by Donna | Jul 6, 2018
Once I talked on the Language Lady Facebook page about how many times I had said “A paragraph is a unit of thought” in three days of teaching. (Too many to count!) And promised a post about designing paragraphs, paragraph breaks, and general paragraph help. Here you go!
Dividing paragraphs is one of the most challenging aspects of writing for young writers and adults alike (along with many other challenging aspects!). That is why when people who do not write a lot write a full page with no paragraph breaks. That is also why middle school writers start writing and have no idea when to indent–so they randomly pick a spot (“Hmmm….looks like I’ve written enough to change paragraphs now…”) and indent.
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by Donna | Jan 16, 2013
In my language arts series for grades two through twelve, I have a weekly lesson called “Wacky Words.” (Yeah, I’m all about alliteration. Um, Language Lady??!!) Anyway, the title fits a little better than calling them homophone lessons because not all confusing word are true homophones. Some are just, well, confusing–and wacky!
Here are some tricks and tips I have used recently in a Wacky Word lesson. Maybe some of these will help you remember which word is which (not witch!). Smile…
1. Hear—There is an ear in hear.
2. Here—There is not an ear in here.
3. There—It is here and there. There is a here in there!
4. Their—The word heir, which can mean ownership, is in the word their, and their is a pronoun that shows ownership!
5. See—Do you see two eyes in the word see ?
6. Boar–Boar has an a and is an animal.
7. Then—Then has an e and means next. According to one of my students (Isaac!), then means when.
8. Isle— Isle is like the word island.
9. Chord—Chord has an h like chorus (both musical).
10. Compliment—Compliment has an i–I like compliments.
11. Sensor—Sensor relates to the senses.
12. Herd—Herd of deer—almost the same letters in a different order!
13. Heard—Heard has the word ear in it
14. Through—It is rough when you go through hard times
15. Threw— He threw a new screw.
16. Pair—Love is in the air for this loving pair.
17. Pare—After he caught it, he was gong to pare the hare.
18. Pear—A pear half looks like an ear—and has the word ear in it.
19. Desert—has one s and you only want to be stuck in the desert one time!
20. Dessert—has two s’—and you want two desserts!
21. Main—The main (for first) murderer was Cain—both spelled ain.
22. Mane—The lion has a mane and is not tame!
23. Its—pronoun that shows ownership—never use an apostrophe to show ownership to a pronoun; that makes a contraction.
24. It’s—always say the two words uncontracted—if you say it is when you see this word, you will never use it’s for possession—the dog lost it’s (it is!?) collar—WRONG.
25. Sense— He was tense, so he lost his sense.
26. Cents—There are one hundred cents in a dollar and one hundred years in a century.
27. Since— Since the prince was tense he began to wince.
28. Presence— Can you think of a trick?
29. Present—have you ever heard the saying that “the present is a true present”?
by Donna | Jun 9, 2011
So many of my students have trouble spelling today’s day of the week! Wednesday is definitely not phonetic, so students (and adults!) get stuck on the spelling of it. Most people say Wednesday without the sound of the d at all.
We teach our students to spell difficult words in many ways, giving them as many tools as we possibly can.
1. Syllable by syllable—longer words that are phonetic in nature can often be syllabicated and spelled syllable by syllable by a student who is fairly phonetically-savvy: con/se/quence.
2. Tricks and mnemonics—we call these “Tricky Tricks to Help It Stick” and use them often with our “Wacky Words”—words that have a wacky counterpart that can be confusing, such as the homophones their, there, and they’re. I had an elementary student this year who told the class that they could easily spell Nebuchadnezzar if they just divided it up and pronounced the ch as choo (not kuh): Neb/U/Chad/Nez/Zar! Of course, any tricks that help a person are handy tools to have (though the trick must help that person in order to be effective).
3. Visual tricks—many visual people spell by “seeing” the word—its shape, its sequence of letters (and the shapes those letters make), etc.
4. Memorization—some people are just naturally good spellers (it is now thought to be a specific skill set separate from intelligence) and can memorize a word’s spelling once it is seen.
More on “Wednesday” in the next post!
by Donna | May 19, 2011
Children who learn to read naturally, without reading instruction, are raised in an environment that is conducive to learning to read naturally—an environment that creates a love for learning and a very perceived need to learn.
While I have never had a natural reader myself, I tried all throughout my children’s learning days to create this type of environment. It has created outstanding learners and avid readers in the Reish home.
One of the “rules” that Ray and I had for our children’s early education was that if something could be taught informally (and painlessly), we would teach it that way (as opposed to using workbooks or “curriculum” for something that can just as easily be learned while driving down the road or snuggling on the sofa).
That is one thing that I truly loved about the “natural reader learning environment.” Why get a workbook to teach capital letters when you can teach it while you are running errands (from all of the store signs)? Why get a program for rhyming words when nursery rhymes, silly songs, and I spy games on the road can do the job without the stress? The “natural reader learning environment” fit how we thought young children should be taught—regardless of whether our kids truly became natural readers or not.
