October 7th, 2016
Hello Families!
Last week I highlighted the importance of play in our classroom, and shared with you a few of the ways children learn by interacting with materials in the different areas of the room. This week I wanted to take a few moments to talk about another important part of our day, Daily 5. The Daily 5 is a literacy program used by our district to foster literacy independence in the elementary grades. What does that mean for my preschooler you might ask? Teaching Daily 5 skills helps children learn strategies for reading a story, increase reading skills, and build their stamina for independent tasks. I firmly believe that every child is a reader, and we begin Daily 5 by talking about the three ways to read a story: Read the pictures, Read the words, and Retell the story. Even very young children can look at the pictures in a story and describe what they see happening! Daily 5 has five components we will work on through out the year; Read-to-Self, Read-to-Someone, Listen-to-Reading, Work-on-Writing, and Word Work. This week we began working on Read-to-Self.
“Having children read to themselves is the first component of Daily 5 and the underpinning to creating independent readers and writers” (Bousey & Moser, 2014). During Daily 5 this week we talked about the guidelines for Read-to-Self, as well and what students and teachers will be doing during the time. Together we created a chart with pictures and words for children to refer to when unsure of what to do. Then we practiced, practiced, practiced!
I have included some pictures of children working on Read-to-Self in our classroom this week, please enjoy!
A few reminders for next week:
- Please wash and return nap things to school on Monday.
- The water table and painting easel are now open, please send children to school in clothes that are comfortable and easy to wash! The children love these areas and we do our best to cover up clothes with art smocks, but occasionally accidents happen and paint does get spilled.
Have a great weekend!
Mrs. Stortini and Ms. Thabet
References:
Boushey, G., and Moser, J. (2014). The daily five: Fostering literacy independence in the elementary grades (2nd edition). Stenhouse Publishers.