Ladders to Literacy
A Preschool Activity Book

Table of Contents

About the Authors

Forewords
Kevin N. Cole
Juliann J. Woods Cripe

Acknowledgements

Introduction

I Theoretical Framework for Early Literacyand Language Assessment and Curriculum

• Chapter 1 The Development of Early Literacy
• Chapter 2 The Role of Scaffolding
• Chapter 3 Implementing Ladders to Literacy

II Print/Book Awareness

• Shared Storybook Reading
• Snack/Lunch Menu
• Following Recipes
• Making Signs
• Many Ways to Write
• Morning/Afternoon Message and News
• I Found
• Name Cups
• Classroom Post Office
• Fill in the Blanks
• Making Books
• Photography
• Sorting Objects
• Blocks
• Recording Constructions
• Treasure Hunt
• Science Projects
• Obstacle Course
• Long Jump
• My First Journal
• Landscapes and Maps
• Museum Exhibit

III Metalinguistic Awareness

• Sound Representations
• Musical Instruments
• Rhythmic Activities
• Listening to Songs
• Clap the Syllables
• Syllable Puzzles
• Nursery Rhymes
• The Rhyming Book
• Rhyming Games
• Playing with the Sounds of Words
• Sound Isolation
• Letter Sound of the Week
• First Sound Song
• Guess the Word (Blending)
• I'm Thinking of a... (Blending by Category)
• Word to Word Matching Game: First Sound
• Play with Miniature Toys
• Pretend Play--The Store
• Pretend Play--Magic Password

IV Oral Language

• Show and Tell
• Food Talk
• Talking About Books
• Enacting Storybooks
• Book Buddy
• Portraits
• What Did You Hear?
• Feeling Objects
• I See, You See
• Treasure Boxes
• Water Play: Floating Objects
• My Dream
• Special Words
• What Does This Mean?
• Let's Say it Another Way!
• Interviews
• Movie Reviews
• Brainstorming
• From This to That
• Let's Find Out!
• Showtime

References

Appendix A: Ladders to Literacy Preschool Checklist

Appendix B: Early Literacy Activities for Children and Parents: A Parent's Guide to Easy Times to Do These Activities

Appendix C: Glossary

Appendix D: Additional Resources

Index

Introduction

SUPPORTING LITERACY DEVELOPMENT IN YOUNG CHILDREN

This volume of preschool activities attempts to form a comprehensive and cohesive framework that brings together theory, research, and practice across diverse disciplines: early literacy and language development, early childhood, and early childhood special education. Theory and research as well as actual classroom practices guided the development of the activities. Similarly, theoretical foundations as well as ideas for practical applications are presented in this volume for users to make their own and adapt to their particular circumstances. Following is a description of the major features of the curriculum

General Knowledge Features

This volume provides teachers and parents with knowledge and skills in four areas: 1) understanding the development of literacy in young children, 2) providing a literacy-rich physical environment in the home and school, 3) promoting early literacy through child-responsive teaching strategies, and 4) assessing children’s literacy development in developmentally appropriate ways.

• Knowledge about literacy development—Information is provided on child development and applications of emergent literacy research to the curriculum to ensure thorough understanding of the processes involved in the development of literacy in young children.
• Literacy-rich physical environment—The curriculum provides recommendations for materials, activities, room arrangements, and organizations of daily routines that support children’s literacy experiences in the home and at school. These include listening to storybook readings, participating in structured writing center activities, and visiting the classroom library.
• Adult–child interaction—The curriculum provides teachers and parents with information on the use of child-responsive teaching strategies, drawn from the social-interactionist research (Diaz, Neal, & Vachio, 1991; Pellegrini, Perlmutter, Galda, & Brody, 1990; Snow, 1983; Wertsch, 1985). Some of these strategies have been used successfully in early intervention programs (Mahoney & Powell, 1988) to facilitate mother–child interaction and early language development of children with disabilities. Examples of child-responsive teaching strategies include varying levels of task demands and support in response to the child’s level of competence in a task, facilitating language through information-talk, expanding on the child’s utterance, asking open-ended questions, following the child’s lead, and taking turns.
• Assessment of early literacy—The curriculum provides developmentally appropriate and ecological procedures for teachers and parents to assess young children’s early literacy learning, such as informal observations, structured performance samples (e.g., Teale, 1988), and a checklist.

