Early Years’ Homework
The Early Years students will be expected to complete homework each school day. We will not be sending home a weekly homework packet. Each child is at a different stage of development so we would like them to work each day for about 15 minutes on an activity that will help them progress to the next stage of reading, writing, or math development. We are providing you with a list of stages to help your child progress academically along with some examples of activities to teach the skill. Once they have mastered a skill, you can begin working on the next one. The activities your child completes at home should be recorded in the homework composition book and turned in on Fridays.
Skills / Suggested Activities/ExamplesReading
Phonemic Awareness- Phonemic awareness is the ability to notice, think about, and work with the individual sounds in words.
1. Rhyming Word Activities - Children identify words that rhyme in a series of activities. / Rhyming Word Activities
· "Put your thumbs up if these two words rhyme--pail-tail or cow-pig?" or "Finish this rhyme, red, bed, blue,__(two)______."
· Rhyming words in songs, poems, and books. As you do shared reading with your child, pause at the end of phrases and have your child supply the rhyming words.
2. Syllable Segmentation - Children participate in a series of activities that help them realize that words are made up of syllables. / Syllable Segmentation
· "Can you count the syllables or the word parts in football?" (2)
· Have children clap for each syllable you say.
· Begin with two or three syllable words and build up to longer words with more syllables:
airplane / air / plane / 2
table / ta / ble / 2
porcupine / por / cu / pine / 3
3. Sound Isolation - Children identify the beginning, middle, and ending sounds in words. / Sound Isolation
· "What is the beginning sound in nose?" "What is the ending sound in pig? "What is the sound you hear in the middle of cat?"
4. Blending- Say the sounds of a word and have your child blend the sounds to guess the word. / Blending
· "I Say It Slowly, You Say It Fast" Game. Explain that you will say the sounds in a word slowly. Child says it fast.
Example: Parent says "/c/-/a/-/t/” slowly, child says "cat.".
· Play “Guess My Mystery Word” game. Parent slowly says sounds to a mystery word and the child has to blend the sounds to guess the word.
5. Segmentation – Tell your child a word and have them separate the sounds they hear. For example you say bat and your child should say “/b/ /a/ /t/”. / Segmentation
· Rubber Band Stretch
1. Parent models with a large rubber band (or a pretend rubber band) how to stretch out a word as the word is said. /mmmmmmmm-/aaaaaaaaaaaa-/nnnnnnnnn/
2. Parent models with stretched out band how to bring rubber band back to original length and says the word fast: /man/.
3. Children pretend to stretch rubber bands as they say the sounds in different words.
· Have the child play the role of the parent in “Guess My Mystery Word” game. This time the child slowly says sounds to a mystery word and the parent has to guess.
Letter sounds – The students should know what sound each letter makes. / · Use the phonics song to help teach your child the letter sound.
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Letter names - The students should know the name of each letter. / · You can create flash cards with the letters to help your child learn the letter names.
· Create two sets of alphabet letters and play “Go Fish”.
· While reading books, point to a letter and ask your child to say the letter name.
CVC words – The students should be able to read CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words such as dog, cat, beg. / · With the alphabet flash cards, make a CVC word. Then switch the beginning, middle or ending sound to create a new word. For example, start with mat, then switch the m to b to spell bat.
· While reading to your child, stop at the CVC words and have them sound out the word.
High Frequency Words – Kindergartners should know 30 High Frequency Words and the First graders should know 100 High Frequency Words. / A list of the words and creative ways to practice words is attached to the packet.
Digraphs- The students readwords with digraphs: sh, ch, th, ng, wh. (Fish, chin, that, song, when). / · Go on a “digraph search” in magazines or books. Have them find the digraph, read the word and then record it in their homework book.
Consonant Blends -The students read words with consonant blends such as flip, trip, crab. / · Go on a “consonant blend search” in magazines or books. Have them find the digraph, read the word and then record it in their homework book.
Along with focusing on strategies to develop phonics skills, we encourage students to read or be read to each night.
Writing
1. Have your child draw a picture.
2. Draw a picture and write beginning sound. For example, if your child drew a cat they should try writing a “c”.
3. Draw a picture and write beginning and ending sound. For example, if your child drew a cat they should try writing a “ct”.
4. Draw a picture and write beginning, middle, and ending sound. For example, if your child drew a cat they should try writing a “cat”.
5. Draw a picture and write a sentence. Try to incorporate High Frequency Words, spaces, capital letters and ending punctuation. For example, if your child drew a cat they should try writing “I see a cat”.
6. Write multiple sentences using descriptive words, High Frequency Words, spaces, capital letters and ending punctuation, “I see a cat. The cat is orange and white. My cat likes to run.”
Math
By the end of the year the students should be able to:
1. Count from 1-30 (K) or 1-100(1st)
2. Recognize numbers 1-30 (K) or 1-100 (1st)
3. Write numbers 1-30 (K) or 1-100 (1st)
4. Numeral Dictation- Write numbers out of order when dictated
5. Use concrete objects to determine the answers to addition and subtraction problems (for two numbers that are each less than 10). (K)
6. Know the addition facts (sums to 20) and the corresponding subtraction facts and commit them to memory. (1st)
Here are some suggestions that can be adapted to teach math at home:
· Look around your home for numbers of things. Find a number between 10 and 100. Write the number. Draw a picture that shows where you found it, or explain it in words.
· Create three different patterns. Extension: Describe the pattern (red blue red blue =ABAB, red blue green red blue green = ABCABC)
· Gather a small handful of pebbles, beans, rice grains, or any other small common objects. Sort them and compare quantities. Then, gather a few of each pile and put them together. How many do you have in your new pile? Do this 5 times.
· Go on a hunt. Find three things that are longer than your foot. Find three things that are shorter than your foot. Use the attached sheet to record what you found.
· Find a few small objects around the house. On a blank piece of paper, draw the objects and label how many you counted. Extension: Make two piles with your objects. Count how many are in each pile and compare them using <, greater than >, less than <, or equal to =. / · Print a worksheet from the website: www.math-drills.com. You can practice addition or subtraction.
· Count the letters in the names of people at home. Talk about whose name has the least or most letters.
Extension: First grade students might include first and last names, street names, city/country names, etc.
· Take a handful of coins.
Sort them into groups based on their size.
Extension: Draw a picture and write how many coins are in each group. First grade write a complete sentence.
· Write 2 numbers between 1 and 50. Circle the number that is less than. Repeat this 10 times using two different numbers each time.
· Write four addition number stories. Draw pictures and/or write the number sentence to solve your number stories.
· Ex: There are 10 birds in the tree. Five came. How many birds are in the tree?
10 + 5 = 15
Phonemic awareness activities are from: http://teams.lacoe.edu/