The 5 W’s and H

Read a story together with your child. Before reading text, write the following words on an index card- who, what, when, where, why and how. Ask your child questions about the text using these words to begin the sentence and discuss the text. Let your child try to come up with a question using the cards. If you feel this activity is too hard to complete in response to a book, try asking the questions using the words about a recent experience they had. Then, try the activity in response to a book.

Asking Questions as you Read

Read a story together with your child. Before, during and after reading a text with your child, engage their curiosity by having them ask questions as they read. Some prompts that may guide your child to ask questions are.

• Preview the text before reading and start with a "I wonder" question.
• While reading ask who, what, where, when, why, an how questions.
• Ask questions about what may come next in the story and make predictions.
• Ask how a character might be feeling and why or why a character may have acted a certain way.

What is your Opinion?

After sharing a story with your child, ask if they would recommend the book to a friend and have them explain why or why not. Write what they are saying and read it back together.

Fluency Pyramid

Create a simple sentence that uses words your child can read (examples are linked below under online resources). Draw or cut out a large triangle.

Place the first word on the tip of the triangle (see picture below). Below the first word, write the first word again and add the second word, creating the triangle shape. Continue this process by adding one new word on each line. Have your child practice reading each line.

Act It Out

Find a book that has a character talking. Have your child read their characters conversations repeatedly so they can sound like the characters they are portraying. If a book has characters having a conversation have your child practice with a family member or friend and each person can be a character. Ask your child how the character is feeling and to read their dialogue with that feeling. Guide them to look at the punctuation at the end of the sentence and have them match their voice to that punctuation. Prompt your child to reread the lines to support them reading smoothly with meaningful expression.

• Suggested Books to use for this activity: Mo Willems Collection

Rereading for Fluency and Comprehension

Once your child has sounded out the words or stopped to figure out unknown words in a sentence, prompt them to go back and reread that sentence again. Prompts to support your child as they are rereading:

• "Now that you have figured out the words in the sentence let's go back and reread to really understand what is happening."
• "Make sure you reread the whole sentence."
• "Match your voice to the punctuation at the end of the sentence.

Match Letters as you Sing

Sing the alphabet song as you flip through the pages of an alphabet book. Make sure your child points under each letter as you go. Reread the book without singing to see if they can remember the name of each of the letters.

Trace and Compare Letters (uppercase vs. lowercase)

Write the letter then have your child name that letter. Next, have them trace the uppercase and lowercase letter with their finger. Ask them what they notice is the same and what’s different between the uppercase and lowercase letters.  Try writing and tracing letters in fun ways such as with shaving cream, in rice or sand. They can even build letters using pipe cleaners, playdough, or cooked noodles.  

Rereading for Fluency and Comprehension

Find a letter in an alphabet book. Find that letter somewhere in your house, in a book or magazine, or anywhere around them. When they find the letter have them trace it with their finger.  

Swat the Letters

You will need 26 sticky notes or small pieces of paper and a flyswatter or any kind of object to 'swat' the letters. (toilet paper or paper towel tube, wand, etc). Write only 1 letter (A-Z) on sticky notes. Spread out the sticky notes in random order. Continue by saying each letter sound and your child will swat that sound. Once your child masters letter sounds, say a word and have your child swat the letters that spell the word in order.

Shaving Cream Letters

Spread a small amount of shaving cream on a countertop or cookie sheet. Call out letter names or letter sounds. Have your child write the letter in the shaving cream. You could extend this by saying CVC words and having them write the words in the shaving cream.

Spin the Letters

You will need disposable cups for this activity. Stack cups on top of each other. Lay the cups on their side. On the first cup, choose six consonants (any letters except a, e, i, o, and u) to write around the thicker outside edge of the cup. On the middle cup, write the five vowels (a, e, i, o, u) around the thicker outside edge of the cup. Have your child turn one cup at a time to make new words to read.

Recognize if single sounds are the same or different

Play "Odd word out with your family." Have your child identify the word that does not belong. You can choose 2 or 3 words that all have the same beginning or last sound and choose 1 word that does not have the same sound. For example, "Which word does not begin with the same sound as the others?" fan, pan, fit, firm or "Which word does not have the same ending sound as the others?" mitt, cat, kick, pet.

Blending a first sound with a rime

Ask your child what this word is, "c-at?" The sound of 'c' is your first sound, and the rime is 'at.' Give them other first sounds to blend with the rime. Repeat with other rimes - 'ip', 'ot', etc.

Identifying the Sounds in a Word

Say a word that has 2 or 3 sounds. Count the number of sounds on your fingers. You can also use small objects such as pennies, chips, tokens, buttons, etc. Line them up in a row and move each object up when they hear the separate sound. For Example- a-t (two sounds), l-e-g (3 sounds), chip (ch-i-p).

List, Group, Label

Think of a topic that your child knows a lot about (ex- school, a familiar place, a sport, etc.). Working together, create a list of the words that they can think of related to that topic. Once the list is complete, read them over and place them in different groups. Last, try giving each group a label.

Shaving Cream Letters

Have your child choose a familiar object in the house. Do NOT let them tell that adults what the object is. The child then describes the object the best they can without saying the name while the adult tries to guess what they are describing. Switch roles.

Act it Out

With your child, discuss emotions (sad, happy, confused, etc.). Have your child choose one word, without telling you, and act it out. You will need to guess the emotion. Together, think of other words that mean the same (synonyms) and feeling words that are the opposite (antonyms). Switch roles.