Activity Features

• Ecologically sensitive—This volume emphasizes the importance of providing children with a broad literacy-rich environment (i.e., physical and social) both at home and at school. Teaching is activity based (Bricker & Cripe, 1992), with literacy skills encouraged within meaningful everyday life activities.
• Developmentally appropriate—Activities encourage children to experience and experiment with literacy activities by reconstructing meanings of books and events through their own words and expressing their own ideas and stories.
• Responsive to individual differences—Activities are designed specifically to respond to the particular needs of young children with a variety of disabilities. The social-interactionist perspective of our curriculum and, in particular, the use of scaffolding (Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976) provide a framework for addressing the variety of individual needs experienced by children with disabilities who are learning together with their typically developing peers. The activities immerse children in an authentic literate environment. The emergent literacy experiences that have been associated with school success are introduced not as isolated segments but through a series of activities in which each child can participate and learn at his or her individual level of functioning. To facilitate learning, activities include developmentally appropriate teaching strategies. Adults can provide different levels of assistance, arrange tasks and situations, and match the goals of the interaction with the individual child’s understanding of the tasks (Wertsch, 1985).
    The teaching strategies and adaptations for specific needs of children with disabilities are guided by the notion of scaffolding (Wood et al., 1976), a dynamic type of adult–child interaction in which the adult provides high levels of support and low demands to assist the performance of a child who is less competent. Researchers have identified a number of adult interactive behaviors that positively affect children’s literacy and language outcomes (Morrow, 1989). These include strategies such as questioning, giving information, clarifying and restating information, expanding on the child’s utterances, and offering praise and feedback. These strategies have also been used to facilitate language in young children with disabilities (Fey, 1986). Use of these approaches allows for individualization in a child-responsive manner, making the curriculum ideal for use in an inclusive program in which children of many ability levels may be grouped in the same classroom.
• Multiculturally sensitive—Literacy is deeply embedded in the culture of the family and the community (Heath, 1982; Sulzby & Teale, 1991). This volume offers literacy activities that are meaningful across and within a variety of cultures and ethnic groups and that address the issue of culture-specific adult–child interaction styles.
• Grounded in research theory—Effective implementation of any curriculum depends on a solid understanding by the users of the philosophy and principles on which it is founded (Adams, 1990). Each teaching activity is accompanied by relevant theoretical and empirical information to enable users to understand the purpose of each activity.

Instructional Features

The following features enable teachers and parents to use the activities in a variety of settings and with children at different stages of literacy development:

• Useful in group instruction; adaptable to heterogeneous groups—The curriculum is designed to ensure that children of different ability levels can be served in inclusive groupings. Each experience includes activities for a range of developmental levels so that teachers can respond to individual differences.
• Supports that can be integrated with other curricula—Ladders to Literacy will enhance rather than replace existing curricula. This makes the curriculum flexible and easy to include with classroom curricula and routines.
• Activities that are developmentally appropriate—Activities are functional and meaningful for the child and facilitate behaviors in multiple areas. Each educational activity identifies a developmental sequence of activities to accommodate children of different developmental levels.
• Provision of guidelines for child-responsive teaching strategies—For each activity, guidelines for teaching strategies are described to facilitate children’s participation and to allow for adjustments of demands and support according to the child’s level of task competence.
• Provision of suggestions for including families—A series of activities are available specifically for use by parents and other family members.
• Provision of recommendations for individualized family service plan/individualized education program goals and objectives—The educational activities contain examples of child behaviors that can be expected to be facilitated during the activity. This is to assist teachers and parents in identifying goals and objectives.
• Inclusion of formal and informal assessment procedures—Guidelines are recommended for using portfolios to document children’s progress. Informal assessment procedures, observation forms, and checklists are proposed to assist teachers in determining children’s progress toward specific objectives.

