Thursday, August 30, 2012

Guest Post: How to Encourage Early Childhood Literacy by Nancy Parker

Today, guest blogger Nancy Parker offers some tips on how to get children reading earlier. These techniques may be applied at school or at home. Remember, the world is a classroom! Enjoy!

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Teaching a child to read is one of the greatest gifts that anyone can give to a child. As educators of young children, teachers have been given the perfect opportunity to make a difference in the life of a child by encouraging a love for reading. For this reason, the following list of ideas has been created to help teachers to begin to introduce early childhood literacy in their classrooms while keeping children engaged and entertained.

1. Act it out-Children learn best when they participate in multisensory experiences. Therefore, they should be involved in group readings. They can act out stories with puppets or dress in costume to help make the story relevant to them.

2. Introduce themes with books-At the beginning of a new theme or unit, teachers can read a book to help introduce the concept to the children. Because children like puzzles, it can be fun to read the book, and then let children take turns guessing what will be the new theme.

3. Make a class book-Young children love to talk about their favorite things. Therefore, a class book can be made in which children include pictures of their favorite objects with a short line written at the bottom by the teacher. Then, whenever their teacher reads the book, the children will become personally involved in the story as their page is read to the class.

4. Place books everywhere-Instead of allowing children to grow up believing that books only belong in the library, children should be encouraged to read books throughout their day. Therefore, placing a few carefully selected books throughout the classroom can encourage a child to pick one up when they are curious about a subject.

5. Use Rebus Recipes-By incorporating rebus books and recipes into their lessons, teachers can teach children how to follow directions along with the value of print for conveying a message. For young children, rebus recipes should be kept to only a few simple steps. Teachers should guide children through the process by pointing out how the pictures work with the words to tell a story.

6. Post names everywhere-One of the first words young children learn is their name. Therefore, children’s names should be posted throughout the classroom. They can be on lockers, chairs, and tables. Not only will this help children to keep up with their things, but it will also help them to learn to recognize their name in print.

Young children are naturally drawn to literacy related activities. They love to participate in story times and practice writing through scribbles and carefully drawn letters. By giving children a variety of opportunities to practice their developing skills and explore new books, teachers will be paving the way to early childhood literacy for every child in their classroom.


Author Bio

Nancy Parker was a professional nanny and she loves to write about wide range of subjects like health, Parenting, Child Care, and Babysitting, find a nanny tips etc. You can reach her at nancy.parker015 @ gmail.com.

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