Spontaneous Reading Fun

Ready or not, Grannie Camp has begun.

Spontaneous reading fun is the mission, and will commence. Never mind the disorganized chaos that happened because I am a disorganized sometimes overwhelmed creative person who just retired and had to move out of my school/classroom three days ago.

The fun Grannie Camp has begun! My granddaughter was a delight every hour. After breakfast, playing with the kitty, watering the potatoes, and cleaning the porch, we were ready to show and tell what we already know about letters and sounds. We did so, by her picking up a ball, reading the letter, naming the picture…

Review of letters/sounds

This is when I taught her my actions per letter/picture sound. Video here >>

I even showed her my trick about telling g/q apart, and drew a spontaneous picture

We worked with the balls on letters/sounds, until it seemed that her attention was waning and she needed a change (focus on child’s needs). Then Grannie decided it was time for an art project that would be used for teaching reading.

Art Projects

The first project was an elephant paper sack puppet, because “elephant” reminds us that the letter “Ee” says /e/ like in the word elephant. Someday, when I have time, I will try to make for you, my readers, instructions or help on how to do this, but in the meantime, perhaps you can improvise. It was a simple project.

After the elephant puppet, our next spontaneous fun for teaching reading, was to make a rainbow vest. I cut this vest out of a big paper bag that was laying around in the bottom of my pantry. The neck-hole was cut out of the bottom of the bag, with arm-holes on each side, and a slit and “v” shaped neck-line down the front.

Then came a super fun part. I had just helped decorate at a “fiesta baby shower” so the left-over crepe paper was put to delightful use. Sunshine used a paintbrush to apply glue in stripes on which to adhere strips of the crepe paper. Little artist even had the experience of using little scissors to trip the excess on the edges.

Sunshine was so proud when she was finished with this. She requested that I take a picture even of the back, because she wanted her mommy to see it!

Rest and then more spontaneous reading fun

Now after getting up early and working so hard, by this time she was tired. She had some “quiet time” in Grandpa’s chair, with Mr. Froggy.

After some rest, she actually wandered upstairs to her playhouse (post about that here>> at my Grandma Mary Martha blog) and she got her little tablet and pencil and worked to write a series of letters:

Granddaughter’s spontaneous writing. This became a spring board for our next spontaneous reading fun

I praised her on her beautiful letters. She asked me, “What does it say?”

I looked at it and wondered, “Should I make something up, like I used to for my children about the paper strip in Chinese fortune cookies, for my children?” (I used to say a Bible scripture or concept instead of read what it really said.)

But instead I answered her honestly. I said, “Well it really doesn’t say anything, except letters.”

A Super Power is Discovered!

She said, “Read them to me.”

So I read every single letter out loud, and she positively BEAMED. She delighted in having the power to write something on paper that could solicit a specific response in the reader! She had discovered a power of writing! Oh boy, the spontaneous fun reading is only gonna get better!

Then, I proposed that we play a game. She was tired and not sure that she wanted to, but maybe she could not resist Grannie’s charm. She did play! We worked together so SOUND OUT the following words. She each letter for the sound that I gave her. Then when the word/spelling was finished, I said each sound again as I pointed to the letter, and tried to help her blend the sounds to figure out the word. This part was not easy for her.

Something that I tried, which often is helpful, is WHISPER VOICE. I discovered that if you “whisper the sounds” sometimes it seems to be easier for the child to catch it. Finally, she was READING those words!!

Spin the Bottle

Our last spontaneous fun for reading was using these words in a game of spin the bottle. In this game she confirmed to me that reading all capitals is what she is more accustomed to. Now personally, I like to teach lower case letters first, but since she already knows capital letters from her private preschool experience, well…we have some work to do. Learning capitals seems to be licked.

It was a pleasure to share! Smartsy Reading Teacher would doubley blessed if you would subscribe so that you get in on all the fun and resources that are to come, for surely for this retired teacher, another kind of passion is being pursued. I still want to help children grow to be amazing readers and writers!

Grannie to her sunshine,

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