Yesterday my daughter and I started to "label" things in our apartment. I got the idea from the comments on a post on Melissas blog. Already since a while my daughter is telling us that she wants to learn how to read. I kinda figured that she is too young ... and that she would have to learn her ABC first. However after reading the post on Melissas blog I was surprised how many kids start reading REALLY early. So I figured maybe she is not too young after all.
On the other hand I am always very careful becaue I am very scared to push her to something she is not ready for. Therefore I loved the idea to label things in our apartment. It's a rather simple thing to do and - what I love most about it - it is totally up to my daughter what she makes of it and whether she takes it in or not!
Yesterday I told her what we would do and asked her what she would like to be labeled. First thing she said was TEDDY! :-) So I wrote a label for teddy - but we did not put it on him! I think this would be a violation of "Stuffed animal rights".
Anyway, she demanded labels for quite a few things in her room and also in the rest of the apartment and she had so much fun putting the labels to their places. I am really curious whether those labels will make any difference ....
2 comments:
It will definitely make an impact, what you're doing is adding to her environmental print. One of the first class books we made every year in K, was a book of environmental reading the kids could already do. This kept the kids from getting into the, "I can't read," slump. For instance, in the US at least kids can "read" the M for the Golden Arches aka McDonalds. The assignment was to have each child bring in one picture of something they could "read". These are often signs like the red Stop sign etc. This encourages them and gives them a sense of success.
Not sure how old your daughter is but another favorite activity we used classroom labels with was reading the room. To do give your daughter a clip board and have her go around and copy down the words. To make it fun you can get a special marker or pencil with a fancy topper. Once they began alphabet recognition I'd give them a page with a thematic word written down the side, like this:
S
N
O
W
Then the students had to find a work that began with that letter. This got them "reading", letter recognition, and writing practice in the guise of fun.
They also liked spotlight letters. I'd give them a target letter, clip boards, pen, AND a flashlight. They'd have to spotlight the word as the found it before writing it down. You have not idea how neat they thought using the flashlight was!
Thanks so much for your lovely comment! I totally forgot that you are a professional! :-) Do you happen to know a book that you can recommend?
I would also like to send you an email - if that's alright. But probably not today.
My daughter is 3 1/2 by the way. So I think that is quite young ... however, I was surprised about how many kids seem to have started reading at that age or earlier!
Talk to you later. Have a great day!!!
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