Hesston College Preschool: BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS!!!

"Reading books" in preschool is a pre-cursor to learning how to read in Kindergarten and beyond. In preschool we focus on the emerging skills that are needed before they learn conventional reading in Kindergarten. Some emerging literacy skills you may see with your child: looking through books pretending to "read" while looking at pictures; re-telling stories they've heard multiple times; asking to be read to (multiple times) as they make connections between the characters, story line and text; reading a book front to back, left to right; running their fingers along the text as they "read"; enjoying books and asking to be read to, phonemic awareness, letter recognition, understanding that written words have meaning and their spoken words can be written down, and much more!

Early literacy is key to helping young children succeed as readers later on. In preschool, our focus is on appropriate activities that fit the children's developmental level and needs. We read books aloud at least 2 times a day, and more if the children request it. The books we focus on have repetition, rhyming, prediction, rich in language, informational, high-quality story and text. We also emphasize letter recognition and the phonetic sound of letters; we accomplish this by introducing a letter of the week. We talk about words that begin with that letter and the sound they make. Learning that each letter makes a different sound is also part of early literacy.

I hope that you encourage book reading at home; reading to your children at bedtimes and other times too!! Research says that children who have been read to at home have a higher chance of being good readers!

Here is some reading that is happening here at preschool....love it!!!