Sunday, March 22, 2015

Joy (#SOL 15, Day 22)

Kindergartener's using sound boxes 
I was reminded recently that learning to read and write in kindergarten is hard work. I had the pleasure of working with a teacher, modeling some ways to support emergent readers and writers. Specifically, she asked for assistance with using sound boxes and teaching sight words. She selected two children and I was able to show her how I use Elkonin boxes (sound boxes) in order to slow down kindergarten children's articulation of words so they can segment sounds to facilitate reading and writing words.

Within a minute or so, the children had the hang of it. They were problem solving by segmenting CVC words into sounds and pushing each sound into a box and then trailing a finger under all of the boxes to blend the sounds into the initial word.  We next transitioned to writing words using the sound boxes as needed. The children were eager to try this, so we had a go of it. If they could write the word without assistance of the sound box, they did. If not, they used the sound box in order to hear the separate sounds--most often the short vowel. We worked for about 6 minutes or so and they had a substantial list of words with several short a and short o words,  and two short e (often tricky) words.

This was joyful and successful work. I love to watch children learning.



14 comments:

  1. There is nothing better than watching kids learn! You can see the joy in their little faces when they know they've got it! Thanks for reminding me of the special joy we find in our profession.

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    1. It was my pleasure, Rose.Thanks for taking time to read and comment:)

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  2. Phoneme segmentation...such an important prereading skill. I have a 4th grader that cannot segment and his spelling is such a struggle for him. We play "Chips Ahoy!" I have double-sided counting circles. We use yellow for the consonant sounds and the red side for the vowel sounds. It's hard for him, but he's doing better. Thanks for the post. D :)

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  3. That is the true joy of teaching...when you can watch that 'light bulb moment' when a student gets it...or you can observe a student becoming curious and wanting more...wanting to learn and explore. What a great profession and one so important. Jackie http://familytrove.blogspot.com/

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    1. I agree Jackie. There is joy in the teaching and the observing.

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  4. Mary Ann, the use of the sound box is a clever approach to phonemic awareness and decoding. Thank you for sharing.

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  5. There is so much joy in learning. Thank you for devoting a post to that truth. Their little faces, so determined, perfectly illustrated your piece. Thank you for sharing.

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    1. The children are always motivating, aren't they?

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  6. Love reading about the process you used to help them. Segmenting sounds to facilitate reading and writing . . . sometimes I forget how hard it is to learn to read. My two went about it totally differently.

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    1. That's the best thing Ramona--there's lots of ways to learn how to read.

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  7. Don't you love it when you can observe the process of learning. That is why I love teaching reading.

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  8. Don't you love it when you can observe the process of learning. That is why I love teaching reading.

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