In todays blog post I will be talking about the skills children need to learn before they are able to “write” or learn their letters.
In no particular order:
· Children need to have developed their gross and fine motor skills. Gross motor skills are the big movements such as throwing a ball, catching a ball, climbing etc. Fine motor skills however are the smaller movements such as holding sorting toys, all types of water play, playing with the sand and mud kitchen and its various resources, painting, cutting. This is so the child has the dexterity to hold a mark making tool in the required grip and mark make with good control.
· Sound differentiation- This can be a tough one because it all depends on the children’s concentration and ability to be able to pick out sounds. An example of this is by going on a sound walk and being able to pick out the different sounds such as bird noises, the differences in the sounds the wind makes between trees, the sound of waves as the tide ebbs and flows etc. This can help when It comes to being able to tell the difference between m and n, b and d, s and z, sh and ch etc.
· Language rich environment- This is giving opportunities to explore stories and written words. We rotate our books every 2 weeks at Squirrel Lodge so that the children do not get too bored of the same stories. If children show an interest in certain stories, we will extend and develop learning based on the story. In our home area we have “shopping lists” and recipe cards so that children can learn and understand that words carry meaning and writing can be for a purpose. In the garden we often encourage the children to “record” their achievements whether it being how many times they get the ball in the hoop or marking how far they have jumped. We have also recently acquired a library card for the nursery with the children recently taking their first trip to the library. They loved it!
· Write dance- Before a child can write/form a letter, they need to learn the shapes the letters might make such as a swirl for an ‘s’ or a zigzag for an ‘m’ or a ‘z.’ This is where Write Dance is amazing. We do Write Dance at Squirrel Lodge and the children love it. Using songs, music, rhymes and movement the children learn coordinated mark making that will be used when they learn to write their letters. For example, there is a song about leaves falling off a tree where the marks are the leaves falling in a wiggly line movement. Learning these in a fun and creative way then gives the children more confidence to practice these marks in their own “writing” or drawings.
· Story scribing- This is where the children create their own stories and the adult/practitioner writes it down. This is lovely thing to do and can be done one-to-one or in small groups. It enables the children to become imaginative and explore new words and their meanings as well as learn the way a story is structured. The adult can also extend. For example, if a child says their character was walking through the woods, the practitioner could assist by saying, “why were they in the woods?” or “what happened in the woods?” At Squirrel Lodge we love writing their stories down and the children love to revisit their own stories too.
· Modelling letters sounds- This should be done in casual way so that children are learning without realising it. An example would be at snack time. When asking what they want for snack, you could say, “would you like an a-a-a-apple or a b-b-b-banana?” or if getting ready to go out, you could say, “where is your c-c-c-c-coat?” or “do you have your h-h-h-hat?” This helps the children learn the initial letter of words. This also helps children to understand words are made using different sounds.
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