Words, What are they good for?

Words are very useful. This is, of course, very true for a student who is learning to read. Without learning his/her words, a student might simply try to get by with memorizing symbols in frequently viewed books. Of course, many might do this anyways, but this week's readings provided ample opportunities through recommended activities to motivate our students to truly learn their words.

I found several activities that I believe would be both challenging and fun for my elementary students. One activity, called odd-one-out, was one of my favorite word games from my earlier school years. So the concept is pretty simple. A list of words is provided to the student(s), sometimes with pictures, sometimes without, and the student must determine which word is the odd-one-out.

What was a fun activity that you can remember for using and learning words growing up that you might share in your future classroom?

Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness
What is it? This term is very important. It is the ability for a student to hear, identify, and be able to manipulate small units of sounds in/from the spoken word. This is sooo important for our early learners. This now explains to me why children with hearing disabilities or delays have a harder time speaking. I have kids in my family who this applies to.
I found it interesting when I did some extra research on the topic of just how much information is out there for parents and teachers to apply this type of teaching in the classroom or at home. I found several activities that I would love to access in my classroom. I believe that the Rhyming word games/activities are my favorite because they appear a little more interactive.

How will you apply this strategy within your classroom to make it fun and interactive?

Fluency

After reading the assigned articles from Deeney (2010) and Rasinski (2004) along with the Ch. 4 from our text (Cunningham, 2010), I view fluency very differently. I previously considered fluency in reading simply that of being able to read a passage or whatever one is reading in a way that flows smoothly and sounds right... I now consider it a more complex process. This is especially true for those who struggle with finding "meaning of understanding" in what they read. I have noticed a lot of classroom time in today's classroom is focused on vocabulary to promote comprehension, but is this the best approach?? What ways will you promote comprehension in your classroom while still promoting fluency without confusing the two?

Emergent Literacy

As a teacher in TN we should focus our efforts on those strategies which truly benefit our students in their learning process(es). One snippet from the IRA/NAEYC joint position statement (1998): Stages of development that really stuck with me was: "...early childhood teachers need to understand the developmental continuum of reading and writing and be skilled in a variety of strategies to assess and support individual children's development and learning across the continuum. At the same time teachers must set developmentally appropriate literacy goals for young children and then adapt instructional strategies for children whose learning and development are advanced or lag behind..." To me, this statement sums up the need for ALL teachers to incorporate different strategies to meet the needs of a variety of students. It is our responsibility, as future teachers, to educate ourself in this manner. I loved that the phases provided a three-part approach to expressing what the student, what the teacher, and what the parent(s) can do because it is a team-effort. How will you incorporate this approach within your future classroom? How will you motivate parents to get involved even when their life has a busy schedule?