RESEARCH ON LADDERS TO LITERACY DEVELOPMENT

The activities in this volume have been extensively field-tested over a 4-year period in a variety of preschool settings, including child development programs, Head Start programs, and early childhood special education classrooms. Sites included an inclusive child development center serving primarily Caucasian middle-class children; a multicultural program in an Islamic School; two Head Start programs, one attended primarily by African American children and the other primarily by Native American children; and self-contained special education preschools in public schools attended by children from a variety of cultural backgrounds and presenting a broad range of disabilities. A total of 26 teachers and teaching assistants participated in the field-testing. The professional training of the teachers ranged from a child development associate to a master’s degree in early childhood special education. Most teachers implemented each activity at least once. Generally, activities such as Storybook Reading, Snack/Lunch Menus, Journals, and Morning/Afternoon Message took place daily. Activities such as Show and Tell and Musical Activities took place weekly, whereas activities that required more intensive planning and materials preparation (e.g., Long Jump, Following Recipes, Making Maps) were implemented only once during the school year. Teachers reported that they liked the activities and found them developmentally appropriate, culturally sensitive, and easy to include within their daily classroom routines. To meet the needs of heterogeneous groups of children, the activities in this volume were designed for participation by children functioning across a range of levels typical of inclusive settings. In one particular study, we explored the effects of conducting activities on the early language and literacy development of young children with disabilities, children at risk, and typically developing children (Notari-Syverson et al., 1996). Overall, all children benefited from participation in the activities. Children at risk and children with disabilities in particular made significant gains on standardized and nonstandardized measures of early literacy and expressive and receptive language.

Chapter 3

Implementing Ladders to Literacy

The main purpose of the Ladders to Literacy curriculum is to illustrate how learning about literacy and language is an integral part of daily life at home, at school, and in the community. It provides guidelines and suggestions for teaching a variety of early literacy and language skills across a broad range of situations and tasks (e.g., from quiet book activities to active physical motor games). Activities should be easy for teachers to implement within the context of their daily classroom routines. Although the activities lend themselves to teaching a broad range of early literacy and language skills, each activity has been assigned to one primary area (print/book awareness, metalinguistic awareness, or oral language), and teachers are recommended to focus on teaching skills in the designated primary area. Given the range of ages and abilities in inclusive and special education preschool settings, teachers often need to address multiple educational goals within a single activity. Within the primary area (e.g., print/book awareness), recommendations are provided for teaching children with different needs concepts and behaviors that are developmentally appropriate to their individual levels. While reading a storybook, for example, one child can be taught to identify letters, another can sight-read familiar words, and a third can learn to label pictures. For each level, scaffolding or teaching strategies to facilitate the individual goals are suggested.

The physical context in which activities take place is an important factor for the successful implementation of the curriculum. Following are suggestions for arranging the classroom environment to maximize opportunities for children to experience and learn about literacy.

ACTIVITIES

Components

Each activity includes a purpose statement with a list of behaviors the activity facilitates, a description of the activity procedures and materials, suggestions for specific child objectives and adult assistance, adaptations for specific disabilities, and ideas for home activities and parent involvement.

Purpose Statement

The purpose statement describes the major goals of the activity and how these goals promote the use of literacy and language in daily life settings. It also includes a list of concepts and behaviors across the three major areas of the curriculum (print/book awareness, metalinguistic awareness, and oral language) that the activity develops. These behaviors correspond to items from the Ladders to Literacy Preschool Checklist.

Materials and Description of the Activity

Suggestions are provided for organizing materials, setting up the activity, and encouraging child participation.

Adult–Child Interactive Behaviors

The adult–child interactive behavior section describes how, through participation in the same activity, children functioning at diverse levels may learn new concepts and behaviors developmentally appropriate to their individual needs and characteristics. Three groups of learning objectives (these are the task demands) with corresponding teaching strategies (or supports) are outlined: high demand/low support, medium demand/medium support, and low demand/high support. The three levels of task demands consist of skills that correspond to items on the Ladders to Literacy Preschool Checklist. These are skills the adult aims to facilitate or teach children during the activity. For example, the three levels of task demands for the Snack/Lunch Menu activity in the print/book awareness section are the following:

• High demand/low support: Children read the menu to find out what will be served for snack/lunch. They will: read words and name single letters.
• Medium demand/medium support: Children refer to the menu during snack/lunch and will: recognize a few memorized words.
• Low demand/high support: Children will:  identify foods and objects represented in the pictures.

