Ask the Teacher Tuesday: A New Reading Strategy and Gift-Giving!

This first topic is a “part 2″ of a previous question, posted a couple of weeks ago (Ask the Teacher Tuesday Reading and Study Skills). I would encourage you to read that post before reading this one since I will be bouncing off what I said in the original post.

The original question was: Do you have any advice on when/how to start teaching reading?

I came across some very interesting information this week that I wanted to share. It has to do with the topic that was discussed a couple of weeks ago about when and how to teach reading. I went to the library this week to pick up some books on activities to do with toddlers, just to get some fresh activities into the mix and to plan for the next few months of wet, cold and snow (need I say more?).
I came across a great resource: Baby Minds: Brain-Building Games Your Baby Will Love by Linda Acredolo and Susan Goodwyn. I was very pleased to see that their approach on reading paralleled my views on teaching reading. But I did find a bit more information very helpful that I, myself, don’t do, but have definitely starting doing,this week.
A few very important statements from their book that I wanted to share with you:

• Countless studies have shown that children whose parents read to them from very early ages (regardless of how they do it) tend to talk earlier, read better and think in more complex ways than children whose parents don’t.

• The second item is a term they coined “Dialogic Reading”. All this means is to bring dialogue into the context of reading. Not just reading the words but modeling how and what we think while we are reading. This type of reading, answers questions in the reader’s mind. The “how”, “why” and “Where” types of questions. Let me just interject here, that as a teacher I was trained to approach teaching with this style. While reading a text, it is important to pause with the students and reflect what we were reading. But I have to admit that I haven’t thought to do this type of reading with young children (my own kids). Because in my mind, babies and toddlers couldn’t truly understand these types of questions and since they can’t talk to me, why try? I have been convinced otherwise and feel very foolish for being so naive.

• They cited a experiment done between dialogic reading and basic reading and what they found convinced me to definitely begin doing dialogic reading with my own kids and to inform you, my readers about it. The study took parents who ALREADY read to their TODDLERS on a daily basis and broke them into two groups. One group was encouraged to go home and continue what they had been doing and the other group was given the information on dialogic reading and shown how to do it with their toddlers. At the beginning of the study all the children were pretty much at the same developmental skills but after only 1 month, the group that did the dialogic reading were 8 and 1/2 months ahead on one measure and 6 months ahead on the other. And after 9 months of the study this group continued to be 6 months ahead of the other. Keep in mind, also, that all the children were found to be 6 months ahead in reading to their peers, before the experiment, due to parental involvement in daily reading.

Here are some examples of types of questioning to use:

“What’s Dumbo doing? He’s flying!”
“Where do you think Dumbo is going?”
“What do you think Goldilocks told her mommy when she got home?”
“Why do you think he is mad?”
“From the picture, so you think she is happy or sad?”

HOLY COW! How did I not think of this, as a teacher? But starting early, at 6 months, this type of reading seems to definitely improve language and reading skills.

Pretty much the authors state that a good question, is one that inspires your child to say something.
If you want more information on how to apply this type of reading, I would highly encourage you to check out the book at your local library or purchase a copy for you own.

I can’t wait to get to the Mathematics section of the book and report my findings to you.

The next question that was posed to me this week, that I thought would be a great one to discuss early on, isn’t actually on education per say, but on a more personal level with your child’s teacher.

Jenny asked, “What is a good teacher gift? I am already stressing over what to get Joshua’s teacher for Christmas. I don’t want to get her something she will get 1,000 of. What are some of the best gifts you got when you were teaching?”

I LOVE talking gifts and this actually is a fun one for me, because during the holidays and birthdays, us teachers would joke about our gifts. DON’T get me wrong, we definitely appreciate the kindness and thoughtfulness of the students and parents, but sometimes we wished we could do a “wish list” for parents to see. My teaching partner and myself actually starting joking with the kids early on in the school year of what we wanted for Christmas, in hopes to score some great gifts.

A few thoughtful and useful gifts:

1. Gift Cards! I think this one is probably on the top of any teacher’s wish list. Gift cards could be for restaurants, retail stores or even salons. The beauty of it is, we teachers know that it is more the thought then the price tag!! We would be tickled pink to get a $5 gift card to Bob Evans, Starbucks or Bath and Body Works. If you can afford more, feel free to indulge your teacher in a larger amount. But DON’T feel bad if $5 is all you can afford. We understand and truly appreciate just being remembered during the holidays. It truly is the thought that counts
2. Find an interest that you know your child’s teacher is into. I can think of 3 all-time favorite gifts that I received. And none of them were expensive or extravagant! The first being a University of Michigan bell. It was a small, porcelain bell that I could use in my classroom but also after the school year was over, I could place it on my sports wall at home. Believe it or not, that was the only University of Michigan gift I received in 7 years of teaching {insert jokes here…I know many of you OSU fans will jump on that one}. The second was a bag of bird seed. You may think that that is an odd gift to give a teacher, but this particular student knew how much I loved watching birds and that I had many bird feeders in my yard. What was even more thoughtful, he knew how much I enjoyed Cardinals in the middle of winter time, so he made sure it was black oil sunflower seeds – Cardinals favorite seed. To be honest, I almost cried after opening that gift because it showed me that the student really picked up on that particular interest of mine during the school year. The third gift was actually gifts for my kids. This particular student of mine was extremely into sports. It was phenomenal the information he could give me about “who did what, in what year etc” so know how much my Evan is into sports, he got Evan a Nerf Set of balls (the one with a basketball, a football and a basketball) and got Carter a book on sports.  I also got a very generous gift card, but it was more thoughtful that the parents though of my kids too.

Now that I have given you a few things that are wonderful to receive as gifts, a few items that we tend to get A LOT of:

1. Coffee mugs. I don’t know really why parents think we drink a lot of coffee or something – LOL but I got on average 5 coffee mugs a year. I do love my coffee, but unfortunately I don’t have room for 35 extra mugs in my kitchen. Instead, buy them a nice bag of coffee (i.e. Starbucks, Caribou etc)
2. Candles. I love Yankee Candles but I don’t use up that many during the year. A possible alternative is the Bath and Body Works Wall Flowers and a set of refills.
3. Lotions. I got a lot of lotions. And this one is border line because I love to small pretty but I actually have an allergy to many of the scented lotions, so many times I had to re-gift those. If you want to get lotion, get them a gift card instead to some place like Bath and Body so that they can pick out something that they will get to use. But one thing that I never got tired of was getting hand lotions, because teachers are always washing their hands and my hands will crack during the winter months. So the mini hand lotions were perfect for putting on my desk and using at school.

Hopefully those suggestions help!

So this week, what I want to hear from y’all is two-fold. Any books that you have read (on activities to do with toddlers) that are good recommendations? What special, creative gifts have you given teachers?

If you have questions or concerns, not related to this post that you would like to bounce off me, you can leave a comment here or contact me.

For a complete list of “Ask the Teacher” posts, click HERE

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