Disclosure: I received a complimentary book from The Innovation Press in exchange for my honest review. As always, my reviews are 100% from me! I'm so excited to share with you a NEW chapter book series! The Zoey and Sassafrass books are perfect for young readers. We read the first book in the series called Dragons and Marshmallows and my 1st grader and preschooler were captivated with the story right away. Let Me Tell You About This Book... Zoey is a sweet little girl, who is always … [Read more...]
Rhyme Time Packet for Preschoolers
Rhyming is a very important skill for beginning readers to practice. It’s a phonemic awareness skill that helps kids hear sounds within words. It’s also a lot of fun! We love to play a game where we say a word and try to come up with as many words as we can to rhyme with it. It's something simple we do while driving in the car or waiting at the doctor's office. Rhyming can be fun and silly, but it’s a great way for kids to practice hearing the sounds in words. Today I'm sharing with you my … [Read more...]
Preschool Literacy 101
I love talking about teaching literacy. In fact, I love it so much that I minored in literacy in college. I talk to lots of moms teaching preschool at home and a lot of them want to know what children need to know before they head off to Kindergarten. This Preschool Literacy 101 post will go into the basics of teaching preschool literacy. Let's start with defining literacy. Literacy is teaching reading, writing, and oral skills. Beginning literacy is the knowledge and skills that precede … [Read more...]
Awesome Reading App for Kids + Giveaway!
Disclosure: This post is sponsored by Speakaboos. All opinions are my own. I'm really excited to share with you an awesome reading app for kids that we just discovered! Speakaboos is the reading app for kids ages 2-6 that turns screen time into reading time. If your kids are like mine, they LOVE screen time. We limit screen time at our house, but I do let them play educational games. This app is one that I feel great about because it encourages my children to read! Have you heard of … [Read more...]
Apple Tree Game with Sight Words
I love September...it is quite possibly my favorite time of the year! Since apples themes are everywhere right now, I thought I'd share with you a sight words apple tree game I created for my Preschooler and Kindergartener. They are both learning how to read, so this game is a great way to introduce sight words to them! For this game, children don't have to know how to read yet, because they will be looking at the letters in the words and looking for the same ones on the apple tree. If … [Read more...]
Teaching Preschoolers How to Pick Out Books Independently
This is an all too familiar scene for us...we are at the library and I tell the kiddos to pick out books. My two preschoolers head over to the book section and grab a handful of 5 books and toss them in a pile and head somewhere else. Great. They hardly looked at them before dumping them in our book pile! Since I'm usually busy keeping my baby happy, I only get a quick glance at what they picked out. We check them out and when we get home to read the books we sometimes find that the books are … [Read more...]
Free Vowel Cards
Vowels are a great concept to teach after a child knows the alphabet. Learning vowels can be tricky, so today I'm sharing with you a free vowel cards to help teach this to your child. When you introduce vowels to your child, it is important to explain that vowels give words their volume! Ask your child to tell you the sounds in the word 'wish'. If he can segment, he will tell you /w/-/i/-/sh/ are the sounds. Ask him to tell you which sound is the vowel in the word. If he cannot, then … [Read more...]
8 Things to Teach After the Alphabet
Have you ever felt stuck on what to teach your child after the alphabet? Your child knows the letters and sounds, but what comes next? How do they go from the ABCs to reading? I get asked this question frequently, so today, I'm sharing 8 things to teach after your child knows the alphabet. To know if your child is ready to move on from the alphabet, you can do a quick assessment. Mix up alphabet letters and point to one. Have your child recite the letter name sound. It's one thing for a … [Read more...]
7 Early Literacy Games You Can Play Anywhere
My kids love games! A lot of times when we are out and about or even at home, I make up games to sneak in some extra time to work on early literacy skills. Early literacy skills refers to what children know about reading and writing before they learn to read or write. Today I'm sharing 7 games we play that promote early literacy skills. The games I'm sharing here focus on letter knowledge and phonological awareness. 1. Rhyme Machine My oldest (who is 5) is super into rhyming these days. … [Read more...]
Ten Apples Up On Top Counting Activity
Last week, Wes and I started doing preschool at home. The letter we started learning about is 'A' and we are doing lots of activities with apples. One of my favorite apple books is Ten Apples Up on Top by Dr. Seuss. I was inspired to do this activity after reading this idea from Buggy and Buddy. We put our own twist on the activity and it was a lot of fun! In this book, there is a lot of counting. The characters in the story are adding apples to the top of their head throughout the story. … [Read more...]
