If you have taught emergent readers you are familiar with the difficulty in (tracking) keeping the child's 1:1 correspondence between the print and spoken word. I believe this is a developmental issue that cannot be taught. It can however be reinforced. I found a great new 'toy' for reinforcing it this week while shopping at what I call the 'crap' store in Kansas City. The store is actually US Toy and they stock aisles and aisles of useless party favors, decorations and other 'crap'. My find, however, proved to be quite useful this week in my small emergent reading groups. I found a dozen creepy hairy fingers that my emergent readers can put on their own fingers and use as pointers. They proved to be quite a hit with my emergent readers. I'll post pictures of them being used later this week.
Now this is cool info. And it's fun stuff to. Whatever happened to the kid in us? Emergent learners probably enter the world hungry for exploration and creepy hairy fingers are like bait to their little curious minds. Listen up old school teachers that have lost your passion for thinking like a 5 year old, "Great things await you!"
ReplyDeleteLaRon | @laroncarter