just for words

So, these are just a few of the words Brayden can read and find in text. These (well, except for ‘dad’) are in the guided reading books I’ve been introducing and he’s been reading. He’s been a teensy bit resistant to reading and doing word work lately. Sooooo, leave it up to his very clever mama, me! While he was trapped, in the bath, I had him right where I wanted him. Trapped!….I mean,…in the bath:). He couldn’t run away and resist. I arranged the words on the board and let him shoot the word I read with a little squirting fish from the bath tub. He really liked this, hence no photos. There was no way I was about to risk losing his attention. Especially, since he was so engaged. After playing that a few times, I rearranged the words on the board and pointed for him to read and if he was correct (which he always was…my little scholar), he could squirt me in the tummy. HUGE motivator! Needless to say I kept rearranging and he kept on squirting his little fish. After it was all said and done, I had a very wet t-shirt (ewww, that didn’t sound nice…but, you get it), and (in Brayden’s words) squeaky clean kid, who participated successfully in a nice little word review. Woo-hoo!

This is actually after the bath and I was trying to pose him…and as you can see, he had totally moved on. He sure was playing Transformers on Playstation:) I kept saying, “smile booga”…and he did his best. Notice his crooked smile and all the while, not taking his eyes off the t.v.

I HEART magnetic letters and numbers so much. Maybe it’s the kindergarten teacher in me, but I really do LOVE them. These inexpensive magnetic letters and numbers are available in all kinds of different, fonts and styles. From the thick, chunky and tactile plastic versions that are perfect for younger hands, right through to the thinner, illustrated letters for a little bit older children. Using these tactile letters or numbers for learning has proven to be a very successful practice. Even, from a very early age, children can be encouraged to learn through playing with the letters. They don’t have to know what each letter is and the sound it makes rather sort them by attributes. Here are some examples;

sticks/no sticks

round/not round

tail/no tail

This helps with graphophonemic awareness (letter identification and sound identification) as a child starts to become familiar with the letters.

Really young children can sort by color as mommy says names of letters just so a child is exposed to them and the names. I know last year, Brayden liked to match the ‘mommy’ letter (upper case) to the ‘baby’ letter (lower case). Once he learned all upper case and lower case letters, he would match beginning sound pictures to the letters. Now, he is currently building words and even builds short phrases and sentences from words he knows. Later, we’ll move to finding patterns in words like: –at in the words: cat, bat, hat, sat.

Learning through play is an important part of a child’s development and helps him gain confidence and independence. Especially, in their learning. While I am playing and at the same time teaching my toddler, I praise him like crazy for doing well and not criticize any of his mistakes. He’s my booga boo and I am just so proud of his effort and interest at this age of 3 and half.

SO…I encourage you to get your toddler or any toddler you know a set of magnetic letters and/or numbers. They are a whole lotta fun!

Here is my cutie all squeaky clean. What a great bath time….JUST FOR WORDS!