Emerging Literacy-Guiding Literary Awareness
(For ages 3-6 years old)
Sandcastles’ pre-school and kindergarten programs engage in the practice of emergent curriculum. The teachers work to develop all arrears of curriculum with the students, listening to their ideas and interests and focusing on how and what they play. We believe that children are most receptive to learning experiences when their interests are engaged. As a result of our belief we have chosen e have chosen to develop our own literacy curriculum, incorporating resources from bank Street College of Education and those used by schools our students matriculate to.
In all of our classrooms emerging literacy begins at circle time and is integrated throughout the curriculum. Each morning children are read to, poems and finger plays are recited and songs are sung. By creating predictable, repetitive routine students begin to develop memorization, word recognition, and listening skills. They are invited to share their ideas and opinions about the stories and poems introduced, encouraging critical and analytical thinking skills as well as supporting speech and expressive language.
Read aloud books, presented at story time, are often either picture books, which provide many rich opportunities for story telling and reading picture cues or books with patterns that have a repetitive theme, providing for whole group “reading”, visual tracking and memorization opportunities. In the older classrooms chapter books are introduced to the group as a means of developing story prediction, expanded writing and imagination.
In addition to read a loud books teachers present a variety of other types of literature including fiction, non-fiction, children’s magazines, poetry, multicultural stories and stories in non-English languages. The kindergarten participates in the Weekly reader Program and has the opportunity to work with and bring home their own periodicals each week.
The classrooms also have access to a “listening center” in which small groups of students can listen to and follow along with the story being read. Most importantly daily reading occurs as a way to encourage a love of books, reading and writing.
Writing is also an integral part of sandcastles daily routine. At circle time younger children practice name and beginning letter recognition, fostering phonemic awareness and beginning letter sound symbol connections. Older classrooms work on a Letter of the Week and sight word recognition. Every day items are labeled in all pre-school classrooms as a means to foster word recognition and understand print concepts. Throughout the day children are encouraged to spend time at the writing areas and a variety of different materials are available to experiment with including, markers, pencils, crayons, chalk and stencils. Students are encouraged to label their environment creating signs for the block area, dramatic play area and adding to the items labeled throughout the classroom.
Teacher’s help students record their thoughts and ideas by taking dictation, helping with spelling and supporting invented spelling attempts, as well as continuing to encourage self expression. Classrooms also work on creating books with their groups using charts and graphs created at circle, pictures drawn with a unified theme and individual ideas organized and bound into book form. Class books are a favorite with our emergent readers because they (the children) were part of the creation of a book. Students take turns taking home class books to share with their families. Writing is encouraged through the use of journals. Older students have their own journal which they use to express their ideas and feelings daily. The children are also encouraged to share their journal writing with family and friends. Younger children are introduced to the journal process through a whole class journal which is sent home with a different child each night as part of a sharing project.
Sandcastles emerging readers and writers are given ongoing daily opportunities to explore literacy in an open, non-threatening environment. Children are encourage, but never, required, to participate in daily activities designed to enhance inherent reading and writing skills. Our most successful readers and writers are those children who explore at their own pace making discoveries and gaining confidence in their abilities.
