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Conyers, J. (2012). My Very Own Imagination Library. 88(4). Retrieved 2020, from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00094056.2012.699850

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Emmitt, M., Komesaroff, L. & Pollock, J. (2010). Language and learning: An introduction for teaching (5th edn). Melbourne: Oxford University Press

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This is a great resource on exploring about voice registers and appropriating it to suit the social context. While at first glance it might seem focused on speaking skills, it is important to note that the protagonist is continuously receiving feedback from her teacher about the various social contexts before she tweaks her behaviour. This proves that active listening, assessing of one's social environment, how others are speaking or what is culturally appropriate are important prerequisite skills in developing and expressing situationally appropriate behaviours (Emmitt, Komesarof & Pollock, 2010). The ability to listen in context displays higher social conciousness in decoding language and is a great resource for children practicing to appropriate social behaviours across different contexts.

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Decibella and Her 6-Inch Voice | Child Story by Julia Cook

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This resource offer strategies to help children to be fluent and it relates to reading which is supported by Vygotsky's Social Constructivist theory as he believed that children have to be scaffold. This resources also guides teachers and parents on the importance of the reading with fluency.

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What Is Fluency?

Fluency is the ability to read "like you speak." Hudson, Lane, and Pullen define fluency this way: "Reading fluency is made up of at least three key elements: accurate reading of connected text at a conversational rate with appropriate prosody or expression." Non-fluent readers suffer in at least one of these aspects of reading: they make many mistakes, they read slowly, or they don't read with appropriate expression and phrasing.

​ Developing reading fluency with Read Naturally Strategy programs

Key Concepts

Why Is Fluency Important?

For many years, educators have recognized that fluency is an important aspect of reading. Reading researchers agree. Over 30 years of research indicates that fluency is one of the critical building blocks of reading, because fluency development is directly related to comprehension.

Here are the results of one study by Fuchs, Fuchs, Hosp, and Jenkins that shows how oral reading fluency correlates highly with reading comprehension.

To interpret this type of correlation data, consider that a perfect match would be 1.0. As you can see, oral recall/retelling, fill in the blank, and question answering are all above 0.6, which indicates there is a strong correlation. But oral reading fluency is by far the strongest, with a .91 correlation.

Many researchers, including Breznitz, Armstrong, Knupp, Lesgold, and Pinnell, have found that fluency is highly correlated with reading comprehension-that is, when a student reads fluently, that student is likely to comprehend what he or she is reading.

Why are reading fluency and reading comprehension so highly correlated? Dr. S. Jay Samuels, a professor and researcher well known for his work in fluency, put forth a theory called the automaticity theory. According to Dr. Samuels, people have a limited amount of mental energy. If you want to multitask or to become proficient at a complex task such as reading, you first need to master the component tasks so you can do them automatically. For example, a reader who must focus his or her attention on decoding words may not have enough mental energy left over to think about the meaning of the text. However, a fluent reader who can automatically decode the words can instead give full attention to comprehending the text. To become proficient readers, our students need to become automatic with text so they can pay attention to the meaning.

See also:

Challenges Faced by Non-Fluent Readers

Students become fluent by reading. Some students learn to read fluently without explicit instruction. For others, however, fluency doesn't develop in the course of normal classroom instruction.

Research analyzed by the National Reading Panel suggests that just encouraging students to read independently isn't the most effective way to improve reading achievement. Too often, simply encouraging at-risk students to read doesn't result in increased reading on their part. During sustained silent reading, at-risk readers may get a book with mostly pictures and look at the pictures, or they choose a difficult book so they will look like everyone else and then pretend to read.

Even if at-risk students do read, they read more slowly than the other students. In a 10-minute reading period, a proficient reader who reads 200 words a minute silently could read 2,000 words. In the same 10 minutes, an at-risk student who reads 50 words a minute would only read 500 words. This is equal reading time but certainly not an equal number of words read.

These students need to read more, but just asking them to read on their own often doesn't work. The National Reading Panel has concluded that a more effective course of action is for us to explicitly teach developing readers how to read fluently, step by step.

Research-Proven Fluency Strategies

How do we explicitly teach students to read fluently? The National Reading Panel found data supporting three strategies that improve fluency, comprehension, and reading achievement-teacher modeling, repeated reading, and progress monitoring.

Teacher Modeling

The first strategy is teacher modeling. Research demonstrates that various forms of modeling can improve reading fluency. Examples of teacher modeling include:

Teacher-assisted reading

Peer-assisted reading

Audio-assisted reading

Teacher modeling involves more than just listening to someone else read. Students must be actively involved 100 percent of the time and in a multisensory way.

Teacher modeling teaches word recognition in a meaningful context, demonstrates correct phrasing, and gives students practice tracking across the page. A child can benefit from teacher modeling once he or she knows at least 50 sight words and has a good sense of beginning sounds.

The reading rate of the model reader is important. Christopher Skinner, a reading researcher, found that students who read lists of words with him slowly were more fluent with the words than students who read with him at a faster rate. The slower rate enables students to learn new words and clarify difficult words. As students learn more words, they naturally become more fluent.

Another form of modeling is the neurological impress method. In the neurological impress method, a proficient and a struggling reader read together from a passage, with the more able reader reading near the rate of the struggling reader. Heckelman (1969) showed that after 29 15-minute sessions, 24 seventh- through ninth-grade boys, who were an average of 3 years behind in reading, gained an average of 1.9 years in reading based on the Oral Gilmore and the California Achievement Test.

Repeated Reading

Another technique that research has shown significantly builds reading fluency is repeated reading. In fact, the National Reading Panel says this is the most powerful way to improve reading fluency. This involves simply reading the same material over and over again until accurate and expressive.