  The skills selected were the behaviors that are the most likely to occur naturally as children participate in a particular activity. As a result, levels of demand may vary from one activity to another. For each level of task demand, specific teaching strategies to support the child’s learning of a skill are suggested. Teaching strategies are organized according to levels of assistance from low to high support. In general, the more competent child will require minimal guidance from the adult, whereas other children will need more intensive assistance and higher levels of support. Therefore, low-support strategies are generally the most appropriate for children ready to master tasks presenting at high levels of demand. Children learning tasks with lower demands are more likely to benefit from high-support strategies. For each child participating in the activity, the teacher may determine the most appropriate level of demand based on the child’s performance on the Ladders to Literacy Preschool Checklist, the individualized education program (IEP)/individualized family service plan (IFSP) goals and objectives, and/or the teacher’s recent observations of the child.

  For certain activities, multiple skills or goals may be listed within each level so that teachers may select the most appropriate tasks for individual children or address more than one skill for the same child. In the previous example, the high-demand level contains two learning objectives: reading words and naming single letters. When multiple learning objectives are listed for the same level, individual strategies may be applicable to only one of the objectives. In this case, the teacher should select those appropriate for each individual goal. For example, two strategies are suggested for cognitive structuring. One strategy is the following: Point out distinctive features, similarities, and differences between targeted letter and other letters ["You said this is a b. Does it look the same as this other b here? Look carefully. Which side of the circle is the stick on?"]. This strategy addresses letter identification. The second strategy is the following: Provide verbal information about the identity of the word ["It grows underneath the ground and is orange"]. This latter strategy addresses word recognition.

  After determining appropriate levels of task demands for each child, teachers should select two or three teaching strategies to assist the child in accomplishing the task. Figure 2 shows an example of an activity planning form to assist teachers in this task. Begin by using the least intensive support strategy (usually the first listed). If this does not help the child learn the skill, then gradually increase the amount of support.

  It is important to remember that children will respond differently to different types of support, with some children benefiting from more direct assistance and others from less direct assistance. Children who are ready to take on high-demand tasks may, at times, need high-support teaching strategies (explicit instructing). In some situations, low-support strategies (open-ended questioning) might be sufficient for children learning low-demand tasks. During the teaching interactions, adults should continually evaluate and revise decisions about appropriate levels of support based on the individual child’s responses to prior types of assistance.

Adaptations

Recommendations are provided for adapting materials and activity procedures to facilitate the participation of children with visual, motor, or hearing impairments.

Home Link and Parent Activity

Each activity offers easy-to-implement suggestions for families to enhance the early literacy and language development of their children at home and in community settings. The purpose of these suggestions is to encourage family participation and establish ongoing communication between the home and the school. The suggestions for home activities are simple for teachers to implement, such as sending home samples of children’s work or eliciting parent assistance in having children bring special objects from home to share with their peers. Also, we have compiled a special set of Early Literacy Activities for Children and Parents (see Appendix B), which help parents reinforce the concepts and behaviors being taught in the classroom. Teachers can, for example, include these suggestions in regular parent newsletters; compile them as a special booklet for parents; or make separate copies, on colored paper, to send home. Also, teachers can personalize the activities by adding illustrations or have children draw their own pictures or paste figures or photographs on the copies.

MORNING/AFTERNOON
MESSAGE AND NEWS

Main Purpose

To use print as a communication tool

Children learn that print is a tool to communicate with others. Thoughts and messages can be translated into print and preserved for others to read and reread. Children are made aware of the process of translating meaningful oral language into print.

