Whole language learning

  

Glue can be messy, but using it is a great fine motor activity!

  Instead of having a "letter of the week," this year, I'm trying to take more of what we call a "whole language approach" where the children are being exposed to letters in words in many ways.  Many items in the room are labeled.  We spell a lot of words.  When we do calendar during group time, we almost always spell the month (while looking

at the name of the month).  We do something called "Daily News" almost every day where I write
"Daily News," what day of the week it is, who the leader is for the day, and what the leader's

Proud of a job well done!

news is. After that we spell "Daily News" together and occasionally, other words as well (primarily, the day of the week).  The objective in this is that each child will recognize almost all letters this year, at their own pace.  Some children will even begin to recognize and read the words used in our daily news in other environments.

I went to a workshop several months ago about integrating "writing" into the classroom in a natural way and I've really attempted to 'beef up' my writing center.  Having different types of writing instruments readily available as well

Walt and Cadham were so proud of this

as LOTS of letter exposure.  I make an effort to sit down with the kids as they are "playing" (today, it was lacing together letter beads) and we search for certain letters.  The last couple of days it was  "I" and "T."    Guess what next week's new word will be-"it"!

As stated n my last post, we are talking about sight and feeling this week.  The kids are making texture collages and we are exploring words such as "itchy," "scratchy," "smooth," "bumpy," and "soft."