In the 1970s, LaBerge and Samuels studied what happens when students read passages over and over again. They found that when students reread passages, they got faster at reading the passages, understood them better, and were able to read subsequent passages better as a result of the repeated reading.

Repeated reading is a form of mastery learning. The students read the same words so many times that they begin to know them and are able to identify them in other text. Besides helping students bring words to mastery, repeated reading changes the way students view themselves in relation to the act of reading.

Progress Monitoring

People who play video games are presented with a specific goal and with immediate, relevant feedback about their progress toward that goal. This combination of having a goal and getting feedback on progress can be very motivating.

Progress monitoring takes advantage of this combination to motivate students to read. You give students a specific, individual reading goal, and you tell them exactly how you're going to know they've met it. Then, you give them the means to measure how they're doing. Finally, you make it simple enough that they'll know they've met their goal even before you do. This progress monitoring is what motivates students to practice reading the same story over and over until achieving mastery.

​Developing Reading Fluency With Read Naturally Strategy Programs

The research-based Read Naturally Strategy combines these three strategies into highly effective programs that accelerate reading achievement. Students become confident readers by developing fluency, phonics skills, comprehension, and vocabulary while reading leveled text. The time-tested intervention programs engage students with interesting nonfiction stories and yield powerful results.

Learn more about the Read Naturally Strategy
Research basis for the Read Naturally Strategy

The Read Naturally Strategy is available in a variety of formats:

Choosing the right Read Naturally Strategy program

One Minute Reader®
Structured, supplemental reading program for developing literacy skills independently. Available in these formats:
One Minute Reader Live (component of web-based Read Live for supplemental reading at school)
One Minute Reader books/audio CDs (for a school-to-home checkout program)

Bibliography

Armstrong, S. W. (1983). The effects of material difficulty upon learning disabled children's oral reading and reading comprehension. Learning Disability Quarterly, 6, pp. 339-348.

Breznitz, Z. (1987). Increasing first graders' reading accuracy and comprehension by accelerating their reading rates. Journal of Educational Psychology, 79(3), pp. 236-242.

Fuchs, L. S., Fuchs, D., Hosp, M. K., & Jenkins, J. R. (2001). Oral reading fluency as an indicator of reading competence: A theoretical, empirical, and historical analysis. Scientific Studies of Reading, 5(3), pp. 239-256.

Heckelman, R. G. (1969). A neurological-impress method of remedial-reading instruction. Academic Therapy Quarterly, 5(4), pp. 277-282.

Hudson, R. F., H. B. Lane, and P. C. Pullen. (2005). Reading fluency assessment and instruction: What, why, and how. Reading Teacher 58(8), pp. 702-714.

Knupp, R. (1988). Improving oral reading skills of educationally handicapped elementary school-aged students through repeated readings. Practicum paper, Nova University (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED 297275).

LaBerge, D., & Samuels, S. J. (1974). Toward a theory of automatic information processing in reading. Cognitive Psychology, 6, pp. 292-323.

Lesgold, A., Resnick, L. B., & Hammond, K. (1985). Learning to read: A longitudinal study of word skill development in two curricula. In G. Waller & E. MacKinon (eds.), Reading research: Advances in theory and practice. New York, NY: Academic Press.

National Reading Panel. (2000). Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. Washington, DC: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Pinnell, G. S., Pikulski, J. J., Wixson, K. K., Campbell, J. R., Gough, P. B., & Beatty, A. S. (1995). Listening to children read aloud: Data from NAEP's integrated reading performance record (IRPR) at grade 4 (NCES Publication 95-726). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Educational Statistics.

Samuels, S. J. (2002). Reading fluency: Its development and assessment. In A. E. Farstrup & S. J. Samuels (eds.), What research has to say about reading instruction, 3rd ed., pp. 166-183. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Samuels, S. J. (1997). The method of repeated readings. The Reading Teacher, 50(5), pp. 376-381.

Samuels, S. J. (2006). Towards a model of reading fluency. In S. J. Samuels and A. E. Farstrup (eds.), What research has to say about fluency instruction. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Samuels, S. J. (1997). The method of repeated readings. The Reading Teacher, 50(5), pp. 376-381.

Skinner, C. H., Logan, P., Robinson, S. L., & Robinson, D. H. (1997). Demonstration as a reading intervention for exceptional learners. School Psychology Review, 26(3), pp. 437-447.

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What is fluency? Reading at a conversational rate with accuracy and expression. Why is fluency important? Fluency directly correlates to comprehension.

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This resource offer strategies and activities to help in fluency and it relates to reading skills. It is supported by Hill (2012) as she mentioned fluency as one of the development in reading other than comprehension. To be a fluent reader, the children must have the early reading skills like phonemic awareness and also be exposed to texts that are familiar.

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Fluency is the ability to read a text accurately, quickly, and with expression.Fluent reading builds stamina for reading lengthy or complex texts. Reading fluency serves as a bridge between word recognition and comprehension.

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Evans, M. A., Nowak, S., Burek, B., & Willoughby, D. (2017). The effect of alphabet eBooks and paper books on preschoolers’ behavior: An analysis over repeated readings. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 40, 1-12. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2017.02.002

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This resource outlines how teachers can implement and integrate practices into the classroom that encourages exposure, interaction, variety,analyzing media and being a media user in sense making and expression into their curriculum. This supports the socio-cultral theory of literacy that encourages children to be multilinguistical in their learning (Rogrow, 2015).

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Fellowes, J., & Oakley, G. (2014). Language, Literacy and Early Childhood Education, Oxford University Press, 2014. ProQuest Ebook Central,  Retrieved from http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/monash/detail.action?docID=4191368.

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Goodman, K. S. (1987). Acquiring Literacy is Natural: Who Skilled Cock Robin?

