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BUILDING BLOCKS FOR LITERACY®
Developed by the Stern Center for Language and Learning
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR LITERACY®Developed in 1997 at the Stern Center for Language and Learning
✤ A professional development program that works with any curriculum and that teaches early care educators and parents how to foster early literacy skills in children.
✤ A program that promotes early literacy skills for children in child care and preschool environments.
✤ Key elements are:
✓ Early literacy research and language development
✓ Shared book reading emphasizing vocabulary
✓ Phonological (sound) awareness
✓ Speech-to-print connection including alphabet knowledge
✓ Executive functioning
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR LITERACY®Why it Works
✤ A research-based, research-proven* body of knowledge and best practice, which works with any curriculum, for adults working with pre-school age children;
✤ Applies the most current brain science about how children’s brains acquire, adapt, and learn language as a precursor to learning to read;
✤ Provides early care providers and parents with the science, knowledge, and practice to ensure that all children enter kindergarten ready to learn to read.
* Evidence-based research is research that has been proven and demonstrated to work with students through specific, evidentiary findings.
Research-Proven: Year 3 Pre-Literacy Skills Screening Test (PLSS) Pre/Post Test Results: Average % Correct
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Control (n=13) Experimental (n=88)Pre-Test Post-Test Pre-Test Post-Test
54%46%
32%34%
The Experimental group made significantly greater early literacy gains than the Control group (p< .05)
(Podhajski & Nathan, ECEJ, 2005)
Research-Proven: Year 3 Pre-Literacy Skills Screening Test (PLSS) Pre/Post Test Results: Average % Correct for Children Starting At-Risk
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Control Children (p=1.0) Not Significant Experimental Children (p=<.001) SignificantPre-Test Post-Test Pre-Test Post-Test
56%
38%
21%
31%
Of the children who started at risk (the lowest 20th percentile) a statistically significant proportion of experimental children rose to average or better. This was not the case for the Control children.
(Podhajski & Nathan, ECEJ, 2005)
Research-Proven: Year 14 6 Hour Intervention Screening Test: Get Ready to Read! — Revised
30%
20%
14%
42%
Pre-Intervention Post-Intervention
Control (n=13)
Experimental(n=60)
30% of the control group started below average
20% of experimental group started below average
Only 14% rose to average *a non-significant change (p=.356)
42% rose to average or above*a statistically significant improvement (p<.05)
Research-Proven: Idaho Data 2008-2010 Screening Test: Get Ready to Read! Children Who Started the Year At-Risk and Finished Strong
Year
1 G
roup
Year
2 G
roup
0% 13% 27% 40% 53% 67% 80%
80%
67%
18%
20%
Control Children Experimental Children
“Poverty’s Most Insidious Damage Is to a Child’s Brain”
✤ An alarming 22% of U.S. children live in poverty.
✤ Recent research* proves that poverty can have long-lasting negative consequences on brain development, emotional health and academic achievement.
✤ “In developmental science and medicine, it is not often that the cause and solution of a public health problem become so clearly elucidated. It is even less common that feasible and cost-effective solutions to such problems are discovered and within reach.” …Based on this new research and what already is known about the damaging effects of poverty on brain development in children, as well as the benefits of nurturing during early childhood, “We have a rare roadmap to preserving and supporting our society’s most important legacy, the developing brain.” —Joan Luby, MD
*Statements taken from Luby J. Poverty’s most insidious damage: The developing brain, published online by JAMA Pediatrics 7.20.15. Original investigation: Effects of Poverty on Childhood Brain Development, published online by JAMA Pediatrics 10/28/13. Washington University, St. Louis: Joan Luby, MD; Andy Belden, PhD; Kelly Botteron, MD; Natasha Marrus, MD, PhD; Michael P. Harms, PhD; Casey Babb, BA; Tomoyuki Nishino, MS; Deanna Barch, PhD.
“The brain’s cerebral cortex is often larger in children from richer families and from families whose parents
have more education.” – Michael Balter
Total Words (in Millions) Heard by Child by Age 4
0
12.5
25
37.5
50
Professional Wage Earners Poverty
Source: Meaningful Differences, by Hart and Risley 1995
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR LITERACY® Activity Guide for Promoting Early Reading Success
The following 6 pages offer samples of activities from the program.
SHARED BOOK READING Besides being a great way to connect with your child, reading and talking about books are keys to helping your children develop language, build comprehension and learn more about print.
What Do We Read with a Preschooler?
