Issue 7

What is Early Literacy? Early Literacy is what children know about reading and writing before they can actually read and write. Research shows that children get ready to read years before they start school. There are six early literacy skills that parents can incorporate into their children's daily life. These six skills are: Vocabulary, Print Motivation, Print Awareness, Narrative Skills, Phonological Awareness, and Letter Knowledge. More detailed information about these six skills is available at http://multcolib.org/birthtosix/elitskills.html/

You can help your baby, toddler and preschooler learn important skills now so they can become good readers. There are many simple and fun ways to do this. We invite you to bring your child to Library storytimes, which utilize research-based techniques to build early literacy skills. This newsletter will help you extend storytime benefits by including book-related fingerplays, crafts, and other activities.

In this issue we highlight concept books on colors and shapes. Circles and triangles are often parts of letters. Being able to see shapes will help children recognize letters. Many of these color and shape books introduce descriptive vocabulary.

Reserve this book

Reserve this book

Reserve this book

Reserve this book

Reserve this book

Reserve this book

Blue is the lake (touch floor)

Yellow is the sun (touch fingers overhead)

Silver the stars (wiggle fingers high)

When the day is done

Red is the apple (make small circle with fingers)

Green is the tree (reach arms high)

Brown is the chocolate chip cookie for me!

Yummmm (rub stomach)

Creepy crawly caterpillar

("crawl" finger up arm)

Made a cocoon one day

(cup hands together closed)

Turned into a butterfly

(Open hands, hook thumbs)

And then he flew away

(flap hands to "fly" away)

Many of the shape books above have wonderful illustrations of animals and objects created from simple shapes.

This Shape Chick is a fun, shape focused activity that you and your child can make together. Cut out different shapes, identifying the different shapes as you make them. Assemble the shapes together to make a chick, glue it to a bright piece of paper to create a fun Spring decoration. You can also add cotton puffs, googly eyes or orange construction paper to decorate further. For more fun, see what different objects you can create using a variety of shapes. Houses, car and trees are among the many possibilities.