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Hill, S. (1997). Perspectives on early literacy and home-school connections. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, 20(4), 263+. Retrieved from https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A20148984/AONE?u=monash&sid=AONE&xid=aefb63ec

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Storytelling Limited is an organisation in Singapore that conducts programs, trainings, mentorships, collaborations and outreach to spread the art and love of storytelling. Parents and educators alike can be updated about their programs which children could attend or watch videos of. For school leaders who are interested to dive deeper in developing storytelling skills for teachers and tap on the expertise and 'funds of knowledge' of local storytellers' repertoire of local fables and folklores of oral traditions, this resource is also a good opportunity to establish community partnerships while furthering professional development for teachers (Moll, 2015).

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Our programmes include Stories Under the Canopy, Once Upon A Time Storytelling, It's Storytime, Terrific Tales, Young Storytellers Mentorship Project, StoryFest

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Hill, S. (2012). Developing early literacy: Assessment and teaching (2nd ed.). Eleanor Curtain Publishing : Australia.

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Iaquinta, A. (2006). Guided reading: A research-based response to the challenges of early reading instruction. Early Childhood Education Journal, 33(6), 413-418. Retrieved from doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10643-006-0074-2

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Lane, H. B., Pullen, P. C., Eisele, M. R., & Jordan, L. (2002). Preventing reading failure: Phonological awareness assessment and instruction. Preventing School Failure: Alternative Education for Children and Youth, 46(3), 101-110. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1080/10459880209603354

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Ministry of Education (MOE). (2012). Nurturing early learners: A curriculum framework for kindergartens in Singapore. Singapore: Pre-School Unit, Ministry of Education.

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Moll, L. C. (2015). Tapping into the "Hidden" Home and COmmunity Resources of Students. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 51(3), 114-117.

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Putman, M., & Walker, C. (2010). Motivating Children to Read and Write: Using Informal Learning Environments as Contexts for Literacy Instruction. 24(2). Retrieved 2020, from https://www-tandfonline-com.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/doi/full/10.1080/02568541003635243

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Rogow, F. (2015). Media Literacy in Early Childhood Education: Inquiry-Based Technology Integration. In C. Donahue, Technology and digital media in the early years: Tools for teaching and learning. (pp. 91-103). New York: Routledge and Washington.

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Serafini, F. (2012). Expanding the four resources model: Reading visual and multi-modal texts. 7(2). Retrieved 2020, from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1554480X.2012.656347

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StoryFest is an annual festival sharing the love of stories through a showcase of varied delivery methods and repertoire. This is a great event for both educators and families alike to be exposed to and be immersed in the art of storytelling. Offering children increased modalities of story delivery cultivates the appreciation and offers learning in multiple modalities

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List of all the performances and workshops for StoryFest 2020

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UNESCO Family Literacy and Learning Programmes

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UNESCO Family Literacy and Learning Programmes

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This is a resource pack that focuses on piloting, implementing and managing a family literacy program. Through key questions, the resource supports an educator in thinking about addressing aspects of a program like community partnerships, funding, content and also various considerations and concerns that might arise. It allows the educator to think about planning the program in a comprehensive and systematic manner. This is a great resource for school leadership in a few different ways. The first is when they are designing the program for the first time. The second might apply to schools who wish to implement their programs for a diverse group of students and require funding from governmental bodies. This resource is a great way to offer structure as proposals are reviewed based on impact, quality and sustainability. Lastly, it is helpful for schools who wish to review their home school partnership literacy programs and may utilize this in strengthening their current program in a detailed manner and serve to ensure that strong partnerships between home and school are maintained.

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This is a great resource for school leadership to consider when thinking about the delivery of learning phonics. Letterland is a commonly available and widely used material, however, teachers who are trained and tuned in to the specific design and possible extensions of the Letterland materials would be able to then better design and implement them in class. Teachers are also able to showcase how letterland alphabets are utlized in these videos and suggest them as parent child reinforcements at home based on what is being taught in school. This is a great resource for beginner teachers to tune in to the various design elements of the Letterland pack for easy implementation in class, for teachers who are already using Letterland to refresh their memory and perhaps seek inspiration for new ways they are able to implement these strategies in class and ensure that multiliteracies are encouraged in class (Rogrow, 2015).

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Watch the Letterland Tricks and Strategies to motivate children to read, write and spell confidently. Once the children learn the tricks they can use them independently whenever they are reading and writing. As teachers you will enjoy the strategies designed for use in the classroom.

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This resource gives parents multiple ways to implement elkonin boxes at home using various materials and engages the learner in a kineasthetic way. It allows for their learning to be engaging and varied and also inspire uitilization of home found materials at the discretion of families.

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This resource offers an alphabet match activity and this related to the learning progression element of reading. This is supported by Hill (2012) as he mentioned Vygotsky's theory of "children actively constructing their own knowledge". This activity allows children to construct their own knowledge before they learn to read.

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If your child needs some practice matching uppercase and lowercase letters, this pretty spring butterflies alphabet match game will help!

How to Prepare

1. Download the Spring Butterflies Alphabet Match printable HERE.

2. Print out the pages.

3. Cut apart the butterflies

4. Then cut each butterfly in half on the line.

5. To make the cards more long lasting print onto card instead of copy paper, or laminate them.

How to Play Alphabet Match

Read your child's favourite book together then ask them to point out big letters (capitals) and little letters.

Talk about where in the sentence the big letters are. Is there a pattern?

Let your child play with the alphabet match cards to see if they can recognise the difference between uppercase and lowercase letters.

Then ask them to match the cards correctly. Just start by giving them a few pairs of cards till they're confident.

Ask them to say the letter sound AND the name of the letter out loud as they work. For example, the letter sound might be 'fffff' but the letter name is 'eff'.

Ask them about the object on the butterfly's tummy. Can they name it? Does it start with the same letter?

