At school, you will see me:

• Teaching the sounds of language – I will provide opportunities for children to practice with the sounds that make up words.  Children will learn to put sounds together to make words and to break words into their separate sounds.
• Review the letters of the alphabet – I will review the letters of the alphabet.  All children should know the names and shapes of each letter.
• Helping children learn and use new words.
• Reading to children every day – I will read with expression and talk with children about what they are reading.
• Systematically teach phonics – how sounds and letters are related.
• Giving children the opportunity to practice the letter-sound relationships they are learning.  Children have the chance to practice sounds and letters by reading easy books that use words with letter-sound relationships they are learning.
• Helping Children write the letter-sound relationships they know by using them in words, sentences, messages and their own stories.
• Showing children ways to think about and understand what they are reading.  I will ask children questions to show them how to think about the meaning of what they read.
• Teach the meaning of words, especially words that are important to understand a story or book.
• Teach ways to learn new words.  I cannot possibly teach your child the meaning of every new word they see or read.  Children should be taught how to use dictionaries to learn word meanings, how to use known words and words parts to figure out other words, and how to get clues about a word from the rest of the sentence.
• Helping children understand what they are reading.  Good readers think as they read and they know whether what they are reading is making sense. Teachers help children to check their understanding.  When children are having difficulty, teachers should show them ways to figure out the meaning of what they are reading,