A branch of the public library called Little REaD Wagon has been doing a Play and Learn series at the library we usually go to, the Guerra library, to encourage early literacy. These ladies travel around to different libraries throughout the year to do their series. We were not able to make all of them, but we did go 4 different Fridays.
The topics they offered were:
- What is early literacy?
- What is print awareness?
- What is letter knowledge?
- What is phonological awareness?
- What are narrative skills?
- What is print motivation?
- Why is vocabulary important?
- What other resources are available?
Each day we attended began with reading a book as a large group and then going off to play with the resources they brought. Some examples of activities are listed below. Most activities had books to read that were related.
1. A sound garden for phonological awareness- hanging pots, pans, and kitchen items on strings for the children to play on.
2. Music instrument exploration- for phonological awareness
3. Writing letters and putting them in a mail box (they did not have to know letters or have skills to write) for print motivation
4. Making play doh with a recipe for print motivation
5. Using tongs to pick up small items to practice fine motor skills for print motivation
6.. Finger painting for vocabulary
7. Planting a lima bean in a pot for vocabulary
8. Looking at pictures from magazines, etc on the wall with a magnifying glass for vocabulary
9. Playing with book character cut outs on a sticks while reading a book.
10. Digging for dinosaurs for vocabulary
11. Playing with baby dolls and learning to care for them for vocabulary
12. Making large bubbles
13. Puzzles
All of the activities were things that are easy to be done at home.