Can they think of other words that start with the same letter?

Looking for more alphabet activities?
These are free: These are at my TpT store:
I hope you enjoy this alphabet match activity and wish you happy teaching and learning!

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Spring Butterflies Alphabet Match | Liz's Early Learning Spot

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If your child needs some practice matching uppercase and lowercase letters, this pretty spring butterflies alphabet match game will help! Download the Spring Butterflies Alphabet Match printable HERE. Print out the pages. Cut apart the butterflies Then cut each butterfly in half on the line.

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This resource offers a google drive file which contains an alphabet wheel for children to recognise the beginning sound of items. This relates to reading, which is supported by Tankersley (2003), as she mentioned that phonemic awareness is a key skill needed by children to form the basis of reading. Tankersley (2003) mentioned "phonemic awareness is the first thread in the tapestry of reading."

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Get access to files anywhere through secure cloud storage and file backup for your photos, videos, files and more with Google Drive.

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This resource offers a website that allows access to children's books and this relates to the element of reading and listening as the children are able to read and listen to the ebooks found. This is supported by Conyers (2012) as he mentioned having books readily available for children at home can lead to the success of a child when they attend school.

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This resource offers a video of a book, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom being read to the children. This relates to reading, which is supported by, children having to know that a word contains many sounds and the sounds are produced by letters, present in the word (Tankersley, 2003).

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Chicka Chicka Boom Boom | Read Aloud Story

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This resource offer an auditory activity where rhyming words are used in the rap and it relates to listening and reading of the words. This is supported by Hill (2012) as she suggested rap and rhymes as one of the ways to draw children's attention to the sound of the language. This activity also integrate with the Music & Movement with Literacy as they used rap and singing to teach the sound of the rhyming words.

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Fun Rhyming Song For Kids | Make a Rhyme, Make a Move | Jack Hartmann

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This resource offer a Music & Movement activity that requires children to do some movement according to the syllable that they heard and it relates to listening. This is supported by Hill (2012) as she mentioned that syllables is important to analyse the structure of the words. The structural analysis is the Stage 5 of the sequence in the content of phonics. This activity integrate Literacy with Aesthetic and Creative development which compliment the Kindergarten Framework of Singapore : Nurturing Early Years (2013) as activities are integrated between domains.

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Learn Syllables | Syllable Song for Kids | Clap, Stomp and Chomp | Jack Hartmann

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This resource offer children to learn words that rhyme with the familiar tune when they read and it relates to listening and reading. This is supported by Cunningham, Hall and Defee (1998) as they mentioned that sounds and letters can be introduced in 'rounding up in the rhyme". This big bookl also shows pictures of the beginning letters and rhyme that they can recite with familiar tunes.

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How picture books benefit children's learning

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How picture books benefit children's learning

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This resource offers a website to explain how picture books can help with building children's language skills. This relates to the element of reading and listening, which is supported by Soundy (2012) as she mentioned that little attention has been provided to analyse and understand an image. As the popular saying goes, a picture speaks a thousand words, in this case a child can learn so much from reading picture books.

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As a speech language pathologist and parent, I've found reading aloud to be an excellent opportunity to work towards advancing language skills with kids. While reading a book to your child, you can help facilitate specific language concepts such as expanding vocabulary, modeling appropriate social language, improving auditory comprehension, developing literacy concepts, and targeting sequencing. Read on to learn more about these five areas of language development, and find picture book recommendations to help you get started!

Expand Vocabulary

As you are reading a picture book to your child, be aware of vocabulary that your child may be unfamiliar with. When you come across an unfamiliar word, define it as you are reading. Asking your child to explain the word themselves during reading time will help them store that specific word within their lexicon. A study by the National Reading Technical Assistance Center ¹ showed that children made increased gains in their ability to understand vocabulary when the definitions were explained during the read-aloud, and there were even further gains when the children explained the definition themselves.

For example, when reading Hoot and Peep you'll come across this sentence: "Peep thought it was the perfect night to sing about the magic of moonbeams." After reading the line, explain: "Moonbeams are rays of moonlight." Then further your child's knowledge of this word by showing him or her images of different moonbeams online.

Another excellent strategy is reading the same story repeatedly. According to the study, there were 12% gains in vocabulary knowledge with repeated readings of stories. To learn more about repeated reading and its benefits, click here.

These are three of my favorite vocabulary-building picture books, but keep in mind that most children's books can be used to expand vocabulary.

Build Social Language Skills

Pragmatics is defined as social language, our ability to interact with others appropriately. It includes things like having appropriate conversations, staying on topic, respecting others, etc. Most children learn these skills by copying the behavior of adults and peers in conversation, and through symbolic play. Books that model specific social behaviors can help further these skills.

For example, when reading No Fits, Nilson!, ask your child, "Why does Nilson throw temper tantrums?" and "What does Amelia do to help Nilson calm down?" This book can help lead a productive conversation about temper tantrums and the interaction between the two main characters. To see more recommendations on targeting specific social skills related to special needs, visit my website here.

These books are a great place to start learning pragmatics:

Improve Comprehension

Comprehension is the ability to understand language (receptive language). For example, when you ask a child to point to the title of book, you are testing their receptive language, what they understand. If you ask a child, "Tell me the title of the book," their verbal response is expressive language.

When you read with your child, improving comprehension and recalling information are natural goals. Using strategies such as asking "wh" questions (who, what, where, when, why, and how), and using fill in the blank prompts ("The Little Green Truck feels _____.") and choices (e.g. Is Ladybug Girl at the park or in her backyard?") can help improve comprehension during book reading. Tip: When asking "wh" questions, start by asking simple questions and then progress to more complex questions. This is called a scaffolding technique. For more information about strategies to use when asking your child to retell the story, click here.

