Shared Reading: A Powerful Practice to Support Literacy
We know the importance of providing our students with a strong diet of literacy fundamentals: phonological awareness, alphabet/sound knowledge, concepts about print, and concept of word in text. A challenge we sometimes face, however, is that students show skills in these areas during isolated activities, but we don’t see them making the leap to using […]
Using Calm-Down Strategies
In a previous post, we discussed strategies for helping your students 1) identify and 2) measure their emotions using the Feelings Chart and the Feelings Thermometer. This week, we shift our focus to the third and final step – helping students 3) manage their emotions. After recognizing what it is that they are feeling, students […]
Development of Patterning Skills
From a very young age, children tune in and look for patterns in their surroundings. For example, a bedtime routine is a pattern of events children often recognize…bath, story time, and then bed. Another such pattern is when we eat…breakfast, lunch, and then dinner. As children begin to recognize such patterns, it allows them to […]
Modifying Activities and Environments
Have you noticed one or more of your students quickly losing interest when you begin a particular activity? Or maybe you’ve realized that there are certain activities or times of day when challenging behaviors seem to always occur. When you sense that student disengagement is becoming a pattern (whether for one student, several, or many) […]
Numeracy: Recognizing and Writing Numerals
A student’s early abilities to recognize numbers and understand what they represent very much depend on their exposure to these ideas at home and school. They develop gradually with increased practice connecting verbal and written symbols with each other and with concrete mathematical situations. In kindergarten, children are working on recognizing and writing numerals in […]
Where are they now?
More than half of the school year has gone by, and your students have been learning so much—how to connect letters to their corresponding sound, compare quantities, complete activities independently, and cooperate with peers. As we head into the second half of the school year, it is time to check-in to see how your students have […]
