If you were to walk into our preschool 3/4 classroom on any given day, you would see it bustling with excitement and energy. Some children may be creating stories at the easel, making a bridge with the blocks, examining an insect with a magnifying glass, drawing a picture for a family member, or reading a book with a teacher. While our preschoolers aren't necessarily reading or writing in the formal sense, opportunities abound daily to lay the foundation for these skills. We provide rich, authentic opportunities for children to develop oral language, reading, and writing skills.

Rich Talk and Oral Language

Developing reading skills depends on a child's oral language development strength. Teachers support many varied experiences to build background knowledge, leading to stronger comprehension skills. For example, on a recent cold wintery morning, we placed colored water outside to see what would happen. The children made predictions, and the teachers scaffolded their ideas by discussing things such as frigid, frost, thermometer, mixture, and thaw. Upon arrival the following day, the children delighted in bringing the ice inside to explore. The children felt empowered to ask questions, investigate, and explore their ideas. 

Read Alouds

Throughout the day, we read stories as a group, individually to children, and children also browse books independently. It is a frequent sight to see children plop right on a teacher's lap for a story. Often, it is a favorite story that we've read together multiple times. Jim Trelease shares in his book, Read-Aloud Handbook that vocabulary acquisition increases when children read the same picture book at least three times. Currently, Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? by Eric Carle is a class favorite we have read at least ten times. In the story, the author uses words such as bellowing, braying, and fluting - words not commonly used in conversation with children. As discussed in Jim Trelease's book, the eventual strength of our vocabulary is not determined by how many common words we know, but by how many rare words we understand. Where are the rarest words found, you may ask - in printed text, such as storybooks.

Emergent Reading and Writing

Preschoolers naturally have many stories to tell. While they may not be formally writing, opportunities for mark-making and storytelling lay the foundation for writing and reading. When our three-year-olds begin the school year, we follow their lead. Finger painting, sand trays, clay, and dry erase boards are offered to develop an understanding of mark-making and strengthen the hands' small muscles. An easel is another tool we use because it develops core mobility and forces children to cross the midline, a skill needed for reading, writing, and simple tasks such as shoe tying. It is also much easier for young children to work on an upright vertical surface. The easel was recently where one student's story came to life about planet earth and was a perfect opportunity for a teacher to model using the alphabet to dictate his story. Surrounding the children is meaningful and valuable print such as name tags on cubbies, labels for parts of the classroom, pictures of family photos with names, alphabet charts, and notes to family members and classmates. During a recent study on dinosaurs, the children co-created a web of their knowledge on dinosaurs. As they shared their ideas about types of dinosaurs, diets, and characteristics, the teachers modeled handwriting, letter identification, and construction of a word. Their introduction to the alphabet and print is meaningful, joyful, and embedded in all we do. We convey to the children throughout the year that they are already very capable readers and writers!

Storytelling Table and Pretend Play

One day the polar bears and seals went swimming in a pool. "Help," cried the baby polar bear, "I am stuck on a glacier." "Don't worry, I will come and save you," said the mama polar bear. "Come with me, and I will protect you in my warm cave."

Above is a glimpse of storytelling and pretend play between two students at our storytelling table one morning. At ages three and four, they demonstrate a clear sense of story as they use loose parts to experiment with storytelling and language. Our storytelling table contains open-ended, loose parts items such as glass gems, wooden people, animals, felt squares, and lights. Frequently, the children request that a teacher record their story on paper, and they proudly hang it for all to read. In her article, "Play-Based Learning Leads to School Readiness," Jennifer Winters shares, “Research has shown that through rich pretend play using open-ended materials, children use more complex and more frequent oral language and increase their ability to hear, identify and manipulate individual sounds in spoken words. In pretend play, children tend to speak longer and use more words.”

A Reggio Study - Marveling at Metamorphosis

Reggio studies are a large part of our preschool program. The founder of the Reggio Emilia approach, Loris Malaguzzi, believed young children are strong, capable, and competent learners. One fall day, we discovered a chrysalis on our school grounds. The children eagerly observed the chrysalis as it changed over several weeks. "It looks brown, it is oval-shaped, I think a caterpillar is growing inside" could be heard from the preschoolers. We took this opportunity to expose new vocabulary to the students and provided books to serve as a reference tool. Two boys delighted in looking up poisonous caterpillars, which led us to discuss survival mechanisms in the wild. The children made observational drawings of the chrysalis and eventually the caterpillar to capture the changes. The teachers helped label the pictures with the words, as we named the various alphabet letters. To culminate our study, the children made books about our caterpillar study. Bookmaking helped the children understand concepts of print, the role of an author and illustrator, the alphabet, and creating illustrations. 

It is joyful to watch young children daily immerse themselves in literacy. Preschoolers come ready to invent a story or make a book about their family members, and we are eager to cultivate their interests and support them on their journey. From an intricate story created with blocks to a class mural about winter, literacy development is happening all around us every day. Here are some suggestions as you nurture your child's interests and support their literacy growth.

Supporting Your Preschoolers Literacy Development

Follow your child's interests and engage in many wide-ranging experiences from exploring your community, to nature, to reading, to music and movement, to art. Varied experiences are the basis for literacy, language, and comprehension.

• Provide various fine motor opportunities such as painting, beading, playdough, cutting, and drawing. These experiences strengthen the small muscles in the hand.
• Cook with your child. Recipes expose children to print and new vocabulary.
• Set aside time for oral storytelling - a fantastic way to develop auditory skills and vocabulary acquisition. 
• Sing and rhyme with your preschooler. Rhyming is a key predictor of reading readiness.
• Encourage pretend play both indoors and outdoors.

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About the Author

Sarah Masters 

Preschool 3/4 Teacher

smasters@stanleyclark.org