Kindergarten Literacy Depends on Home and School

Parents

Provide opportunities for students to practise skills in real reading and real writing by:

• writing letters, taping letters or stories

• writing diaries, journals

• creating lists, memos

• reading newspapers, TV., guides, recipes, comics, novels, signs, announcements

• researching

Allow your child to make mistakes in writing and reading too. Children are allowed to make mistakes when learning to speak.

Encourage your child to find a quiet comfortable place to read.

Know that some children find a typewriter or word processor helpful.

Share your writing with your child. Allow him to see that adults make mistakes too. Make sure your child has someone to share his reading/writing with.

Celebrate your child's work:

• praise and reinforce

• reward

• display

• share

Read aloud to your child and have him read to you.

It is crucial that your child:

• feel positive about reading and writing

• see  a reason to read and write

Partners in Learning

Always begin with a positive comment when your child shares reading or writing with you.

Model writing and reading. Let your child see you:

• writing a friendly letter

• making lists (grocery, menus)

• reading for pleasure (magazines, newspapers)

• reading or writing information (recipes)

• writing a story or poem

• writing in a diary or journal

• writing captions for family photos

• writing out invitations

• writing scripts for home videos and slide presentations

Provide and discuss new experiences to expand children's knowledge and understanding.

Discussion aids writing and reading. Build opportunities for talk through:

• Visits - Planetarium, sports events, library, swimming, Klondike Days, museums, Valley Zoo...

• Trips - small towns, farms, Drumheller, Calgary, Jasper

• Happenings - balloon rides, baking, building, playing sports/games

Help your child learn to solve problems using reading and writing

Don't tear a piece of writing apart.

• Stress the positive while limiting the number of helpful comments

Not all written pieces need to be perfect.
 

Parents Evaluate By:

Keeping writing samples (dated) and having the teacher review these samples with you.

Analyzing:

• Look at the concepts (ideas) chosen

• Does the piece hang together? Does it make sense?

• Is spelling and grammar improving?

• Is the percentage of correctly spelled words increasing?

Scanning your child's writing done at home:

• Is the quality (not quantity) improving?

• Does he/she enjoy writing (if not, why not?)

• Is your child using a variety of writing formats? (e.g. letters, lists, diaries...)

Allowing for errors (written or read aloud):

• Students must remain positive or they may avoid reading and writing. Some work should just be enjoyable.

• The language and thoughts used in a piece of writing should remain those of the child.

• To be most successful, students focus on only a few skills at a time.

• The message is the most important. The mechanics (e.g. spelling, punctuation) are aids to making the meaning clear.
   

Teachers

Model reading and writing by:

• writing in journals

• reading literature

• writing letters

Help make associations between past experiences and new learning through reading, writing, speaking, listening and viewing.

Create a non-threatening environment to provide confidence to try new activities. Give specific suggestions to encourage and stimulate students to continue learning.

Provide extensive opportunities and encouragement to practise "real reading and real writing" by:

• sending pen pal letters

• reading novels

• reading the newspaper

• writing for school newsletters

Teachers Evaluate By:

Using a variety of methods and examples of student work to evaluate individual student progress:

• files of student work

• diagnostic tests

• writing folders

• observations

• informal contracts

• student-teacher conferences

• open home and school visits

• checklists

• standardized tests

• reading tapes

• anecdotal records