Here are some recommended books for improving comprehension and recalling information:

Develop Reading and Writing Skills

It is never too early to improve print awareness and target emerging literacy (the ability to read and write) skills. As you read aloud, use various strategies, such as print referencing, to improve your child's ability to learn and become aware of print.

What is print referencing? This is when the reader points a specific word as he or she is reading it. This technique can significantly help a child become more aware of print. To learn more about print referencing and how to facilitate this strategy, click here.

Learn Sequencing and Story Development

As you are reading a book aloud to your child, review the events in the story as they occur. For example, when recalling specific events in the story of The Monkey Balloon, you might summarize, "Mimi went to the playground and then she saw the bus." You can also ask your child to recall specific events with a fill in the blank prompt such as: "After Mimi went to the playground, she saw the ______."

And using visuals can always help! I use sequencing cards to help the child recall specific scenes in The Monkey Balloon. Reading wordless books can also be an excellent tool to target narratives and sequencing because it forces you to create your own story! Check out some of these recommended read-alouds:
1. Butler, Shari, Kelsi Urrutia, Anneta Buenger, Nina Gonzalez, Marla Hunt, and Corinne Eisenhart. "A Review of the Current Research on Vocabulary Instruction."A Review of the Current Research on Vocabulary Instruction(2010): 1-19. National Reading Technical Assistance Center, 2010. Web.

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How to Use Picture Books to Build Kids' Language Skills | Brightly

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As a speech language pathologist and parent, I've found reading aloud to be an excellent opportunity to work towards advancing language skills with kids. While reading a book to your child, you can help facilitate specific language concepts such as expanding vocabulary, modeling appropriate social language, improving auditory comprehension, developing literacy concepts, and targeting sequencing.

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This resource offer assessment tool for phonemic awareness and it relates to early reading skills as children tries to decode words and make meaning. This is supported by Hill (2012), as she mentioned that assessing phonemic awareness is useful to find out whether the children are able to identify letter sounds and for future planning if their learning.

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Emerging readers Assessment (Print awareness)

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Emerging readers Assessment (Print awareness)

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This resource offer as an assessment tool to assess the reading behaviours and the concept of print and it relates to reading. This is also supported by Hill (2012) as she mentioned that by assessing the reading behaviours, it can help teachers to choose the appropriate of early readers for the children,

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This resource offers a sample on how an educator can approach implementing progressive phonological elements in her classroom implementation.  Although it presents a more systematic and explicit approach, teachers with this resource can manipulate with flexibility in adapting it to the relevance of the lesson or children, making lessons more complex, or simpler when required. This is also a great resource for teachers to map out progressions, identify areas of improvement and also set goals for children who require more support in their learning.

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This resource offer an activity that requires children to sort the pictures based on their syllables in the correct packet that has the correct number and it relates to listening. This is supported by Lane, Pullen, Eisele and Jordan (2002) as they mentioned that Syllable Awareness is one of the 4 level of the Phonological awareness.
This resource is also one of the activity that integrate between the Numeracy development and the Literacy development, which follows the Kindergarten Framework of Singapore : Nurturing Early Years (2013).

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Totschooling - Toddler, Preschool, Kindergarten Educational Printables

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A great way to encourage phonological awareness is to learn to identify and count syllables in words. This fun popcorn-themed sorting activity will keep kids motivated while they clap out the syllables!

This post contains affiliate links for your convenience.

This FREE Syllable sorting activity is great for preschool and kindergarten kids who are learning about syllables. They will love the popcorn theme!

Print and laminate all pages, or print them on thicker cardstock paper. Cut out the popcorn boxes and all the popcorn kernel pieces. Mix up the pieces and have children clap and count the syllables in each word, then place it with the correct popcorn box.

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FREE printable sorting activity for preschool and kindergarten kids to sort syllables with a fun popcorn theme! This is a great literacy activity to develop phonemic or phonological awareness. Clap and count the syllables in each popcorn kernel and sort it with the correct popcorn box.

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This resource offers a syllable sorting game that can be done at home using everyday items. This relates to the listening element, which is supported by Tankersley (2003) as she mentioned learning about syllables, allows children to "make the link between being able to hear and manipulate phonemes." This shows that understanding syllables are an important skill a child needs to have in order to be able to manipulate words when he/she is writing.

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FREE printable syllable sorting mats to help teach young children how to break words into syllables. Perfect for kindergarten or elementary school.

I first made these printable syllable sorting mats years ago and have used them both for intentionally teaching syllables to my whole class and also as a follow on literacy centre for small groups.
Perfect for word work in the Early Years, these syllable mats provide ideal visual support for young children learning to break words into syllables.

This post contains affiliate links.

Recognising syllables in words makes both reading and spelling easier for young children. A syllable is defined as
All words have syllables.
'one or more letters representing a unit of spoken language consisting of a single uninterrupted sound'.
It is an important concept to learn in early childhood but an easy one with most children leaving preschool being able to hear the parts in words.
In preschool, I start teaching by using children's names to introduce the concept of syllables. I clap the syllables as I say their name aloud and then encourage them to do the same.
Another method is to put your hand under your chin and count the number of jaw drops as you say a word but I've found this strategy tends to work better for older children.

As a whole class, we then use our syllable mats and a big basket of familiar items and together we clap the words and sort the objects, adding them to the correct numbered mat.

You might also like our Syllable BINGO Game as you can use the picture cards together with these mats to make sorting quicker and easier than finding different objects. You can find them here.

Learning syllabification usually means plenty of different hands-on way to practice counting syllables. All the hard work is already done! Just print, laminate and cut.

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FREE printable syllable sorting mats to help teach young children how to break words into syllables. Perfect for kindergarten or elementary school. I first made these printable syllable sorting mats years ago and have used them both for intentionally teaching syllables to my whole class and also as a follow on literacy centre for small groups.