Materials

Paper; blackboard; markers; chalk; flannel board; felt letters

Description of activity

Write a message each day during the large-group circle, while the children are watching. The content of the message can be generated by one or more children, by adults, or by both children and adults. Children can volunteer information they would like to share with the rest of the class, or you can elicit comments on specific topics (e.g., important events in the community, weekend experiences, a favorite book or activity). You can also ask more specific questions (e.g., what the weather is like, what children liked best about school that day) or use the message for planning by describing the daily schedule and activities or an important event that will take place in the classroom that day. Write the message on a large sheet of paper or chalkboard, or use magnetic boards or letters. Add pictures and objects. Draw children’s attention to the process of translating oral language into print, and discuss the advantages of recording a written message and news. Repeat readings of the message, and have children retell the message to one another ["Jamie, tell Sarah what we are going to do today"]. Help children read along by pointing with your finger at each word read. Encourage children to read the message along with the adult, and discuss the message or the news. Encourage children to make evaluations and express opinions ["What did you think of the muffins we baked today?"], to investigate causes and effects ["Did you enjoy the trip to the train station?"], to solve problems ["Why didn’t it work?" "What could we have done differently?"], and to make predictions ["What are you planning to do this weekend?"].

This activity develops the following behaviors and concepts that are related to early literacy:

Print/Book Awareness

Print—book conventions, awareness of graphic symbols, letter identification; letter–sound correspondence—single sounds and letters, words

Metalinguistic Awareness

Perception and memory for sounds—words, phrases; phonological skills—alliteration, segmentation

Oral Language

Vocabulary—words and sentences; narrative skills—narrations of real events; literate discourse—categorical organization, decontextualization

ADULT–CHILD INTERACTIVE BEHAVIORS

High Demand/Low Support

Children offer ideas and dictate coherent narratives. They participate in writing the message by helping to spell selected words. They will: name individual letters, identify corresponding sounds, select letters to represent sounds, and use letter sounds to write words

Support Strategies

Open-ended Questioning

Ask children to volunteer to spell a word that they dictated.
Yesterday we had snow. How do we write snow?

Providing Feedback

Encourage children to self-evaluate and correct responses by asking them for clarifications.
Why did you say that we need a t in milk?

Cognitive structuring

Have children identify one letter or sound at a time.—How do we write cat? What’s the first letter?

Help children make distinctions and comparisons of relevant features of letters and sounds.—How do we write a b? On which side of the circle is the stick? How do we write a d?

Task regulation

Stretch (e.g., Ssss-sunday) or iterate (e.g., T-t-t-today) sounds to help children identify them. Provide choices.—Does cat start with a c or an s?

Instructing

Ask children to help spell words by identifying single letters and sounds.—The first sound in snow is /s/. Which letter is that?
Read one sentence at a time, pointing to each word. Then ask children to read that sentence with you as you point to the individual words.

Medium Demand/Medium Support

Children participate in writing the message by adding comments. They will: identify a printed word and recognize some of the words in the message

Support Strategies

Open-ended Questioning

Ask children if they would like to add anything to the message.—Nathan said that it’s cloudy today. What else?

Write the additional comments, and ask children to read a word.

Cognitive structuring

Demonstrate the one-to-one correspondence between a child’s utterances and the printed words by pointing to each word while reading it aloud.—Beth said, "I went sledding in the park." And here are the words, I went sledding in the park.

Provide strategies for how to identify a printed word.—Each word is separated from other words by empty spaces.

Task regulation

Circle or highlight with a color marker a word proposed by the child, and ask the child to read it. Circle or highlight names of children in the class or add them at the end of the message as authors, and ask children to identify them. Provide visual cues by drawing a picture or showing an object that corresponds to the chosen word.

Instructing

Point out important words before reading with the children.—This sentence was about Bro’s trip to the hospital. Let’s read the word Bro together.

Model reading the word.

Low Demand/High Support

Children attend to the writing of a message. They will: know that the print tells the message

Support Strategies

Instructing

Draw children’s attention to the link between the oral dictation of the message and the print by pointing to the text while reading the message. Ask them to show that print conveys the message.—Where does it tell us what we are going to do today?

