As a part of my Reading Disabilities class, we put on a family literacy night at a local elementary school. We were grouped into classrooms and each classroom designed three to four literacy games for a specific grade level. My group designed a Finding Nemo and Finding Dory themed room for kindergarten. We decorated our classroom with streamers and balloons, as well as created an ocean for one of our games out of a blue plastic table cloth. The activities we planned included: sight word fishing, a letter 'D' and letter 'N' fish craft, and a upper case & lower case letter matching game. We also gave parents a handout with tips for activities and strategies to use with students at home, as well as a Finding Nemo themed bookmark for students to take home with them.
This night allowed for us to engage the parents in their child's learning by bringing them into the school to practice literacy skills with their child through fun, engaging games. I had the opportunity to model with parents how to sound out words with their students as they played the sight word fishing game I created. It was so neat to see how parents are often interested in their child's learning, but often do not know how to help their child because no one shows them how. This was an important take-away for me because as a future educator I will make it my goal to provide parents with tips and videos on how to help their child at home with homework, reading, and other learning skills. This experience also showed me how important it is to create positive school experiences for parents too. Often times, they may not have had a good experience at school and nights like these help to change that stigma for them.
Overall, the night was a success and I felt it left parents feeling more confident in helping their children. It also allowed the students to succeed and have fun with literacy. By developing positive literacy experiences with both parents and students, both will start to see literacy in a more positive light.
This night allowed for us to engage the parents in their child's learning by bringing them into the school to practice literacy skills with their child through fun, engaging games. I had the opportunity to model with parents how to sound out words with their students as they played the sight word fishing game I created. It was so neat to see how parents are often interested in their child's learning, but often do not know how to help their child because no one shows them how. This was an important take-away for me because as a future educator I will make it my goal to provide parents with tips and videos on how to help their child at home with homework, reading, and other learning skills. This experience also showed me how important it is to create positive school experiences for parents too. Often times, they may not have had a good experience at school and nights like these help to change that stigma for them.
Overall, the night was a success and I felt it left parents feeling more confident in helping their children. It also allowed the students to succeed and have fun with literacy. By developing positive literacy experiences with both parents and students, both will start to see literacy in a more positive light.