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This resource is a webinar on Dyslexia and serves as a beginning resource for teachers to find out more about how dyslexia is expressed in children's learning in literacy and various early intervention strategies. Even for the teachers whose classes do not have children with dyslexia, the early intervention strategies promote a multisensory approach to learning literacy. This also aids in teachers offering children a diverse and exciting delivery of learning literacy while catering to a diverse group in the class and that children with additional needs can still portray and develop success in the various modes of their 'work'.

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This resource is a wonderful review and gives teachers ideas on how to incorporate new ideas on implementing literacy based strategies in the classroom for multi literacies and ensure that holistic learning is accounted and supported through children's learning (MOE, 2012).

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Watch recorded webinars! NAEYC regularly hosts timely webinars that touch on important topics in the early childhood education field

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This resource is a webinar that focuses on how adults can utilize different digital programs to create their own digital storybooks. This allows educators to bring their creativity and reflect the intricacies of the stories that they would like to tell. This also pushes the educator to conduct storytelling in a different way from one that they are comfortable in. This resource is also a great extension to work with children for them to tell stories digitally, encouraging media literacy in the curriculum (Rogrow,2015).

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Asian Festival of Children's Content (AFCC) 2020

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Be part of the first webinar presented as part of Asian Festival of Children's Content (AFCC) Digital, a lead-up event to AFCC 2020!

Digital Storytelling Tools with Rushton Hurley

Join teacher trainer and educational technology researcher Rushton Hurley on this webinar, where he shares various digital storytelling tools to keep your kids glued to their seats. If you are a teacher, storyteller or parent, discover how you can help your students and children tell their stories in compelling, creative ways with the latest web-based tools.

This session is the first webinar presented as part of AFCC Digital, a lead-up event to the 2020 Asian Festival of Children's Content, which will take place from 3rd - 4th October.

Watch the webinar here:

Rushton Hurley has trained teachers and school leaders around the world on creative uses of technology for fostering and sharing stories of success. A former Japanese language teacher and school principal, he now runs NextVista.org, a non-profit based in the Silicon Valley that has helped educators all around the world discover the possibilities of digital media in teaching. He is also a featured speaker at AFCC 2020.

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Be part of the first webinar presented as part of Asian Festival of Children's Content (AFCC) Digital, a lead-up event to AFCC 2020! Digital Storytelling Tools with Rushton Hurley Join teacher trainer and educational technology researcher Rushton Hurley on this webinar, where he shares various digital storytelling tools to keep your kids glued to their seats.

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This resource offers activities for vocabulary building and this relates to listening, which is supported by Goodman (1987) where he mentioned "oral language is the most accessible and useful form for such immediate communication". This shows that constant communication with children will allow children to listen to new words and build up on their vocabulary. This will allow them to expand their vocabulary for writing activities or speaking.

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Are you required to teach a list of vocabulary words each week? Vocabulary words are a very important piece of teaching students to read. Learning and mastering essential vocabulary words can be achieved through vocabulary graphic organizers, vocabulary templates, no-prep vocabulary worksheets, vocabulary games, and a vocabulary display for your classroom wall!

Before we jump into the activities, if you prefer to see some of these activities in action, check out the video below!

Vocabulary Words of the Week in Journals

At the beginning of the week, we take two days to introduce all of our new vocabulary words for the week. When the words are introduced the teacher shows the word and a picture to match the word. The students take turns guessing what the word means. Finally the teacher reads the definition with the students. The students help the teacher determine an action that will represent the vocabulary word. This is a very important piece because research shows that when kinesthetics are included into learning, students are better able to retain the new information. All week this action is paired with the word whenever it is read or said. The students then write the word and definition onto their Words of the Week sheet and place it into the vocabulary journal for future reference.

Vocabulary Journals

Vocabulary journals should be a staple in every classroom. Vocabulary journals can take the form of a stapled packet, coil binded book, or hole punched binder. The purpose of a vocabulary journal is to have a place for students to keep all of their vocabulary practice and a place for them to look back and reference past vocabulary words. I love adding the vocabulary journals the parent teacher conference portfolios. I also love to have students bring their vocabulary journals back to the reading table during reading groups to reference or add information.

Free Editable Word Cards

Every week we put our new vocabulary words on cards. These cards are used all week for a variety of games and activities. At the end of the week, the students take the cards home to practice and keep. Download a free copy of the editable vocabulary cards here.

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Vocabulary Headbandz

Vocabulary Headbandz is a fun game that students love. Simply print off your vocabulary words onto these free editable vocabulary cards. Each student attaches a vocabulary word card to their headband. The youngest participant takes the first turn. Then play passes to the left. When it's your turn, just flip over the timer and ask each of the players a question that will help you figure out what the picture is on your head. Once you've asked each player a question, simply begin another round and then another. If you guess the vocabulary word before the timer runs out, simply take another card and put it behind your headband. Continue to ask questions until the timer runs out. For each vocabulary word that is guessed correctly, you get a point. The player with the most points at the end of the game is the winner.

Teacher Tip:
If you don't own the Headbandz game, the headbands could be made from sentence strips and binder clips.

Memory/Concentration

Memory (also known as Concentration) can be played two different ways. Students can have two stack of vocabulary words and take turns turning over two cards in an effort to get a match. Each time a card is turned, the student turning the card has to read the word aloud and use it in a sentence. If the student gets a match, he/she can keep the match and go again. If the student does not get a match, the next player takes a turn. Another variation of the game would be to have one copy of cards have the vocabulary words printed on them. The other set of cards has the definitions printed on them.