Circle names of children in the class, and model associating printed and spoken names with classmates represented in the message.

Comments/Adaptations

Comments

The message can also be written on the computer, and individual copies can be printed out for each child.

Adaptations

Messages can be translated into braille for children with visual impairments or into a sequence of drawings or pictures for children who have hearing impairments and who are not able to read yet.

Home Link

Parent Activities: Diaries; Scribbling; Writing Messages

CLAP THE SYLLABLES

Main Purpose

To understand that words can be conceptualized as a collection of parts

The child recognizes that words can be subdivided at the syllable level. This activity introduces children to differentiating the sound of words from their meaning. Children come to view words as collections of sounds apart from their meaning.

Materials

Drums or other musical instruments; paper; crayons

Description of the Activity

During circle time, begin the activity by modeling the clapping behavior and encouraging taking turns. Go around the circle. Say each child’s name, then say the name in syllables, clapping for each beat. Encourage children to clap the beat with you ["Andrew! An-drew"]. Lead children in clapping twice. After the first few times, children should join you in clapping syllables. You can extend the activity in several ways. Call out the names of objects in the classroom ["Table"]. Have the children repeat the word, clapping the syllables along with you. Encourage children to take turns calling out the name of an object in the classroom, then have all of the children repeat the child’s word, clapping the syllables. Instead of clapping, you can use musical instruments such as drums, tambourines, or xylophones. Also pictures and labels with names can be used as visual support.

This activity develops the following behaviors and concepts that are related to early literacy:

Print/Book Awareness

Symbolic representation—pictures; print—awareness of graphic symbols

Metalinguistic Awareness

Perception and memory for sounds—words; phonological skills—blending, segmentation

Oral Language

Vocabulary—words and sentences

ADULT–CHILD INTERACTIVE BEHAVIORS

High Demand/Low Support

Children will: segment words into syllables by clapping and saying words in syllables

Support Strategies

Cognitive Structuring

Explain how to segment words.—Table has two beats. Ta-ble. Do you hear the two beats in table? Ta-ble.

Model saying words in syllables, and have children count the number of syllables before clapping themselves.—Hippopotamus. Count the parts. Hip-po-po-ta-mus! How many parts did you count?

Task regulation

Have children segment familiar words, such as their names or objects present in their classroom.—Say Kelley in two parts. Say banana in little parts.

Have children choose words to segment. Have children segment two-syllable words.—Table. Say it slow.

Have children segment compound words (e.g., caterpillar, spaceship). Say the first one or two syllables, and then have children add the syllables that follow.—Elephant. I say el-e. You say -phant.

Instructing

As you model saying words in syllables, have children clap to the syllables. Model saying words in syllables, and have children repeat the word in syllables.—Vol-ca-no. Say volcano like that.

Medium Support/Medium Demand

Children will: blend syllables into words and repeat words segmented into syllables

Support Strategies

Task regulation

Have children blend familiar words such as their names or objects present in their classroom.—Lin-da. What word is that?

Use two-syllable words.—Win-dow. Say it fast.

Instructing

Model blending the word, and then repeat the task with a new word. Say a word segmented into syllables, and have the child repeat.—Pump-kin. Say these two sounds: pump-kin.

Physically guide children by holding them in your lap, taking their hands, and gently clapping to the syllables.

Low Demand/High Support

Children will: repeat multisyllabic words

Support Strategies

Task regulation

To elicit children’s interest say unusually long words that are likely to be novel and unfamiliar (e.g., kookaburra, extraordinary, enormous). Enunciate words slowly.

Instructing

Have children repeat words that peers have blended or segmented.—What word did Ly say?

Comments/Adaptations

Comments

This activity can be incorporated into the rhythmic activities. This activity can also be used for segmenting sentences into words and segmenting compound words. Children can use movements and actions other than clapping (e.g., jumping, placing a block in a container for each segment, tapping the table with their hand). Children can also be asked to segment or repeat words while looking at books with unusual multisyllable words (e.g., Many Luscious Lollipops [Heller, 1989]).

