Parent Information:
Shapes and Colors: For the next three weeks, the group lessons will focus on colors and shapes. We introduced the basic shapes (circle, square, triangle, rectangle) as well as the basic colors(red, blue, green, yellow, black, brown, purple, orange). Colors and shapes are addressed in depth in the lessons as described below.
Parent Hints for those students who do not recognize color and shapes:
*point out shapes in nature and around your home. What shape is the window? What shape is your button? Etc. Discuss shapes when you travel or read books
*teaching colors is much easier… point out the color of the sky, grass, trees, etc. When you give directions use colors in the directions, for example, get your blue shirt to put on today or bring me the red towel.
Language Development: Children develop the majority of their language through listening to stories, conversations, media etc. Perfecting language is done through conversation. For example, asking your child questions and requiring a verbal answer, making your child use words instead of pointing or crying to express needs, reading to your child and discussing the pages as you read them, or simply turning off the movie on the way to school and talking. Our technology age has caused a decrease in language skills in young children as we are seeing at school this year.
Letter Person: Students will meet 26 Letter People. Our Letter People come from Letter People Land. They visit us each week bringing us stories, songs, group activities etc. The vowels are introduced first so that the Letter People coordinate with our ABEKA reading program. The pre-k children will begin writing the letter introduced each week, learning the sound of the letter and identifying the letter/sound in initial, medial and final position. Letter introduction, identification, formation and sound recognition is the primary focus of the PreK group.
Marks On Hand:
W-water lessons -pouring, eye/hand coordination, fine motor skill development
Orange-tong/transfer lessons teaching pincher grasp, hand-eye coordination, fine motor skills, one to one correspondence, pre-scissor skill, attention span development, helps child establish handedness
Red-knobbed cylinders, brown stair, pink tower teaching fine motor skill development, grading by size, building by size, stacking, balance and hand-eye coordination etc.
Purple- peg lessons teaching grasping, fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, attention span development, grouping by likeness, pincher grasp, pre-writing skills
Blue-color tiles and color matching/naming teaches colors(primary, secondary), matching by similarities and differences, vocabulary development
Green-Shape lessons teach naming shapes, matching by similarities and differences, vocabulary development
Pink- patterning/matching/grouping
I-Insets teach pencil grasp, left to right tracking (necessary for reading)
L- Listening lessons
1-numerals 1-3-counting, one to one correspondence for 1-3( the numeral 1 means 1 object, the numeral 2 means 2 objects) numeral recognition and numeral matching 1-10 without one to one correspondence, counting through 10
2-numerals 1-5, one to one correspondence for numerals 1-5(#5 means 5 objects), numeral recognition, numeral matching 1-12 without one to one correspondence
3-numerals 1-8, numeral recognition through 8, one to one correspondence for numerals 1-8, counting 1-12 and recognition of 1-12, ordering numerals 1-10,
4-numeral recognition and one to one correspondence 1-12, counting 1-25, ordering numerals 1-12
T-tong lessons for older children- hand-eye coordination, fine motor skill development. The T lessons differ from the orange shelf by the size of the objects transferred. The orange shelf has large object to transfer the T shelf has very small transfer objects.
M-matching lessons for the more advanced student. Students match objects by color, shade, family, similarity or difference.
5-numeral recognition and one to one for numerals 1-12, counting to 30 and above, naming numerals through 20
6-these lessons are not on the shelf at this time but will be introduced as children become ready for beginning addition, numeral recognition 1-25, counting to 50
N-tracing/writing first and last name
L-matching upper and lower case letters, naming letters in upper and lower case forms, identifying beginning sounds
S-matching letter sound to objects beginning with that sound
K-These lessons are not on the shelf at this time but will be introduced as the children are ready for the skill. Early reading lessons/ matching 3 letter words to object, using letter sounds to decode(sound out) 3 letter words