Vocabulary Display
Teacher Tip: Use two different colors of paper when printing the cards. Also, choose a dark color or make copies on card stock paper so the answers don't show through the back side of the card.
Vocabulary displays can be a powerful instructional tool. Complete the vocabulary posters with the students. Provide the students with their own vocabulary mini-posters to complete with the teacher. If you have more than one word per day, make multiple copies of each word and display them all. Leave this information up on the wall all week and at the end of the week, the expo marker can be wiped off with Lysol wipes or a Mr. Clean magic eraser.

Vocabulary Bingo

After the class has learned at least twenty-five different vocabulary words, bingo is a great option that students love to play that will provide a great opportunity to review. Students simply write a vocabulary word in each space of their bingo card. The teacher provides the definition of one of the words and the student finds the vocabulary word and covers it with a bingo chip. The first student to get 5 in a row, 4 corners, or black out wins the game.

Roll a Word

Students need a vocabulary word list or stack of word cards. This activity should be played with partners or small groups. Students take turns choosing a card/word. Then student rolls a dice and follows the prompt on the Roll a Word sheet. Other players determine if the answer is correct. Players take turns until the teacher decides that the time is up.

Vocab Short Stories

Writing stories is the ultimate determination of whether or not a student truly understands the meaning of his/her vocabulary words. The teacher writes the vocabulary words that he/she would like the students to use when writing their short stories before making copies. Students need to use all the vocabulary words in context all while forming a short story. This activity comes with templates for 8 words, 10 words, or 12 words as well as with or without space for drawing a picture to match the story.

Parts of Speech

Nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are an important piece of students learning grammar so why not combine them with vocabulary word practice? Students read the words at the top of their sheet and then sort them into the proper grammar categories. This worksheet is available in 8 words, 10 words, or 12 words templates.

Draw a Word

Drawing detailed pictures of a word's meaning is another powerful tool to help students learn, understand, and retain a new vocabulary word. The teacher can choose the six words prior to making copies or the student can choose the six trickiest words.

Picture This

Give each student a vocabulary card with a number. Write the numbers from 1-25 (or however many students you have in your class). Once students get their card, instruct them not to show anyone their card. Provide the students some time to draw the vocabulary word with as many details as possible. The student needs to also include their card number in the corner of their drawing. Write the list of vocabulary words on the board and give each student a recording sheet. Students walk around the classroom and look at each picture. Then they write the vocabulary word answer in the correct box of their recording sheet. Another variation for teachers who want more structure would be to have students sit at their desk while students take turns coming to the front of the class one a a time to explain their picture to the class. Students who are sitting at their desks would need to determine the word that the picture is showing and write the answer on their recording sheet.

Act it Out

Act it Out is similar to Picture This except instead of drawings, the students would use actions. The actions are performed as a group or one at a time in front of the class for the others to guess the vocabulary word and write it on the recording sheet.

Vocabulary Word Mini Posters

Earlier in this post I explained vocabulary displays. When the teacher is completing the vocabulary posters with the students, the students can complete the mini posters and put them in the vocabulary journals. This is a great option to keep the students engaged and actively participating.

Vocabulary Dice

Vocabulary dice can be used with any list of vocabulary words. Give each student a list or stack of vocabulary words. Students can do this activity independently or with a partner. Once a word is chosen, the student rolls the dice and follows the prompt on the dice. Answers can be provided verbally or written on a piece of paper or marker board.

Vocabulary Sentences

Students choose five of the trickiest words from the vocabulary word list. Then the student writes a sentence that shows the meaning of the word in context within the sentence. Students can also color the vocabulary word within the sentence.

What's included in this 56-page vocabulary pack:

Vocabulary Journal

My 5-Day Vocabulary Routine

Words of the Week

Vocabulary Words Worksheet

Vocabulary Mini Posters

Roll a Word

Vocabulary Dice

Vocabulary Bingo

Vocabulary Short Stories

Draw a Word

Parts of Speech

Vocabulary Sentences

Act it Out

Picture This

Editable Word cards

Editable Grammar Flip Flaps

Vocabulary Posters with Display

Detailed Explanation with Pictures for each Activity

Click here to purchase the entire Vocabulary Pack resource.

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Are you required to teach a list of vocabulary words each week? Vocabulary words are a very important piece of teaching students to read. Learning and mastering essential vocabulary words can be achieved through vocabulary graphic organizers, vocabulary templates, no-prep vocabulary worksheets, vocabulary games, and a vocabulary display for your classroom wall!

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Story book with Dramatic play characters

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Story book with Dramatic play characters

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This is a great package of a paperback story book coupled with dramatic play monkey characters. Nursery rhymes are an enticing way to encourage children to listen in on words through its intonation and repitition. Dramatising the rhyme, following along the progression, dramatizing the role of different characters, viewing the visual text, involves active listening, processing and supports the view that literacy is practiced and embodied through a multiliteracy approach (Moll, 2015).

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Childcraft Five Little Monkeys Literacy Bag - SCHOOL SPECIALTY CANADA

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Five Little Monkeys Literacy Bag includes a paperback book and 5 plush characters. The book tells the story of 5 little monkeys who start to jump on their bed as soon as they say goodnight to Mama. The standards-aligned activity guide for teachers and parents extends learning across multiple areas of toddler growth and development.

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This resource guide in articulating the sound to children and it relates to listening to the letter sound which is supported by Hill (2012) as she mapped the teaching of letter sounds to the letters. She highlighted that letter identification and letter sound is an early stage for young readers to gain understanding of the alphabetic principle and its importance.

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This is a great resource for parents to offer activity ideas on how to utilize one material and manipulate it in different ways to achieve different objectives within listening and reading skills. Putman & Walker, (2010) mentioned that motivation through the use of hands-on activities will allow children to gain interest in the learning area targeted. Therefore, using activities as such, will allow children to be more interested learning language.

