Online Books

Book are magical! We all know the importance of reading with your child, not only does it build literacy skills but it is also a great bonding moment and creates life long memories.

 I read to Griffin every night and he is only 2 months old! But as I read I remember the stories that I read as a child. Just tonight I picked up a book about Grover that I loved as a child. It was a book with a cassette (kids now don 't even know what those are -ha!) and when my husband came in the room, he laughed at me as I was reading in the voice I remembered from the cassette as a child!

One of the things I like to do in the classroom once in a while is show them a book read by someone else. There are hundreds of books on youtube that your child can watch and "read" online. I have compiled a list of books that I love reading and showing the kids. Here is the link so that you can share them at home with your family:

Mrs.Giglio's Online Book List

Letters and Sounds

One of the first and more important things that we work on in kindergrten are identifying letters and sounds. With many childern attending Pre-school now lots of new kindergarteners have a great head start when they can identify letters already. Can your child identify all 26 upper ans lowercase letters? If not that is something you can start working on right now. Often at open house parents will ask, "What can I do at home?" obviously it is important to read together every night but also try to check in and see what the grade level expectations are at that time and make sure your child is meeting them. Like right now your child should be practicing identifying letter and sounds.

Other than identifying the letters kindergartners need to know the sounds they make too. That can be tricky for parents to work on, because we use letters so often as adults we don't stop to think about the sounds that they make. so here are a few resources for you to use at home to help you and your child practice.

Online Letter Practice:

Starfall ABC's Click Here

 

Music Video:

 

Printable Worksheets:

 

Click Here for Printable Activities

 

Matching Game:

 

Click Here To Play a Matching Game

Back to School

Welcome back to school!

I am not in the classroom right now, because I am home taking care of my brand new baby boy. But that doesn't mean I dont think about kindergarten still...

With one week in, the time will begin to fly by! Dont forget to ask your child lots of questions about school. What did they like? Who do they sit with? What is the best part of the day? It is important to be a PROACTIVE parent and the more you talk about school in a positive light, the more your child will too.

But now that the weekend is here, don't forget to spend some family time. Here is a great website that lists family events and activities in the area.

http://www.fun4kidsinbuffalo.com/

Kindergarten Countdown

Here is a list of things for you to do in the days before school starts.

With your child, complete the activity each day and cross it off the list. It will not only help get them ready for the tasks of kindergarten it will make the anticipation of first day of school more realistic and give your child something that they can talk about and relate to other children with from day one.

10. Play outside or take a walk

9. Cut something out and glue it to a piece of paper

8. Count to 15

7. Help someone bake or cook something

6. Play a board game

5. Draw a picture of something you did this summer.

4. Write your name with a pencil.

3. Listen to a letter sounds song on youtube like this one: http://youtu.be/QW7N64zsrs0

2. Tell someone your bus number

1. Read a story about school with someone.

What Kindergarten Teachers Wish Parents Knew from Scholastic.com

I posted this article last August and here is it is again because I just can't say enough about it! I feel like every kindergarten parent should read it. If you are a kindergarten parent, or know a kindergarten parent please share this article!

What Kindergarten Teachers Wish Parents Knew | Scholastic.com

Get Ready for Kindergarten Article

Here is a really good article about getting ready for Kindergarten. It has tips for familes and even snack ideas! Check it out!

Get Ready for Kindergarten - SchoolFamily.com

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