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Mrs. Cardamone's Homepage
I will be providing Kindergarten, First, Second, Third, Fourth, and Fifth Grade students at Westmoreland Road Elementary with Academic Intervention Services (A.I.S) in Language Arts.
Strategies to help your child figure out unknown words:
Look at the picture
Get your mouth ready for the first sound
Look at the ending sound
Look for chunks you know
Blend the sounds together
Skip it and read on
Look at the picture for a clue
Reading Strategies To Reinforce
Throughout your child's education he/she will be learning a variety of comprehension strategies. While reading aloud to your child, model these strategies. Below is a brief description of each strategy.
Making connections: While reading aloud with your child it is helpful to discuss connections that your child is making between the book and their personal life, between the book and other books they have read, and between the book and the world. For example, if you were reading Pumpkin, Pumpkin, you might recall a time when you and your parents planted a pumpkin seed. This would be a connection between the text and your personal life. Always be sure to ask your child, "How does that connection help you to better understand the story?"
Questioning/Predicting: As you read aloud to your child share your personal thoughts and questions with your child. For example, if you were reading The Giving Tree, you might say something like, "I wonder what is going to happen next."
Visualizing: While we read we create mental images, or movies, in our minds. As you are reading with your child ask them, "What are you picturing?" For example, if I was reading Tops & Bottoms I might ask the children to describe or draw their mental image of the Hare and his family working in the garden.
Inferring: This is reading between the lines. We infer on a daily basis. We infer how someone is feeling based on their body language, facial expression, and tone of voice. While reading we must infer based on illustrations, author's tone of voice, author's clues and our reading expertise. Once again using The Giving Tree as an example, you would periodically pause and ask questions such as "How do you think Boy is feeling right now?" Always follow this type of questions with "Why, how do you know that?" This second step of asking why will help your child understand his/her thinking process.
Determining importance of the text: This particular comprehension strategy is most useful with nonfiction text. I encourage you to ask your child to skim through a nonfiction text or passage before reading. Also before reading, be sure to activate your child's prior knowledge by asking questions about the given topic. For example, if your child has selected a book about bats to read ask your child "Before we read I would like you to share with me what you already know about bats." It is also key to pay attention to headings, subheadings, graphs, pictures, and captions while reading nonfiction.
Synthesizing Information: Synthesizing is taking all the portions of a book such as characters, setting, plot, etc. to make a whole story. While reading aloud, ask your child to write known important ideas from the story. Then together you may combine these ideas to create a brief synthesis of the overall story.
For Common Core resources you can go to
www.engageny.org. Click on the "Parent and Family resources tab on the left hand side and then on "What Parents Can do to Help their children".
Please enjoy reading with your child as often as
possible to help them further develop a love of reading!