put words together and read aloud to themselves or to family members for the first time you feel in awe and absolutely fantastic! However, we must keep in mind that there are various reasons why students may be finding reading comprehension difficult. As adults, we must regularly revisit the reading comprehension activities and strategies in order to allow your child’s reading comprehension to improve over time. 

by Teacher Nancy D. Sivilai   Through play young toddlers develop their social, emotional, physical, intellectual, moral and creativity strengths.  The word play might be understood as not doing anything of value or without a serious purpose, as often it is not teacher-directed and there is no end product to display.  However, good play gives children an opportunity to explore, experiment, create, and imagine.   Good Play will: As a teacher, we look at stages of development, like all other aspects of development, play progresses through stages.  One stage will prepare for the next stage.  Toddlers play behavior is primarily solitary, onlooking and parallel.  Toddlers need classroom  or free play to be spontaneous.  Group activities will be short because of their attention span.  Toddlers will act alone and independently of others.   In parallel Play, toddlers individually play with toys similar to those used by nearby children and engage in basically the same activity but not yet sharing ideas and goals.  Cooperative play will happen later. Do ‘s for helping your toddler engage in play: Have fun playing with your toddler and watching him/her develop in each domain of learning through play.

 What is an imaginary friend? Imaginary friends can be other children, animals, a toy that has come to life, or any other kind of imaginary companion. Children may have more than one friend and they may change frequently or remain the same for varied periods of time.  When do most children have one and when do they stop? Typically, 2 ½ to 3 years is the most likely age for a child to have an imaginary friend.  For how long this imaginary friend will stick around varies from child to child with some children keeping their pal around for only a few months, and some for years. With the majority of children, imaginary friends will be gone by age 8 or 9, but some kids may keep them up to age 12.  How many kids have an imaginary friend?  Studies show that as many as 50 to 65 percent (1) of young children have an imaginary companion, whether it is completely pretend or in the form of a doll or stuffed animal like “Mister Monkey”.   Why would a child create an imaginary friend? There are many possible reasons a child might have an imaginary friend. Here a few of the more common ones: What’s positive about having an imaginary friend  A study from La Trobe University in Australia (2) discusses many benefits a child may gain from having an imaginary friend including:  When to be concerned about an imaginary friend  Most of the time, your child’s imaginary friend is nothing to be concerned about, but when do imaginary friends become a concern?  (3)  One issue might be that your child is blaming their imaginary friend for things they do, such as damaging or breaking things. Other warning signs that an imaginary friend may be negatively affecting your child’s development could look like:  Final thoughts Most research has shown that having imaginary friends can be a healthy part of childhood, and may have some benefits. If your child introduces you to their imaginary friend or engages with them in your presence, try to get to know them! Ask your child simple questions about their friend (what is their name, what do they like to play, what is their favourite food, etc.).  Getting to know your child’s imaginary friend may give you more insight into your child’s inner world, their likes, dislikes, fears and hopes. (4)  References

By Teacher Shannon One of the best ways to learn is to make a mistake. Learning to not only make mistakes but to also learn from them without getting angry is a lifelong endeavour. As adults it is important to be able to support children in situations where mistakes may happen.  What are healthy risks? This depends on the age and development of your child.  A Toddler 1 student may find that crossing the bridge on the playground is scary and there is a risk in them falling. As an adult we can see that there are ropes to support them on either side, if they fall there is nothing sharp around to hurt them, and there are more benefits in learning to cross the bridge than to be stuck to one side.  For a K1 or K2 student they may find that they want to jump off of the playground from the top rather than go down the slide. As their parent or teacher this can seem like something dangerous to do but the child almost always sticks the landing and there is sand to protect them if they do not. So, if the child feels comfortable enough to take the risk in jumping, why as an adult should we stop them?  There are three possible outcomes for your child in this example Benefits of taking risks include… If you as the adult are unsure of your child taking on a challenging task, instead of saying no that is too dangerous, take a look at the task and see where you can help your child to one day complete it. For example, if your 18 month old is very interested in another child’s bike and wants to ride it for themselves, break down the skills needed to ride the large bike by providing your child with balancing activities, pedalling a tricycle, etc. Until your child is comfortable enough to do these tasks then you can reintroduce the bicycle.  The benefits of trying and failing far outweigh not trying in the first place. I hope you are able to learn something from this and both you and your child see the world as a place full of opportunities for growth, both in success and failures.