The environment described in the last couple of days’ posts is extremely conducive to teaching a myriad of things that kindergarten and first grade curricula often use workbooks, worksheets, and other “formal” approaches. And kids do not even know they are doing “school” with Mom and Dad while running to the hardware store or cuddling during an extensive story time!
Here are just a few of the skills that the research on natural readers indicated are learned/enjoyed by kids in this environment:
1. Contact with print
2. Thinking skills
3. Comprehension (especially when a wide variety of materials is presented and discussion follows)
4. Expanded vocabulary
5. Enunciation and pronunciation
6. Love of and need for reading
7. Sentence patterns
8. Relationship between parent and child—the most important one of all, of course!
Create a “natural reader learning environment” in your home—regardless of your kids’ ages….and watch the interaction with print increase; the love for learning grow; and the positive relationships bloom.
by Donna | May 16, 2011
“You may have tangible wealth untold; caskets of jewels and coffers of gold,
But richer than I you could never be; for I had a mother who read to me.”
So what were the commonalities I found in studying the environment of “natural readers”?
Common Characteristics of Natural Readers:
1. Interaction with adults—these kids were with adults a lot—and definitely not around peers more than adults. They had adults on hand to discuss things with, to answer their questions, and to provide examples of proper speech patterns, etc.
2. Much book handling by the child—these children were surrounded with books that they were permitted to interact with. They were often found at very young ages with stacks of books around them, just looking at the pictures, making stories in their minds from the pictures, etc.
3. Print abounds and interest in print is evident by itself—not only did the homes of natural readers contain books themselves, but they also contained all type of print. The parents of these children read magazines, journals, newspapers, etc. I think the “interest in print” part probably began with something like a parent saying, “Honey, look at this whale they found beached on the coast of Florida,” as he or she brought the little one up on to her lap to see the picture that was provided with the article in today’s newspaper, etc. This type of activity causes a child to become interested in print.
4. Tapes and books are used—nowadays, of course, this would say “cd’s and books are used”; however, this is the reason why I began using book and tape sets a few times a week for my preschoolers and elementary children—and why we have used audios (talking books, radio dramas, etc.) every week of our lives since our oldest was one year old. “Tapes” and books show our children the benefits and “fun” that reading provides.
5. Memorization takes place—these natural readers often followed a certain pattern—they memorized a picture book (usually many), then through the memorization, they began making print-sound-word connections. That is, when they turned the page and recited, “If you give a mouse a cookie,” they began to understand that i-f says if and y-o-u says you. Natural readers were experts at memorizing large portions of text.
6. Interest in writing words and “language experience” activities—many years ago, there was a movement in education to replace phonics instruction with “language experience” activities (also called a “whole language approach”). Phonics proponents everywhere were up in arms at the thought of “activities” of writing what the child said (dictation) for him, making little homemade books, etc. taking the place of phonics instruction. While I am a strong phonics proponent, I believe that these “language experiences” and “whole language” activities augment the reading instruction greatly. And, of course, the natural readers in the research were exposed to these types of activities early and often. These kids were the ones who dictated thank-you notes to Mom to go to grandparents and colored a picture to send along with it; they were the ones who had a chalk board in the kitchen in which Mom or Dad wrote the day of the week each morning; they were those who “said” stories aloud and parents copied it in little “journal” books for the child. And on and on. Why wouldn’t these types of experiences and activities increase a child’s relationship with print and love for learning?
7. Experiences related to literacy and books—these obviously include the types of activities listed in number six, but these kids knew from birth that books and reading were important. They were the ones in a double stroller at the library lawn sale as toddlers—child in front seat with back seat full of picture books. They were the ones who had their own “book basket” in the corner of the nursery almost from birth. In other words, they were immersed in literacy and books from an early age.
8. Self-regulated behavior and risk taking—This characteristic related to how they “organize” their little lives. These kids would pull all of the Curious George books off the shelf and stack them up to look at after lunch. They often had little learning systems in place at ages four and five. And they were not afraid to be wrong. This, of course, stems from not being talked down to or made fun of when they did ask questions. These kids were risk takers because taking risks in learning (“Mommy, is this word (dapper) ‘Daddy’?”) yielded information that helped them in their quest to learn. The questions did not yield put downs or “you should already know this.”
9. Read to often—Obviously, a link has to be made from the squiggles on the page to the sounds that those squiggles make in order for a young child to teach himself to read. Thus, a child must be read to (or follow along with books and tapes) in order to learn to read without formal instruction. Now, this is not to say that a child who is read to will automatically learn to read early and on his own. I read aloud to our first three kids three to five hours everyday for years and years—and not one of the three was a natural, or early, reader! But it certainly created a love for print and learning in my children!
Tomorrow—how does this reading environment teach informally what could take years of instruction to learn?
