Tag Archives: preschool

Rhyming is an Important Foundation for Reading

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It’s Rhyming Time, It’s Rhyming Time, Oh Yeah!

Rhyming Words (Echo)

Sound the Same(Echo)

At the End (Echo)

If you have heard Miss Anne’s storytime, you’ve heard this song.  Our preschoolers sing this song with such enthusiasm.  To them, this song is part of their normal storytime routine, but it is more than just a cute song.  As the song progresses, Miss Anne calls out two rhyming words for them to practice. Then they repeat the song with different rhyming words.  This is part of the Heggerty Phonemic Awareness curriculum, along with practicing onset fluency and final sounds.  According to Heggerty, “Phonemic awareness refers to the ability to focus on and manipulate phonemes in spoken words.” Phonemes are the smallest unit of sound in speech.

One of the joys of my job is creating preschool learning stations that complement Miss Anne’s storytime.  There is a rhyming station almost every week.  Many of the activities come from two fabulous online sources, The Measured Mom and This Reading Mama.  Some of their activities can be purchased, but many are free.

Here are six reasons why rhyming is important.  The Measured Mom has an article on her blog with these reasons, but I also found them on several other websites including here.

  1. Rhyming teaches children how language works.  It helps them notice and work with the sounds within words.
  2. Rhymes help children experience the rhythm of language.  As they recite nursery rhymes they learn to speak with animated voices. Someday they’ll read with expression, too.
  3. When children are familiar with a nursery rhyme or rhyming book, they learn to anticipate the rhyming word.  This prepares them to make predictions when they read, another important reading skill.
  4. Rhyming is important for writing, too.  It can help children understand that words that share common sounds often share common letters.  For example, the rhyming words cat and bat both end with –at.
  5. When listening to rhyming songs and poems, children create a mental picture, expanding the imagination.
  6. Because rhyming is fun, it adds joy to the sometimes daunting task of learning to read.

One of the early detection signs of dyslexia is not being able to rhyme.  I can relate to this personally.  My son has difficulty rhyming, although he has not been officially diagnosed with dyslexia.

 

Rhyming Books from our Beginning Reader Collection

Flip a Word Books by Harriet Ziefert

This is my favorite.  Some of the pages have a cut out, showing that the ending sound is the same. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rhyming Word Families by Mary Alinas

 

 

 

 

 

 

Amicus Readers, Word Families by Marie Powell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read and Rhyme by Pearl Markovics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First Rhymes by various authors (including Kelly Doudna, Anders Hanson, Mary Elizabeth Salzmann, and Pam Scheunemann)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Preschool Skills: Fine Motor

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One of the most important skills needed for success in school is fine motor development. In storytime we have the children work with play dough, clamp spring clothespins, use scissors, turn locks, color, string beads, and paste. We like them to scrunch scarves and do finger-thumb clapping. The dexterity they develop in those little fingers will help them with their early writing. If your child is enrolled in Preschool Storytime, they will experience a myriad of activities that scaffold this important development.

This website has the guidelines for milestones to look for in development: http://www.kamloopschildrenstherapy.org/fine-motor-skills-preschool-milestones

Below are excerpts from the above website:

Fine Motor Skills (coloring, cutting, beading, lego, drawing)

“Fine motor” refers to the movements we make with the small muscles of the hands. Children start to use their hands right at birth to explore their own bodies and the world around them. Their fine motor skills develop as their whole body starts to move and becomes more stable.  They also learn to do more things with their hands as their cognitive and social/emotional skills improve.

Below are some of the typical developmental milestones for fine motor skills.  After each age group, you can find some “red flags” that might indicate a problem.

Between the ages of 3-4 years, your child will:

  •     Build a tower of 9-10 small blocks
  •     Use playdough to make balls, snakes, cookies, etc.
  •     Build things with large linking blocks, such as Megablocks or Duplo
  •     Draw a circle by herself
  •     Copy a cross (+)
  •     Imitate you drawing a square
  •     Start to hold a crayon or pencil with a mature grasp (like an adult)
  •     Cut across a piece of paper
  •     Start to cut along a straight line
  •     Manage buttons
  •     Put on most items of clothing by herself, but may still need help with shirts and jackets
  •     Feed himself well with a spoon and fork

Red Flags for Fine Motor Development (4 years)

If you notice some of the following things about your child by the time he is 4 years old, you may want to talk to your doctor, or to another health professional such as an occupational therapist.

  •     His movements seem shaky or stiff
  •     Her arms and hands seem very weak
  •     She is not able to cut across a piece of paper with scissors
  •     He cannot copy a cross (+)
  •     She is not able to draw a circle and straight lines by herself
  •     She cannot string ½ inch beads onto a lace
  •     He cannot use a fork and spoon well
  •     She is not able to put on her own pants, loose socks and shoes

Between the ages of 4-5 years, your child will:

  •     Start to use one hand consistently for fine motor tasks
  •     Cut along a straight line with scissors
  •     Start to cut along a curved line, like a circle
  •     Draw a cross by herself (+)
  •     Copy a square
  •     Begin to draw diagonal lines, like in a triangle
  •     Start to color inside the lines of a picture
  •     Start to draw pictures that are recognizable
  •     Build things with smaller linking blocks, such as Duplo or Lego
  •     Put on his own clothing, but may still need help with fasteners like buttons/zippers
  •     Start to spread butter or cut soft foods with a small table knife (with supervision)
  •     Start to learn to print some capital letters

Red Flags for Fine Motor Development (5 years)

If you notice some of the following things about your child by the time she is 5 years old, you may want to talk to your doctor, or to another health professional such as an occupational therapist.

  •     His movements seem shaky or stiff
  •     Her arms and hands seem very weak
  •     He is not able to cut along a straight line
  •     She is not holding her crayons or pencils with her thumb and fingers
  •     He is not able to draw a circle, square and cross (+)
  •     She is not able to put on her own shirts, pants, socks, and shoes (with some help with fasteners)
  •     He is not able to feed himself well with a spoon and fork