EVERYTHING! Magazines, the comics, signs, notes, recipes, web pages, and books, books, books. Let children choose whatever books they want at the library, but check out some that you will enjoy too. Your enthusiasm will be contagious. Parents modeling reading is powerful stuff.
Where Should We Read?
ANYWHERE! Position baskets and boxes of books around the house so you can reach for a book when opportunity knocks—the laundry room, the porch, under the dining room table, next to the toy box, and of course the most popular reading room, the bathroom!
When Should We Read?
ANYTIME! In addition to quiet times like bedtime, pack a tote bag and try reading as you wait at the supermarket check-out counter or the bus stop. Have a wiggly child who doesn’t seem to sit still through a whole book? Look for times when you have a captive audience; when they are eating a snack or when they are sitting on the potty.
PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS…understanding that words are made up of smaller parts
✤ SYLLABLES Being aware of syllables helps us learn new vocabulary, sound out words, and spell.
✤ PHONEMES (sounds) The ability to think about individual sounds in words is one of the strongest indicators of future reading success.
✤ RHYMING Knowing that words sound alike and making our own rhymes help us manipulate sounds and learn new words to read and spell.
Fun with Syllables
Guess My WordHave children practice
putting word parts together. Tell them you are going to the “li...brar...y.”
You Tap My Back, I’ll Tap YoursTell children that you are going to tap out the name of someone in the family on their backs. See if they
can guess whose name it is.
Clap It OutHave children clap out the beats in their names (three claps for Sam-an-tha, two for Pe-ter). Or jump,
karate chop, rubber stamp, or layout objects (like rocks or raisins)
for each beat in a word. Whose name is the longest? The shortest?
Talk Like a RobotTalk... ing... in... a...
mon... o... tone...helps... kids... fo... cus... on...
syl... la...bles.
Sing!Music makes us more aware of
syllables:“Hick...or...y Dick...or...y
Dock.”
Fun with Phonemes
Look for Books and Songs with AlliterationSaying sentences such as “Sammy snake slithered south” is super for separating single sounds.
What if the Whole World Started with My Sound?“My name, Daddy, starts with the /d/ sound. What if everything started with that sound? Your name would be Doseph! We would be sitting in the ditchen...” Get the didea?
(Don’t) Finish What You StartHaving soup for lunch? Tell children, “Today we’re having /s/...” If they can’t figure it out, keep adding one more sound until they get it –/s/.../oo/.../p/.
Fun with Rhyming
“I Spy” with a Twist
Play “I Spy” with children by giving a rhyme as a hint: “I spy something that
rhymes with _____.”
NicknamesMake up silly terms of
endearment for each other! “Daddy-addy-badaddy,” “Tessie Tutu. I love you-too!” “Michael, Michael Motorcycle” and “Miss
Molly, by Golly.”
Read lots of Rhyming Books!
Songs, poems, and stories that rhyme are easy to memorize and help train
little ears in rhythm and rhyme. Don’t forget the classics! Nursery
rhymes, playground chants, lullabies and Dr. Seuss books endure because they are so effective. Plus, they link
us to our past and to each other.
Sing!Most lyrics rhyme. Find songs you and your child love. Make up your own.
SPEECH TO PRINT CONNECTION We are motivated to read and write because we know that print contains a message. We also know that anything we say can be put into print.
If You Can Say It, You Can Write It!Have children dictate to you a thank-you note, email, story, or reminder. Write down exactly what they say, not making any corrections for grammar or pronunciation. Read it back to them, pointing to each word as you go.
Say What?Look for books with thought bubbles (like Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Mo Willems). Cut your own thought bubbles out of white paper and add them to magazine pictures and family photos. Don’t limit it to people. Trucks, machines, animals, and things in nature “say” sounds too. Figure out the spelling together and get ready to giggle.
Stick To It!Sticky notes make labeling objects around the house quick and easy. You can even label your own bodies!
Alphabet KnowledgeBuild your children’s understanding of the ABC’s not just by saying and singing them. Use refrigerator magnet letters to match (L to L), recognize (“Find the M”), and name them (“What’s this one?”).
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR LITERACY® is was developed by the Stern Center for Language and Learning, Burlington, VT
Let’s Get Going!We know how to teach every child to read. It is time to do it.
Key Contact
Stern Center for Language and LearningBlanche Podhajski, Ph.D., President183 Talcott RoadWilliston, VT [email protected]
Date modified: January 6, 2016
