Flip the sound is a strategy good readers use when they come to a word that doesn’t sound right or make sense. Knowing the multiple sounds a letter or letter combination can make and being able to flip the sounds around is an essential skill. Remind your child that when good readers use the strategy Flip the Sound, they listen for a word they recognize. They then check to make sure that word makes sense in the sentence. When sounding out words, review the different sounds letters make. Ask your child, “What other sound could that letter make?” Encourage your child to use the strategy of flip the sound to try different words until he/she is successful. When your child reads a word incorrectly, wait until he/she gets to the end of the sentence. Then, stop your child and ask, “Did the word you just read sound right?” Put your hand palm-down and flip your hand over while saying, “Try flipping the sound.”
Willoughby visited the Children's Museum of the Arts to tour their current exhibition Tweet. Following the tour, they participated in an open studio workshop where they created original works of art using recycled materials inspired by the exhibit.
Check out pictures of our budding Willoughby artists by clicking here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cma_in_nyc/11378308485/in/set-72157638479749595 Willoughby authors are learning all about the 6 Traits of Writing. Did we say 6? Really there are 7, because we can't forget the importance of Presentation in our writing!
Authors have been focusing on finding Ideas for writing that are meaningful to them, and narrowing down big moments to small moments. Our classroom community is the audience for this next writing piece as we work on personal narratives to share a snapshot of how we celebrate the holiday season with our families. We have discovered that our diverse class celebrates different holidays at this time of year, and we are enjoying learning more about our community members through our writing. This past week, Willoughby authors organized their small moments by identifying a beginning, middle, and end to their stories. Next week, they will learn how published authors create Bold Beginnings, Mighty Middles, and Excellent Endings as they take their piece through the writing process. We have an ambitious goal of sharing our published work with you on December 20th during our pre-break breakfast celebration! If authors need more time (because we respect each other's work pace), we will certainly share our process work with you! Blend the Sound - taking the individual sounds of letters or phonemes and blending them together to read a word accurately.
One of our favorite visuals to use with this strategy is to give students a large rubber band or any stretchy band at all. We write a simple consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) word on the whiteboard or chart, then have them take their bands between two hands. They pull the band apart a bit with each sound in the word, stretching out both the band and the word. When they have said each sound and the band is taut, they move their hands and the band quickly back together, with the band springing back to its original state. They say the word quickly at the same time, thus blending the sounds together. Try this at home when your child is reading to you and gets stuck on a word. Another activity to help your child blend sounds together is called Stretch and Read. Students take one button for each letter in a word, laying them in a row and pushing each button forward as they say the individual sound. After saying each sound, they use both hands to push the buttons together, saying the word quickly. One of the verbal prompts we use is this one: “Say each letter as you stretch them out, then put them together and say it fast.” Encourage your child to use Blend the Sound after using Stretchy Snake or Ch Before we begin our next Researcher's Workshop unit on Weather and States of Matter, Willoughby is revisiting the classroom rules they created in the beginning of the year. We picked a few rules that our team needs to brush up on in order to have a healthy community.
One of the rules they decided was important to them was "Show Good Listening and Be a Good Listener." We have been brainstorming all the ways we can show respect to others by showing good listening. We made a chart of what this LOOKS and SOUNDS like in action. Today, Willoughby will be putting on their acting hats and performing skits to role play this important rule! Ms. Jackson Art class is going on a field trip to CMA, this Friday, December 13th from 9:30 to 12:30.
If you have not yet submitted your permission slip and fee ($7). Please submit a hand written note giving your child permission to attend the field trip, by Wednesday, December 11th. If you are able to chaperone and have not signed up, please let us know by adding a comment to this post. When teaching children to read, we are always looking for ways to help them decode words efficiently, rapidly, and accurately. This allows them to focus their attention and understanding what they read rather than focusing on the fundamentals of each word. One way we accomplish this is through teaching children to watch for familiar word patterns called chunks. Chunks are groups of letters that when put together form a recognizable sound or word. Chunks can be found at the beginning, middle, or end of a word. Your child is working on the Accuracy strategy Chunky Monkey. Chunky Monkey can be used for words of all sizes! Here are some suggestions to support your child's learning at home:
1. When reading with your child, have your child look for well-known letter chunks in the words they are reading. These chunks could be prefixes, suffixes, endings, whole words, or base words. For example, your child may look for the chunk and in the word sand, or at in flat. 2. When chunking a word, have your child first read each chunk separately. then have your child put the chunks together to make the word. This will train your child to quickly and easily spot chunks. Stretchy Snake and Blend the Sound are often used in combination with Chunky Monkey (see "Reading at Home" for details on CAFE strategies). 3. If your child is having difficulty finding chunks, guide him/her to look for familiar endings and familiar prefixes (note that we have not taught students the terms "prefix" or "suffix," we talk about beginning and ending sounds. 4. Encourage your child to use his/her fingers and hand to frame the chunks found in words, decode those chunks first, and then move on to tackle the whole word. 5. To help train your child to look for chunks in words, play a game of "I Spy" when reading. For example, when looking at the word blend, you would say, "In this word I spy the word end." Then, switch roles with your child and let your child "spy" chunks in words. Thank you for your continued support at home! |