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This resource offers an article that highlights the importance of book reading which relates to reading, which is supported by the four model resource theory whereby children are "readers as navigators" when they develop cognitive skills like "word recognition, vocabulary knowledge and sound to symbol correspondence." (Serafini, 2012)

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This resource offer definition and strategies for guided reading and this relates to reading, which is supported by Iaquinta (2006) where she mentioned about the teacher's role in implementing guided reading which ranges from selecting text to word work. This strategies are important to select proper text and implement the guided reading successfully.

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Master Guided Reading: Effective Strategies and Activities

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Enhance reading skills with guided reading techniques. Discover levels, activities, and charts for successful classroom and virtual sessions. Ideal for educators.

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This resource offers early readers for guided reading and this relates to reading and listening, which is supported by Iaquita (2006) where she mentioned that the purpose of guided reading is to meet the different needs of all the students in the classroom to greatly expand their reading skills; to teach children to understand the texts while reading with fluency; to construct meaning while using problem solving strategies when they encounter unfamiliar words or complex sentence structures, and to understand new concepts or ideas.

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First Little Readers | Best 10 Books Collection | Guided Reading Level B

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Pitch , rthymicity and rhyming words are featured in this chant and encourages engagement from the listener to explore with intonation in a fun manner. Being attuned to subtle changes in how language is expressed differently through intonation is a great way to encourage the listener to practice and probe into decoding on how it also allows for meaning to be understood differently. This add layers on the concept of how language can be adapted to mean different things through intonation (Fellows and Oakley, 2014). This is further enhanced with the use of resonator bars to connect the audio information with visuals and with this resource, parents are able to extend this experience into the everyday interactions with the child, making learning authentic.

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The Frog in the Bog | Wigglepods Pte Ltd

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Wigglepods > Online Resources > The Frog in the Bog

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This resource offer as an assessment tool to assess children's understanding which relates to both reading and listening. This is supported by Fellowes and Oakley (2014), as they mentioned the importance of assessing to help in advancing learning. There is a cycle for planning, teaching and assessing as it will determine what to do next.

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This report is a synthesis of a nation wide research based literature in the USA that is aimed to promote the development of children's early literacy skills. It showcases the different methodology on exploring and enhancing literacy and offers policy makers a review and guide for future planning. This highlights the cyclical nature of planning, teaching, assessing in improving our practices (Fellows and Oakley, 2015).

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This national guideline serves as a resource that outlines and frames the way Early Childhood Teachers can go about planning their curriculum. This relates to the learning continuum process of decoding, which is supported by Ministry of Education (2012) as it acts a guide for childcare centres or kindergartens to follow to allow children aged 4 to 6 to have quality planned curriculum.

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Digital Letter and Letter Sound Recognition

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Digital Letter and Letter Sound Recognition

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This resource offer interactive auditory guide for children to recognise letter name and letter sound using e-resource and it relates to reading and listening which supported by Evans, Nowak Burek and Willoughby (2017) as they mentioned about using e-resources such as e-book for alphabet instead of paperbook. This resource helps children to listen to the text and read them together.

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This public resource is a community partnership between the library and parents and relates to reading which is supported by Hill (1997) where she mentioned about the importance of partnership with parents and community to fully develop the children's reading ability. In this resource, parents will be able to find some programmes related to reading to young children.

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NLB manages the National Library, 26 Public Libraries and the National Archives. NLB promotes reading, learning and information literacy by providing a trusted, accessible and globally-connected library and information service through the National Library and a comprehensive network of Public Libraries.

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This resource is a tool for educators to guide children to understand the concept of phonemes better by segmenting the sounds they hear in a word. This relates to the concept of reading and listening and it helps children breakdown words to individual sounds.

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Soundy, C. S. (2012). Searching for Deeper Meaning in Children's Drawings. 88(1). Retrieved 2020, from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00094056.2012.643718

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This resource offers as a guide to determine what is to be assessed and it offers educators a framework on thinking about implementation methods in their class. Supporting practice through guidelines helps inform of best practices and further improving on authentic teacher implementation through increased awareness, dedication and balance to the commitment of curriculum goals while ensuring the learner's needs are prioritised (MOE,2012).

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This resource offer the reading and knowledge of letter name and letter sounds and relates to reading and listening which supported by Evans, Nowak, Burek, Willoughby (2017) on the usage of alphabet books to help children in letter recognition and letter sound as their pre-reading skills. The content of this book is also related to children's understanding of the world like apple, ant and many more.

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Develops pre-reading skills leading to word recognition skills.

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Blending method 1 - Rubber band Blending

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Blending method 1 - Rubber band Blending

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This resource shows how teachers may implement this strategy in classrooms to help children visualize stretching out and blending phonemes. With an audio and visual reinforcement, children are able to individually practice sounding out the letter sounds to blend and make a word. This relates to listening and reading the words. This is supported by Vygotsky's social constructivist theory as he believed adults may have to scaffold in the children's learning. In this activity, teacher will need to scaffold the children's learning of blending the words as she connect the sounds of each letter together.

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1st Grade Reading Strategies Rubber Band Blending

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This resource offer as a guide to teach blending of letter sounds to children and it relates to listening to the letter sounds and reading the word. This is supported by Hill (2012) as she mentioned that blending is the Stage 3 of the phonics sequence. This resource guide children to blend the words with consonants and vowels in a fun way.

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Drive-Thru Blending in Kindergarten: Practicing Early Decoding Skills

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This resource offer series of books fro onset and rimes that can be found in a storybook and it relates to reading and listening which is supported by Fellowes and Oakley (2014). They identify rimes as one of the stages to develop knowledge about letter-sound relationships. This books will benefit the children as they will be able to repeat the words once they are familiar with the rimes. This will help them not only to read but also to expand their fluency in reading the book.