More Ideas

Audiotape activity, and send tape to parents.

Home Link

Parent Activity: Let’s Dance!

LET’S SAY IT ANOTHER WAY!

Main Purpose

To develop vocabulary, narrative skills, and literate discourse

Children learn about the symbolic and arbitrary nature of language and print. They learn that objects, people, and events can be represented through the use of different symbolic systems. They learn about the conventions of language and print and their role in the communications of a specific group or culture.

Materials

Paper; crayons; objects presenting information about different cultures

Description of the Activity

During circle time, tell children different ways of saying and writing common words (e.g., hello, good-bye, thank you, yes, no) in foreign languages. If children in the class speak languages other than English, then choose their language and have them translate the words. Make labels in different languages for objects in the classroom, and draw children’s attention to them during daily activities. Display boxes of products containing print in more than one language, such as Canadian products with English and French print. The purpose of this activity is not for children to learn specific words in foreign languages but to become aware that oral and written languages are specific to social groups and cultures. Encourage discussion about other countries, cultures, and traditions.

This activity develops the following behaviors and concepts that are related to early literacy:

Print/Book Awareness

Print—book conventions; awareness of graphic symbols

Metalinguistic Awarenes

Perception and memory for sounds—words, phrases

Oral Language

Vocabulary—words and sentences; narrative skills—narrations of real events; literate discourse—decontextualization, interpretive/analytic discourse

ADULT–CHILD INTERACTIVE BEHAVIORS

 

---

High Demand/Low Support

Support Strategies  

Open-ended questioning

Ask general questions. What’s it like in Mexico? What do people eat?
What’s the weather like? Which kinds of plants grow there?  

Encourage children to make interpretations and use cognitive and metalinguistic words.—What do you think "neko" means? What did you notice about the signs in Chinatown?  

Cognitive structuring

Explain that different words and signs are used in different languages to represent the same object.  

Task regulation

Provide visual and other contextual cues (e.g., pictures, objects, maps) to help children identify the meaning of foreign words.

Instructing

Ask direct questions.—How do you say "hello" in Korean? How do we say "gato" in English? Use peers as models. Provide models, and repeat request.—The Koreans say "agno." How do you say "hello" in Korean?

Medium Demand/Medium Support

 

Children relate personal experiences and knowledge about countries and cultural traditions. They will: describe explicit causal and temporal sequences among events and generalize experiences to other settings

  

 

 

Support Strategies

 

 

Open-ended questioning

Encourage children to talk about their personal experiences with other countries and cultures.
What did you see when you visited your grandma in Puerto Rico?
How does your mother make tamales? How do you say "good night" in Mandarin?

Cognitive structuring

Help children sequence events.—First, you light the candles. Then what?  

Task regulation

Have children talk about a relevant book read in class or at home. Have children talk about objects they have brought to school from home.  

Instructing

Model by talking about your own culture and personal experiences.—Here’s a story my grandfather told me about when he lived in China.
Ask children direct questions.—How do you say "hello" in Hawaiian? What is Ramadan?

Low Demand/High Support

Children will: label and comment on objects, pictures, and events

Support Strategies

Open-ended questioning

Ask general questions. —What’s happening in this picture? What do you use this for?

Task regulation

Have children talk about objects that are familiar and present in the immediate environment.

Instructing

Ask direct questions.—What’s this?

Ask children to label or describe an object or picture following a peer model.

Provide a model, and elicit a response.— This is a dog. "Ma" is the Thai word for dog. What’s this?

Comments/Adaptation

Comments

This activity can be integrated within a reading of folktales or a Velcro board story. Children can create books themselves. Teach children songs in different languages. Make audiotapes of people speaking in different languages and accents. Visit ethnic stores that sell food, literature, and other objects from diverse cultures.

Link with Print/Book Awareness

Use storybooks in other languages and that use different alphabetical systems (e.g., Greek, Russian, Chinese). Create books that describe and contain words from the cultures of the children in the class.

Home Link

Encourage children to bring from home books and songs in foreign languages and articles or souvenirs from other countries or cultures.

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