Alphabet Intervention that Works

Tiffany Brosig — Sat, 17 Sep 2016 16:41:00 +0000

The beginning of the school year is upon us. For kindergarten teachers, that means back to basics. We all know that many kinders come in knowing zero letters, while others come in reading up a storm. Did you know that according to Richard Allington, students who enter kindergarten knowing fewer than 40 letters (upper and lower combined) are already a year below grade level? Crazy isn’t it? Below grade level before even starting school! Not only that–Allington also asserts that ALL kindergarten students, regardless of socioeconomic status or literacy in the home, should know all of their letters by Halloween. Sound impossible? Read on.

In my classroom, I do not spend whole group instructional time on the alphabet. We are always reviewing and talking about letters through modeling, sharing the pen, etc., but explicit alphabet instruction is something I save for small group, and only for the students who need it. Most students quickly pick up on the letters as they are given a multitude of opportunities to use them.

For the students who enter school knowing fewer than 40 letters (they are assessed by an aide on the first day of school), here is what we do:

Trace the Alphabet Every Day.

That’s it. No, I don’t mean give them a handwriting page with dot letters to trace. What I’m talking about is one-on-one finger tracing of an alphabet book (or alphabet cards) while saying the letters and pictures.

A tutor (parent volunteer/older student) sits next to the student–this must be done one-on-one, so it frees up your time to have another person do this. The student (not the tutor) traces the capital and lowercase letter while saying the name of the letter. Then, they point to the picture and say what it is.

“A, A, apple.”

“B, B, ball.”

C,C, cat.”

It’s that simple. Every day, A-Z.

I PROMISE you, this works. I was a skeptic. But I have a ton of respect for Jan Richardson, and this idea comes straight from her book, The Next Steps in Guided Reading which I’ve blogged about before.

But my first year of trying this, IT DID NOT WORK. Why? Because I did not make sure that it was done with fidelity. Every. single. day. But when I finally made the commitment to make sure this was done with all students who knew fewer than 40 letters, THEY ALL KNEW THEIR LETTERS BY October. Even my ELL students. Even students who entered kindergarten knowing ZERO LETTERS. HEED MY CAPITALIZED MESSAGE.

The best part is, you don’t need anything new or fancy. Do you have an alphabet strip/chart that you already use? Use that! With a little cut/pasting action, you can turn it into a book.

It’s best to be consistent so that the students are seeing the same pictures (although admittedly mine aren’t and it still works great). Here is a little alphabet book that you can use if you don’t have anything already handy! Just click on the image below!

Do you already use the tracing book with your students? Tell us about your results!

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Why I Love “The Jan Plan”

Tiffany Brosig — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 07:42:00 +0000

Guided reading used to be a struggle for me. I understood the concepts, read the books on the subject, and implemented guided reading in my classroom, but I just felt like something was missing.

It kind of looked like this:
“I’m done with the book, Mrs. Brosig!”
“OK…um…just read it again! for the 99th time…”

Or:
“Let’s talk about this eight-sentence book for ‘comprehension’ purposes for a while…like a LONG while!”

Or:
“Hey! I found these worksheets on Reading A-Z so they must be great!” (not knocking Reading A-Z…I totally love that resource).

You see, what was missing from my guided reading lessons before was consistency… We might do a sort or some word work one day, others we’d just fill in a graphic organizer related to the story (at level A, not the best use of our time!), but the kids never really knew what to expect. Honestly, I disliked guided reading very much.

Enter Jan Richardson. The book that finally made it all click. I’ve been using The Next Steps in Guided Reading for three years now and I haven’t strayed, because I find that it works for me better than any other system. I can honestly say that guided reading now runs like a well-oiled machine, and it is one of my favorite components of the day! So I thought I would post what guided reading lessons look like in my classroom, based on her plan. Today, I will be sharing a Pre-A lesson. Pre-A students are those who know fewer than 40 letters (counting both capital and lowercase). They need experience with print concepts suck as tracking print and identifying a letter vs. a word.

Full disclosure: The students who modeled this lesson for me are above a pre-a level. They were kind enough to roll with me before reading their own books for the day.

Part One: Working with Letters and Names (3-4 minutes)

When pre-a students come to my table, the very first thing they do is get their ABC charts and a baggie that holds all of the letter they know. They match the letters to the chart until time runs out (it goes quick!)

They may also sort the letters by color, match capital and lowercase letters, name a word that begins with letters in their baggies, or find a target letter on their chart (i.e. “find the letter that you hear at the beginning of car.” At the very beginning of the year, we also do name puzzles until the students can write and identify the letters in their names.

We also spend a minute working on letter formation. The sheet protectors are great for that. They just write their letters down in the empty space on the chart.

Part Two: Working with Sounds (2-3 minutes)

At the pre-A level, we work on the phonological awareness skills of syllables, rhymes, and beginning sounds. We usually do a quick picture sort as a group.

Part Three: Working With Books (5 minutes)

The focus is here is oral language, print concepts, and book handling skills. We CHORAL read a simple level A book together. As we read, the students are encouraged to describe what is happening in the pictures. After reading, I ask the students to look for one word, the first word in a sentence, the last word in a sentence, the first letter of a word, a space, etc.

Part Four: Interactive Writing (5 minutes)

We share the pen, writing a sentence that follows the pattern of the story. I have the students write the dominant consonant sounds that they can hear. We then cut up the sentence and put it back together. One student gets to take the cut-up sentence home.

And that, my friends, is the Pre-A procedure of “The Jan Plan.” I highly recommend you read The Next Step in Guided Reading if you haven’t. There is a ton of great information that helps your understanding of how to move the students through the skills and strategies of learning to read. I’ll be back soon to post photos of an emergent guided reading lesson!

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Alphabet Recognition Archives - KTeacherTiff

Alphabet Intervention that Works

Why I Love “The Jan Plan”